Cas and I break from the main corridor, cutting through the back of the rink toward the exit near the parking lot. My men are already in position, I made sure of that before the game even started. Everything has been mapped, every angle covered, every variable accounted for. I was my father's greatest weapon. The difference is I aim better than he did.
The cold air hits me the second we step outside. My breath mists in front of me. The parking lot is alive with noise, parents and students flooding out of the main entrance on the other side of the building, and I feel the familiar pull, that other thing, the thing that clouds my thinking when I don't want it to.
Her.
I shove it down. Hard.
She doesn't get to distract me tonight. Whatever she's doing, wherever she's gone after the game, it's not my fucking problem. She made her choices and I've made mine, and right now my choice is standing in a parking garage two blocks from here with nowhere left to run.
My phone vibrates. I glance at the screen.
Andrade - They're inside. Both of them.
I feel it then, that slow, boiling heat that rises up through my chest every time I'm close to something I've been starving for. I slide the phone back into my pocket and roll my neck.
“Let's go.”
The parking garage smells like concrete and petrol and the particular staleness of a place that never gets enough light. My footsteps are quiet. I've always moved quietly, Lorenzo made sure of that, one of the few useful things the bastard ever gave me.
Four of my men are already inside when Cas and I arrive. They've handled the exits, killed the cameras, and cleared the level. In the middle of the second floor, bathed in the harsh, flickering glow of a single working light, are two men.
Senator Steven Kellar. And Federal Agent Meekan Di-Leo.
I stop walking when I'm fifteen feet from them and take a moment to just look.
Steven Kellar looks older than his press photos suggest, the kind of man who has had other people doing his dirty work for so long he's started to believe his own hands are clean. He's dressed in a suit that costs more than most men in Stormsend make in a month, and he's standing with his spine rigid and his chin lifted like a man who has never truly been afraid in his life.
That's going to change in the next few minutes.
Meekan is a different creature entirely. I've been watching him operate for months, the smug fuck with his badge and his warrants and his self-righteous crusade against me. He showed up at Lorenzo's house with a search warrant and tore the placeapart, but when he walked into my sister's room, I felt something shift inside me that I haven't been able to put back since. He stands a half-step behind Kellar now, shoulders tense, eyes moving. He knows this is bad. His instincts are better than the senator's, I'll give him that.
Too bad his instincts aren't good enough.
“Xaden Devlin.” Steven's voice is smooth and measured, the voice of a man who has given a hundred speeches and shaken a thousand hands. “I have to say, I'm disappointed. I expected you to be more subtle.”
I let the silence breathe for a moment before I answer. “Subtlety is for people who need to hide what they are.” I take a slow step forward. “I don't.”
His jaw tightens. “You're making a mistake?—”
“No,” I cut him off, and there is nothing warm in my voice, nothing human. “You made a mistake. A long time ago, when you decided that my sister was an acceptable casualty. When you partnered with my father and helped him consolidate power that was never his to hold. When you sent men into my house.” I pause, letting each word land. “When your dog,” I flick my gaze to Meekan, “put his hands on everything Emery left behind."
Meekan's expression doesn't change but I see it, the flicker behind his eyes. Fear dressed up as defiance.
“I don't know what you think you know, son?—”
“Don't.” My voice drops and the temperature in the garage seems to drop with it. Something shifts in the air. My men go still. Even Cas doesn't move. “Don't call me son. Don't talk to me like I'm one of your constituents or one of your foot soldiers. I'm not Masen. I don't need your approval. I don't want your speeches.” I stop walking when there are only a few feet between us. Up close, he's less impressive. Up close, he's just a man with soft hands and hard enemies. “I want answers. And then I want you to understand exactly what is going to happen next.”
Kellar's composure is cracking at the edges. He glances at Meekan like he's expecting backup and finding none. Meekan is standing very still now, hands visible, watching me with the eyes of a man calculating odds and not liking the numbers.
“There's nothing to answer for?—”
I move.
It's fast and it's deliberate, nothing like rage. Rage is messy, rage makes mistakes. This is something colder. I have his jacket in my fist before he can finish the sentence. I twist the fabric and drag him forward until there is nothing between his face and mine.
“The crash,” I say quietly. “Let's start there.”
His breath is sharp. His eyes go wide. I have him and he knows it.
