The room stills again. Short. Final.No one asks what I mean. Every man here knows. Peeling means pressure. Pain. Names dragged out of throats that don’t want to give them. Money followed through blood and fear until the men at the top realize the ground under them isn’t stable anymore.
Logan’s eyes lock on mine. “We do this together.”
“Yeah.”
“No solo moves.” I don’t answer fast enough. His stare hardens. “Cobra.”
“I heard you.”
“That wasn’t agreement.”
“No.”
Cain mutters, “For fuck’s sake.”
Logan comes around the desk slowly. Not aggressive. Not yet. But every inch president. “You want to be useful,” he says, voice low. “Then stay controlled. You lose your head, you become a liability. You understand me?”
I hold his stare. The alley flashes again. Olivia on the pavement. Bruise. Pain. Fear. The sound of her head hitting hard enough that Eli heard it. My hands flex once. Then still. “Yeah.”
Logan keeps watching me until he believes enough of it. “Dom,” he says without looking away from me. “Find us a thread.”
“I’m already pulling warehouse ownership around the route clusters,” Dom says. “Storage lots, freight companies, shell businesses. Anything repeating across cities.”
“Landon.”
“Following the money deeper,” Landon answers. “If the payouts are regular, someone is balancing books. There’ll be a ledger somewhere.”
“Cain, Shadow, Hammer,” Logan continues. “Build rotation. Prospects double up. Nobody moves alone. Women know enough to be careful without getting buried in details.”
Joker tilts his head. “And me?”
Logan looks at him. “You wait.”
Joker’s eyes brighten faintly. “Waiting’s not my strongest gift.”
“No shit,” Logan says. “Do it anyway.”
For the first time since the meeting started, a faint thread of humor almost enters the room.
Then Dom says, “There’s one more thing.”
The room tightens.
“What?” Logan asks.
Dom pulls a still image onto the screen. A grainy shot from a traffic camera. Dark van. Bad angle. Almost useless. But not completely.
“There was a second vehicle behind the van during the club attempt,” Dom says. “Not close enough to look connected if you weren’t checking frame by frame.”
Landon leans in. “Scout?”
“Maybe,” Dom says. “Or cleanup. Or buyer confirmation.”
The cold in my chest sharpens. “They watched,” I say.
Dom’s eyes lift to mine. “Yeah.” Logan swears softly. Dom continues. “They didn’t just try again. They watched her with you. They watched the prospects. They watched the environment and moved when the fight created separation.”
I step away from the wall. One step. The room tracks it. Every man in here feels the shift. “They adapted to me,” I say.
