Page 25 of Privilege

They’d hunt him down.

Like a dog.

That’s all he was to them, anyway.

Just a fucking dog.

Renzo kept his pace at a normal speed as he left his apartment building. He didn’t do any more or less glancing around than he normally would. There was no fucking need to draw unneeded attention to himself because he was acting strange.

Somehow, he made it to the corner store without any trouble. As he expected, his guys were waiting, and they looked like they weren’t pleased about it.

Renzo jerked his head to the side, and without needing to be told, Perry, Noah, and Diesel slipped into a connected alleyway. He wasted no time pulling out the packages from his bag, unwrapping the plastic wrap around the bricks of drugs, and handing each person their take for the week. They’d go home, weigh and package everything, and get to work. In a week, they’d all meet up again to hand over money and get their take of the cash, too.

There was a bit of trust involved in all of this. He had to keep up with the street price of everything. That way, when the guys came back with empty bags but hands full of money, he knew whether or not they were stealing from him.

So far, none of them dared to.

A while back, he had four guys. The other three got to learn really up close and personal what happened when someone stole from Renzo. It hadn’t been pretty, but really, it couldn’t be.

He needed that lesson to stick.

“Thanks, Ren,” Noah muttered, shoving his take into his own bag.

The other two echoed the same thing.

Then, Perry said, “Hey, guess what we heard?”

“I imagine a lot of things,” Renzo replied. “And probably nothing that I’m very interested in hearing.”

Diesel laughed. “Right, I bet. Anyway, we heard you got dropped off last night with Diego. Quite a fucking car, we were told. A Mercedes, right? Who are you messing with that they’re driving you home in a Mercedes?”

Fuck.

Not the kind of attention he needed. It would not do him any favors for these guys to think he was reaching higher than they could. He didn’t need to be seen as out of their league in any regard. It would make discontent, and he couldn’t fucking trust or control any of them when they thought he was hiding shit like money.

Renzo glanced up, and gave the three a look they would recognize as him reaching the end of his very thin and frayed rope. “Get to fucking work, and stop listening to the nonsense you hear on the streets.”

FIVE

“Just make a choice, Lucian,” Jordyn said. “It shouldn’t be this hard.”

“Well, it is, bella.”

Lucia was drawn from her mind at her parents’ voices filtering through her thoughts. In the back seat of the Rolls-Royce, she watched familiar streets pass them by from the safety of the vehicle. It was the smell of new leather that she liked the most in a car. Considering the Rolls had been a gift to her mother for their last anniversary from her father, the car still had that smell. Usually, it would comfort Lucia, but right then, it wasn’t doing that at all.

“You liked the one in the Maldives,” Jordyn pointed out.

Her father grunted under his breath. “Chicago has business down there, though.”

“Holy fu—”

“On our way to church, Jordyn. Try not to swear.”

Lucia glanced at her mother who was currently sitting in the passenger seat—despite it being her car, she liked being driven around more than she drove—who gave Lucian a look that would burn a lesser man.

“Get over the Chicago thing,” Jordyn muttered. “That’s all I am saying.”

“I am over the Chicago thing. I let Liliana get married to that Rossi kid, didn’t I?”