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He’s the bulkiest of us, built by the sort of work none of the rest of us wanted to do. Manual labor. When he decides you’re going somewhere, he has a certain way of making you do it. We grew up side by side, the two eldest of five, and he has always been the only one strong enough to keep me in check.

That doesn’t mean I won’t take him down if I have to.

“It’s about the next Sovereign,” he says.

I let out a dry laugh. “Dad isn’t dead yet.”

“Jesus Christ, Edwin.” His jaw tightens. “You’re a Crotavere. You’re part of this whether you want to be or not. Now let’s go.”

He shoves me back into the elevator and we descend to the club level. I narrow my eyes at him. If anyone else laid hands on me that way, he’d be bleeding already.

“No one answers their phone in this family,” Reese mutters as his heavy steps exit into the hallway. “So we’re doing this the old-fashioned way.”

When we enter Ophidia, it spills over us in heat and sound. Music throbs through my bones. Bodies sway under green and gold light, oblivious to the fact that death has passed through these halls tonight. Most of them have no idea what happens in this building beyond the club.

Or beneath it.

Tristan is exactly where I expect him to be—at the bar, drink in hand, scribbling onto a cocktail napkin with frantic focus. Lyrics, no doubt. Another attempt to drag beauty out of the wreckage we live in and bleed art before the wound closes. At least he has something that resembles a future.

The girl hovering over his shoulder should be the love of his life. Everyone is waiting for his wedding as if matrimony might save the Crotavere line from extinction. Grandpa Wallace is certainly banking on it. He’d like an heir from somewhere, since the rest of us have failed to produce one.

Reese leans down with a heavy hand on Tristan’s shoulder and says whatever he needs to say.

Tristan downs the last of his drink and rises without complaint, offering barely a nod to his girl. Duty clings to him tighter than anyone else. A life tied to the Order in ways we don’t envy.

Then it’s back to the playrooms. A quick check of the records shows our baby brother, Lucian, is in the Black Room, his favorite den of self-destruction. His coping method is uninspired: rough sex, a new girl every night, a thirst he tries to drown in someone else’s sweat.

I swipe the master key card and push the door open.

Lucian is behind a girl cuffed to a St. Andrew’s cross, driving into her with no concern at all that his brothers have arrived to witness his latest bad decision.

His pasty white ass stands out against the black walls. It’s one of the few parts of his body not yet covered in tattoos. I roll my eyes as he continues on, knowing he’s making us stare at it.

“Time to go,” Reese says.

Lucian thrusts on, though his vigor is fading.

“Fuck off.”

Reese grabs him by the shoulder and yanks him away. Tristan throws Lucian’s pants at his chest.

“What the hell do you want?” Lucian snaps.

“Meeting upstairs,” Reese says. “Get dressed.”

Lucian glares, but he understands the hierarchy. A summons upstairs outranks everything. Even getting your dick wet.

We leave the girl bound to the cross, her voice rising in curses as we exit. The turnover crew will find her.

“Where’s Marcus?” Reese asks.

Lucian buttons his black jeans. “How the hell should I know?”

I pull out my phone to check the cameras, but before the screen lights up, Marcus appears at the far end of the hall. He stuffs some little secret into his trench coat and drags a hand through his faded teal hair. Out of breath. Up to something idiotic, surely.

When he spots us, he freezes and grins like a lunatic.

“Brothers!”