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“Also, Julian might not even know we had a plan in the first place,” Ash points out, chewing on a piece of bacon.
“He saw us trying to escape,” I tell him. “He accused me of orchestrating the attack, but I denied it.”
“Did he believe you?” Gage asks, his eyes narrowing.
My skin prickles as if spiders are crawling over my body, but I force myself to replay that last confrontation with Julian in my head. He was furious with me for trying to get my sister out while the cartel members were shooting up the church, but I do think he believed me when I said we hadn’t planned on them showing up—because it was the truth.
“Yeah.” I nod slowly. “I think he did. The cartel attack was real, so as far as he knows, Hannah and I were just taking advantage of an unexpected opportunity.”
Just talking about Hannah and everything that happened makes bile rise in my throat, and for a second, everything goes hazy like I’m going to pass out again. But I force it back and make myself focus and stay standing. I have to be strong and deal with this. It’s not like I can just never talk about Hannah again, or think about what happened. If I’m going to make Julian pay for it, it’ll be at the forefront of my mind the whole time.
I drag in a deep breath and steady myself. I can be strong for Hannah.
“That’s good.” Ash nods, giving me an encouraging look. “If Julian doesn’t know that we planned to double-cross him even before the wedding, it will make all of this easier.”
“What do we know about the asshole?” Knox asks. “He owns that boxing gym. What else?”
“That’s his main legit business,” Gage says. “Like the club is for us. We can go after that and destroy it somehow, but most of his income is from illegal sources.”
“Do we have any idea what all he has his fingers in?” Priest wants to know.
“I’ve seen him go to a few places,” I say, speaking up. “When I was tailing him before.”
That seems like a long time ago now. Following Julian around Detroit, watching him take meetings and make deals and whatever else. Like life is split into befores and afters and everything before Hannah’s death might as well have happened to a different person.
“We can make some assumptions from the places, probably,” Gage says. “We’ll have to figure out what shit he’s got going on so we can figure out how to take it down.”
“Oh,” I say, grimacing as I remember something else. “He’s also fucking his damn sister. So we can use that against him too.”
Ash shudders, and the rest of them look visibly disgusted by that. Before he killed Hannah, that was pretty high on the list of the worst things about Julian fucking Maduro, but now it’s just a drop in the bucket. Just one more thing to use to ruin him.
Gage nods. “We’ll use that when the time comes. I think we have enough to get started, at least. We can look into the gym more, find out how it operates and who goes there. River, make a list of everywhere you saw Julian go and anyone you saw him with. We can check it against what we know about the city and maybe it’ll give us some leads. In the meantime, we can find out what else he has going on. If he has too many irons in the fire, there might be some loose ends we can tug on. See what comes unraveled in the process.”
He sounds confident, and all the others are nodding along. It’s a good plan, and we have something to go on to get started, at least.
Gage’s voice is strong and deep and soothing, but as he’s talking, I can’t fight the exhaustion that’s been pulling at me since the shower. Things start to go blurry around the edges, and the sound of his voice starts to get farther away, as if he’s talking through a tunnel instead of right at the kitchen table.
My body feels heavy, like I could drop right then and there in the kitchen, and I reach out to steady myself against the counter, leaning on it for support.
I’m too tired to fight it, and trying to shove it back doesn’t help. My force of will can’t keep the exhaustion at bay.
All of the guys notice, of course. Gage stops talking and pins me with a look, and Priest and Ash are out of their chairs before anyone has time to say anything.
Ash grabs my arm, offering additional support, and Priest scans my face again. I know he’s going to see how worn out I am, and he’s going to make me go to bed.
He looks me over and then looks back to Gage without a word. But clearly they don’t need to talk.
“That’s enough for now,” Gage says firmly.
I open my mouth, not even planning to argue, but before I can get a word out, Knox folds his arms and gives me his own stern look.
“Don’t make me throw you over my shoulder and carry you upstairs,” he says. “Because I will. And you know I’ll enjoy the fuck out of it.”
“He will,” Ash agrees, shrugging one shoulder. “Sorry, killer. He’s just a big caveman at heart. And none of us will stop him.”
Priest looks back to me, and he doesn’t say anything. But he doesn’t have to. I know if I try to tell them I’m fine and don’t need to rest, they’ll make good on letting Knox cart me off.
I can see the possessiveness and protectiveness in all of their faces, the worry that makes them want to take care of me—even if that means forcing me to take care of myself. There’s nothing I can do to convince them it’s not needed, and honestly, I’m too tired to even try.
