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“Call us guilty on all charges then.” I chuckle, throwing an arm over the booth’s backrest. “So, what’s the big deal? We’ve got every law enforcement agency and courtroom on the East Coast under our thumb.”
“You’re not understanding, Don. New York law already dictates that permanent citizens can be deported if they are convicted of a crime. That’s a given. The big deal is in the word suspected. If you are suspected of being a criminal, then you can be kicked out of the country long before they haul your ass in front of a judge or jury on our payroll,” Poppy says. She glances at Lorcan, who’s staring somewhere above my head, jaw set in stone. “It’s his way of nipping organized crime in the bud without any of the legal legwork.”
The penny finally fucking drops. “Motherfucker,” I muse, dragging a knuckle over my jaw. “He’s a clever son of a bitch.”
Poppy nods. “Our lawyers have spent the morning looking over his proposed legal draft. It’s ironclad and definitely designed with the sole purpose to kick the Quinns out of New York.” She side-eyes Lorcan again. He’s still refusing to look at me.
My eyes narrow. “Why do I get the feeling you’re not telling me something?”
Poppy shuffles in her seat and draws a deep breath. “Our lawyers also spent some time looking over technicalities in immigration law. I’m a US citizen by birthright.” She chews on her bottom lip. “And…Lorcan is married to me. We have two kids together.”
“Point being?”
Finally, Lorcan drags his eyes away from the fucking wallpaper and locks them on mine. They burn with anger. “It means Belsky’s bullshit laws wouldn’t touch me. There’s too much red tape around marriage and parental rights to deport me because of a suspicion. You, on the other hand…” He trails off, letting his unfinished sentence dangle over the table.
I finish it for him. “I’m single with no ties to the United States.”
Lorcan looks tired. “Exactly, and that bastard knows it. He doesn’t want to get me deported. He wants to dismantle my army by getting you deported.”
Silently, I soak it all in. Poppy pours another glass of wine and takes a large gulp. Lorcan twists his emerald ring around his beefy finger.
“Fuck,” I groan.
“What? What is it?” Poppy asks too quickly.
I can’t fucking believe I forgot about this. I was too caught up in hot hookers and crime scenes. I take a deep breath and turn to Lorcan. “In the drawing room yesterday, I had a feeling something was off about him. You called him nothing but a green politician, but I wasn’t so sure. My suspicions were confirmed when that server spilled coffee on him, and he rolled up his sleeves. I saw a tattoo.” Dragging my hand through my hair, I mutter a curse under my breath. “Fuck, man.”
“A tattoo of what?” Lorcan snarls, fists clenched again.
“O. M. ?. T.”
I’m only halfway through spelling out the letters when Lorcan thumps a fist on the table so hard that Poppy’s wineglass tumbles over and smashes. The blood-red liquid soaks the white tablecloth, snaking between the fine china. But Lorcan doesn’t take his eyes off me.
“What does it mean?” Poppy whispers, wide-eyed, a hand on her husband’s bicep.
“It means the bastard is Bratva.”
“The omut tattoo is used as a warning sign within the Russian mafia,” I explain to Poppy, ignoring Lorcan snarling next to her like a fucking bull. “It means you can never escape me.”
Her jaw drops.
“I left the drawing room to look at the security cameras. I managed to catch one of his men in the parking lot talking on the phone in Russian.”
Lorcan rubs his face, muttering something venomous under his tongue. Eventually, he turns back to me, eyes blazing. “You think he’s a Bratnov?”
“I doubt it. We obliterated those fuckers ten years ago and haven’t heard a peep from them since. Why would they wait a decade to climb out of the woodworks?” I stretch my arms across the width of the booth. “Nah. It’s New York City, baby. One of the most lucrative places in the world. It’s about time one of these other dudes tried to take it from us.”
Lorcan sneers at my deranged grin. He knows exactly what I’m thinking: Bring it on.
It’s Poppy who attempts to slice through the tension. “Okay, let’s not get ahead of ourselves. We’re forgetting one very important thing.” She wraps her arms around Lorcan, and his shoulders relax a fraction. Nothing the untrained eye would pick up. “Leo Belsky isn’t getting near the governor’s seat. We’re backing Danny English’s campaign, remember? And here’s a fun fact—nobody running for governor in the history of New York City has ever had so much funding behind them. English will win by a landslide. Belsky will be forced to retreat back to whatever dark, stinky hole he’s crawled out of, and everything will go back to normal.”
I watch Lorcan mull this over, working his jaw. Eventually, he says, “You’re right. He won’t win the election, but that doesn’t mean he’s not a threat. This”—he leans over the wine-stained table and picks up the file—“shows he’s not just a delusional brute throwing his weight around. He’s calculated, and losing out on the governor’s seat won’t make him go away.” He strokes his beard and adds, “There’s also no way he’s working solo, so we need to figure out where the fuck he’s come from and who’s behind him. This isn’t a kill-and-forget type issue.”
“Agreed. I’ll get my men on the case,” I say, rubbing my hands together, unable to hide my shit-eating grin. This is the shit I live for.
Just then, Lorcan’s cell buzzes in his pocket. He sighs, fishes it out, and presses it to his ear.
“Speak.”
