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A low rumble comes from deep within Lorcan’s chest. “Motherfucker,” he snarls. He watches me for a beat, then adds, “Easy, tiger.”
Only when he says that do I realize my grin is now splitting my face in half. I can feel it in my cheeks. Feel the adrenaline trickling through my veins like a virus.
You see, killing has become my routine. As boring and as mundane as a normal civilian finds brushing their teeth or going grocery shopping. A part of my everyday identity. Anything that makes bloodshed a little more interesting is always welcome.
“I’m easy,” I muse, rubbing a finger over my bottom lip. “Easy like a Sunday morning.”
On cue, there’s a polite knock on the door. Lorcan rises to his feet, straightens his cuff links, and barks, “Enter.”
I stay seated, still staring at the flames licking the inside of the marble fireplace.
The hotel manager pops his balding head around the door. “Your guest has arrived, sir.”
“Send him in.”
Lorcan and I lock eyes for a beat. His Adam’s apple bobs in his throat. He twists the emerald ring around his finger. A reminder of who the fuck he is.
I don’t see Belsky until he steps between the armchairs and offers Lorcan his hand. “Thank you for meeting with me, Mr. Quinn,” he says, then he jerks his thumb over his shoulder. “I hope you don’t mind. I brought a few friends.”
Lorcan pins him with a blistering stare. The type that could bring the Devil himself to his knees. “That’s quite all right,” he says, tilting his head in my direction, but his hard eyes never leave Belsky. “I brought a friend of my own.”
Belsky hadn’t realized I was there. I can tell by the way his eyes dart down to me and how his body recoils in response.
“Donnacha Quinn.”
Click-click.
I’d recognize that sound in my sleep. The safety catches of four Remington R51’s being released over my head. Slowly, I twist around and peer up at the suits lurking by the door. Hard-faced men glare at me over their weapons. A chuckle slips from my lips, loose and easy. “It is clear that your men know who I am.” I cock my head, teasing Belsky with a smug smirk. “Question is, do you?”
He’s an odd-looking man. A network of extremes—eyes too dark, hair too blond, and frame too small to be standing next to Lorcan Quinn. It’s like comparing a man to a mountain. He swallows. “I have heard your name before, yes.” Heard my name? His first reaction betrayed him.
“Then you might want to consider telling your men to stand down,” Lorcan snarls, gesturing down to the rug in the middle of the room. “You’re standing on a seventeenth-century Persian. Pretty hard to get bloodstains out of it.”
Lorcan is as cool as ice. Why? ’Cause when you’re the head of the East Coast’s most powerful family, you know nobody is going to kill you on a whim.
The consequences are too great.
Belsky’s eyes drop to the floor, then rise back up to his men. He nods. They shuffle, tucking their weapons back into their waistbands and suit pockets.
“Sit,” Lorcan demands, his professional façade already melting from him. As Belsky lowers himself into an armchair opposite us, two of his men flank him and the other two stand by the door. Lorcan flashes me a grim look. I flash him one back—I told you so.
“I apologize,” Belsky says, smoothing down the front of his suit jacket in an attempt to regain his composure. “I hope this little… incident doesn’t set the tone for the meeting.”
“Not at all,” Lorcan says dryly. I know my cousin like the back of my hand. Mentally, he’s already chucked this asshole in the Hudson. Me? I’m imagining what I’d do to him down in the tunnels. “Something to drink?”
“Coffee, black.”
Lorcan strides to the intercom on the wall and barks an order into the speaker.
“Thank you,” Belsky says, locking his fingers together and placing them on his lap. “I know you’re a busy man, so I’ll cut right to the chase.”
He sucks in a lungful of Quinn-owned air and releases it along with the reason he’s here. “Next year, I’ll be running for governor of New York.” He pauses as if he’s going to get a reaction out of us. What do you want, asshole? A fucking round of applause? A Jerry Springer–style gasp? Fuck off. “I have it on good authority that you’re donating a large amount of money to Danny English’s campaign.”
Silence swirls between us. Lorcan lifts his coffee to his lips, then pauses, cup hovering in midair. “Is that a question or a statement?”
Belsky doesn’t fluster. He’s found his footing. “A statement. I know it to be true.”
He shuffles in the chair, then crosses his legs.
