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7
“Maxim! Fuck, Maxim!”
Maxim glanced up as Stephanie, one of the younger servers, burst into his office. Her eyes were wide and filled with tears. He immediately jumped to his feet. There was one thing he’d never be okay with and that was people messing with his staff. Male or female.
He wasn’t the most protective guy in his family . . . that award probably went to Victor.
No, wait, definitely Regent.
But Maxim looked after the people that belonged to him.
“What is it? What’s going on?” He rounded the desk. “Did someone hurt you?”
“N-not me.”
His phone buzzed with a call as she tugged at his sleeve. He followed her out of his office and down the hallway.
“Jones? What is it?” he said into his phone.
“Come out back,” Glory’s manager replied. “It’s not fucking good. Keep anyone from looking. We’ve done our best, but we can’t be too careful.”
Fuck.
Dread filled him as he exited the back entrance, following the young server.
She let out a small, distressed cry at the sight of a body on the ground of the back alley.
“Fuck. What happened?” he asked.
Jones, and Will, one of the bouncers, were there. Will was bent over, searching the body.
“He was found out here?” Maxim asked, looking up and down the alley.
“No,” Jones said. “A guy flagged down Steph and told her that someone had been in the toilet for a while. She got Will and he kicked everyone out so he could check. Found this guy dead in the stall. That’s when they called me. We cleared the bathroom and the hallway and brought him out here.”
It might seem callous and wrong to move a dead body. But if anyone had seen him, they’d have called the cops.
And that was the last thing Maxim needed.
The police would just love a reason to raid one of the Malones businesses.
And Will and Jones knew that.
“You guys did good. Overdose then?”
Jones nodded. “Yep.”
“And here it is.” Will held up a small baggie with a bit of white stuff left in it.
Shit.
There was a familiar logo on the front. The image of a beaker.
Fuck.
“Mixology,” he muttered.
“Yep. This shit has is making its way through the city and it’s not good,” Jones said. “They found a couple of homeless people dead early this morning and there’s a rumor these baggies were found on them.”
“What the fuck? How would a homeless person get their hands on this?” he asked.
“Apparently, some of the distributors are handing out free samples,” Jones said grimly.
Jones had a network of people he knew across the city. If there was anything you needed to know, you went to Jones.
“Free samples? Fucking great.”
“Good for business,” Will muttered. “Get them hooked and they’ll be back for more.”
“Only problem is that this shit is killing people and on my fucking territory.” This wasn’t acceptable.
“Why are only some people dying, though?” Jones wondered. “Bad batch?”
“That’s my guess. I need to call Regent. He’ll want to get this tested, and get a clean-up crew here.”
“We’re not calling the police?” a small voice asked.
Shit. He’d forgotten about Stephanie. Turning, he took in her trembling form, the way she bit her lip. She looked scared out of her mind, which didn’t sit right with him.
“Steph, sweetie, we can’t have the cops here, okay?” Jones said in a surprisingly soft voice.
Maxim’s eyebrows rose. Jones was usually a hard ass. He didn’t suffer fools and he had a slight temper. He’d been in trouble with the law when he was younger, but had kept clean for years now.
However, he disliked law enforcement even more than Maxim did.
“It wouldn’t be good for business,” Jones continued. “They’d shut us down. No one would get paid. This is better and he doesn’t care. He’s dead.”
“What about t-the drugs? Where did he get them from?” she asked.
Good question.
“Can you send me all the camera footage?” Maxim asked Will, who nodded.
Seems that was how he was going to spend the rest of his night.
Fuck.
She still had no hot water.
With a groan, Aston leaned her forehead against the shower wall. This sucked.
It sucked even worse because it was late Sunday evening and she still felt like utter crap.
But she’d forced herself out of bed and into the bathroom, determined to shower.
She was sweaty and gross. Her head was thumping and she couldn’t breathe out of her nose.
So sick.
But she had work tomorrow and was hoping she’d sleep better after a steaming hot shower.
Or at least breathe a bit easier.
However, she’d forgotten about the lack of hot water situation.
Brian had a lot to answer for. How hard was it to get someone in to check what was going on?
Moving to the bedroom, she grabbed her phone to call him.
No answer.
Yeah, it was a Sunday night, so she kind of understood why he wasn’t answering.
But screw it. She’d put in several requests during workday hours. Enough was enough.
