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“My mother also thought it’d be a good thing to name Ivy after her favorite flower. Morning Glory. Could you imagine what that’d be like in school?” I shake my head, snorting. “Dad convinced her to go with Ivy, and that’s about his only useful contribution to our lives.”
“Saved you a bunch of fistfights while Ivy went through grade school,” Cyrus points out.
“Yup.”
“Then again, you could’ve used them. You fight like shit.”
I hurl a pad of sticky notes at him, which he dodges easily. “Fuck off, Reed.”
“Nice try, Aldridge.” He settles in the chair, feet still kicked up. “Want to talk about the girl?”
“We aren’t women, Cyrus. I appreciate your concern, but enough of this pussy pillow talk shit.”
“Fine, then let’s talk money.” He straightens, lowering his feet, all business now. “Tobias is on my ass. He wants to know how much he’s got.”
“I’ll get him the figures this week.”
“He wants the figures now.” His voice is calm and steady as if he’s not commanding me to do something, but there’s a threat beneath it all.
There is always a threat with Cyrus Reed.
If I were anyone else, I might fidget under his weighted stare.
“What’s the rush?”
“I think he’s done,” Cyrus declares, and I swear, you could hear a pin drop. “I think he’s finishing the remaining shipments he’s got en route, and then he wants out.”
I lean forward against my desk. “Really?”
“Not sure. He was on the cryptic side. Per usual. But yeah, he wants to know how much money he’s got. Think he’s trying to see if it’s enough to retire.” He shakes his head. He knows as well as I do, there is no real retiring from this business.
“He’s worth over seven hundred million. How much more does he need?” I grin.
Greedy bastard.
“Enough to never have to work again and afford his security.”
No truer words have ever been spoken because that’s the truth.
It doesn’t matter if we are legit or out. We all will need security for the rest of our lives.
We have made too much money off the backs of others.
We have ruined and screwed too many bad men.
Men worse than us were sunk below for our rise to the top.
So, even though most of my clients are already semi-retired from whatever they did to become so powerful, there will always be a mark on their backs.
You don’t rule the underworld, leave, and suddenly go back to living a regular charmed life with a white picket fence and a golden retriever more accustomed to greeting the mailman than biting him.
We all still have one foot in the door.
Legit or not.
Well, at least they do.
Me, I’m still all in.
