Ambrose reaches for the pen I've set on the polished mahogany table. His hand trembles almost imperceptibly as his signature scratches across the contract, followed by his brother's. The sound is satisfying in a way that does nothing to ease the restless ache beneath my ribs.
It's more money and before Ilona came into my life, I was all about the money. I would have sat here and bartered with the brothers before lowering the guillotine on their plans just to have a little fun.
Now I want them the hell out of my sight.
"Excellent." I gather the signed documents and slide them into a leather folder, the soft whisper of paper against paper filling the momentary silence. "My associate will show you out."
The door opens on cue, and Kon appears like a shadow taking form. His massive frame fills the doorway, dark eyes sweeping over the Rosetti brothers with the kind of assessment that makes men check their life insurance policies. He says nothing. He doesn't need to. His presence alone speaks volumes, six and a half feet of silent menace wrapped in a perfectly tailored black suit.
The brothers leave faster than they arrived, their footsteps echoing down the marble hallway with undignified haste.
When the door closes behind them, Kon's stoic expression softens by exactly one degree. On him, that's practically a grin.
"You look like shit," he observes, the words clipped and precise, his Russian accent softening the vowels in a way that makes even insults sound vaguely poetic. He moves to the sidebar where a carafe of coffee sits next to crystal decanters of bourbon. The rich aroma of freshly ground beans mingles with the sharper scent of aged whiskey, creating a combination that usually comforts me. Today, it barely registers.
"Fuck you too." I drop into my chair and scrub my hands over my face, pressing the heels of my palms against eyes that feel gritty from too many sleepless nights. "Those assholes took threehours to sign a contract that should have taken less than thirty minutes."
Kon pours two fingers of bourbon, the amber liquid catching the light as it splashes against crystal, and sets it in front of me. He doesn't pour one for himself, never does when he's working. But he settles into the chair across from mine with the patience of a man who has learned when to wait and when to push.
"That is not what I meant, and you know it." His voice is low, measured, the voice of a man who has witnessed enough suffering to recognize it in others.
I knock back the bourbon, letting the burn chase some of the fog from my mind. The heat spreads down my throat and into my chest, a brief flare of sensation that fades too quickly. "Just a case of the blues, I guess. Some days I wish I'd never walked away from my old life."
Kon's eyebrow rises a fraction of an inch, the only indication of surprise he ever allows himself. "The grave-digging days?"
"Being a runner for Club Genesis was easier." I stare into my empty glass, watching the amber residue cling to the crystal like memories I can't shake. "All I had to do was make sure fresh graves were ready for the bodies I had ready to go in them. Easiest fucking job on the planet." A dark smile curves my lips, the kind of smile that makes most people take a step back. "Assholes like the Rosetti brothers were my favorite targets. Made me happy."
"Mmm." Kon's dark eyes miss nothing, and he rarely judges. He steeples his fingers beneath his chin, studying me with an intensity that would unsettle anyone who didn't know him. "You're pining over a girl."
"Fuck you, Kon."
But I don't deny it, and we both know what that means.
I palm my glass and push back from the table, heading for the door, my footsteps silent on the thick carpet. "Drake and Katriana are having some kind of celebration upstairs. I should make an appearance."
"You should find her. Apologize." He pauses, then adds with dry precision, "Stop being a dick."
I pause with my hand on the door, the cool metal of the handle biting into my palm. The laugh that escapes me is hollow, scraping against my throat like broken glass.
"Find her." I don't turn around. Can't. The weight of what I'm about to say is heavy enough without watching his face as I say it. "I know exactly who she is, Kon. I've known since the moment I saw her walk into Scarlet Thorn."
The silence behind me thickens.
"You and all our brothers know I've been building intelligence files on Enzo Marchetti. His operations, his weaknesses, his pressure points." My fingers tighten around the door handle until my knuckles ache. "What you don't know, what nobody knows, is that eight weeks ago I spotted his daughter at Scarlet Thorn. Ilona Marchetti. And I saw an opportunity I should have walked the fuck away from."
I turn to face him, letting him see the weight I've been carrying alone. Kon's expression remains stoic, but his stillness deepens. The stillness of a man recalculating everything he thought he knew.
"I approached her on purpose that night. I was going to seduce her, date her, use her to get close to her father. A way into Enzo's inner circle that didn't involve bullets or blood." The words taste like poison on my tongue. "Or, if the relationship went far enough, leverage. Enzo's precious daughter wrapped up with a Syndicate man. It’s the kind of information that makes powerful men like Enzo very cooperative. Scandals of that degree have a lot of power to ruin lives. They’d do just about anything to keep it locked away."
I let that sink in for the both of us before continuing.
Kon adjusts in his chair, tightening the slipping leather band around his long hair. It’s one of the many features we share and why a lot of people think we are actual blood brothers.
I lift a heavy shoulder. "That was my plan, anyway. Mine alone. I didn't bring it to the brothers because I knew Rafael would shut it down. Too messy. Too personal. But I thought I could handle a little manipulation. And I could?—"
“—just not with her,” Kon finishes for me, his expression all too telling. "So. What happened?"
What happened. Such a simple question for such a complicated answer.