Asher’s voice drops into something low and lethal. “She didn’t do it.”
“How do you know?” Johnson pushes, eyes gleaming. “Were you with her the whole time that night? Holding her hand? Watching her sleep?”
Asher’s nostrils flare. “I know my sister.”
“Everybody knows their family until they don’t,” Johnson says. “People snap. People hide things. Hell, I’d be more surprised if no one in your bloodline ever murdered anybody.”
“Asher,” I say quietly, reaching out to lay my hand on his forearm.
The muscle there is iron-hard, vibrating with angry restraint. He doesn’t look at me. His gaze is fixed on Johnson like he’s deciding how many teeth the man needs to speak.
“Where is she now?” George asks, cutting through before Asher can launch himself across the table. “We haven’t seen her around since Xavier went down.”
Asher’s jaw clenches, then releases in a tight exhale. He drags his eyes away from Johnson and looks at me instead, as if anchoring himself there. “I sent her away,” he says. “The night after Xavier was shot. I didn’t want her anywhere near this until we knew what was happening. She’s with a friend. Someone I trust.”
“Who?” Zay asks, not hostile, just practical.
“Reyes,” Asher says. “Old friend. Lives three hours out. Off-grid. No club ties. She’s safe there.”
Johnson hums under his breath. “Safe and conveniently out of reach.”
Asher’s chair scrapes sharply against the floor as he straightens. “Say that again.”
“Enough,” I snap, before all hell breaks loose.
My voice comes out sharper than I intended, but it cuts through the rising volume of the room. Four pairs of eyes swing toward me, the temperature shifting by degrees.
I uncurl my fingers from Asher’s arm slowly, feeling the heat of his skin through the fabric. “Nobody is convicting anyone at this table,” I say. “Especially not someone who isn’t here to defend herself. We’re looking at possibilities, not picking a scapegoat and locking in the story because it’s convenient.”
Johnson shrugs, leaning back again, but the bruise on his face pulses as if it remembers the last time he thought he could push too far. “Just talking, boss. You said you wanted everything on the board. That’s on the board.”
“I do want everything,” I say. “But we’re not cherry-picking the narrative that feels tidy. We don’t know who killed Marcus. We don’t know if it was personal, political, or both. Until we have proof—actual proof—Talia is off limits.”
George nods slowly. “We still have to follow the rumors, Valentina. Where there’s smoke?—”
“Sometimes there’s just a bunch of assholes blowing steam,” Jackie cuts in. “Especially when a girl’s involved. Men love blaming women for men’s violence. ‘He was obsessed with her, so it’s her fault he got dead.’ Get that weak shit out of here.”
A ripple of tension eases across my spine at that. “We can ask questions about Marcus without turning Asher’s sister into our favorite suspect,” I say, trying to thread the needle between stubborn and strategic. “We can check her timeline, ask where she was, talk to this Reyes if needed. But we are not starting a witch hunt based on gossip.”
“Gossip often starts closer to truth than you think,” Johnson mutters.
“Gossip also almost got me killed once,” I snap back before I can leash it. “So I’m not exactly eager to run with it.”
The room goes quiet for a fraction of a second too long. Zay’s eyes sharpen. Jackie’s pen stops tapping. Asher turns his head slightly, like he’s hearing something in my tone that doesn’t match the words.
George opens the envelope finally, sliding out a glossy photograph and placing it on the table.
“Regardless of who killed him, we can’t ignore what this is,” he says.
The photo lands in the space between us.
It’s Marcus, laid out on cracked concrete, blood pooled dark and sticky beneath his head. His eyes are open, staring at nothing, mouth slightly parted in a final, slack surprise. There’s so much red it almost doesn’t look real, like someone spilled paint and forgot to clean it. His jacket is twisted, his hand curled near his chest as if reaching for something that was never there.
The angle of his body. The way his arm bends. The color of the blood, almost black in the flash.
It hits me harder than I expect.
The room tilts for a heartbeat, and suddenly it’s not Marcus on that ground anymore. The photograph slides sideways in my vision, the edges warping, and another memory slams into place with brutal force.