Page 18 of The House of Wolves

He shifted slightly in his chair, looking as happy to be here as he used to be in church.

“Anyway, Danny’s right: there has been much speculation in the media about what the family is going to do. I’m sure you all read Seth Dowd’s very fine exclusive this morning in the Wolf family newspaper.”

I took a deep breath andlet it out, then smiled at himand the rest of the audience stretched out in front of me.

“But to bring back an oldie but goodie, it turns out that story is fake news.”

I had everybody’s full attention now.

“Because as of today, I am taking over full control of both the Wolves and theTribune.”

There were already questions being shouted. Just for my own amusement, I took one, from Seth Dowd.

“You can’t possibly be serious about actually doing this,” he said.

“Soserious.Sodoing it.”

Danny Wolf was closest to me behind the podium.

“I will bury you,” he hissed.

“You’re repeating yourself. That’s what you told me when you came to my house last night.”

“You lied,” he said.

“And you never learn.”

“What’s that mean?”

“Threatening to beat me up didn’t work when we were kids. And it sure as shit doesn’t work now.”

I could still hear questions being shouted at me as I disappeared into the runway.

It was already good being king.

Or queen.

Either way.

Thirteen

“WE NEED TO TALK,”Danny said to me.

I’d moved into a vacant office down the hall from his. It looked like a broom closet compared to Danny’s and had belonged to an assistant general manager he’d fired a few weeks before. If you followed the Wolves, you occasionally got the idea that Danny Wolf fired people every time he got bored.

That’s the way people thought of them in town. Not the San Francisco Wolves.

Just the Wolves.

I looked at him over my laptop.

“Unless you’re here with the Wi-Fi password, I’m thinking we’re kind of talked out at this point.”

“Still the great wit of the family,” he said.

“Low bar.”

There was no point in asking him to sit. Even if there had been more than one chair, asking him to sit would have been the same as asking him to stay. And I had work to do before heading down to speak to the Wolves players before practice.