Page 99

“It will be between your family and the Murphys, and if I ask, you’ll make the right choice.”

“Yes.” I croak out the word, my heart clenching as if it’s being lassoed by thick metal chains.

“Good.”

And I wonder if ultimately, he’s asking me to choose between cages.

When all I want to do is fly.

TWENTY-SEVEN

callahan

I swallowdown the growl clawing at the sides of my throat as I clean the blood from my bruised hand, knuckles slightly grazed from my victim’s teeth. He isn’t finished—as in dead. I don’t kill every person who crosses me, but in teaching certain lessons, letting a fucker sit and fester in his own fear and pain is useful.

And yeah, entertaining.

The phone call to Lucie goes to voicemail, but I don’t leave a message.

I shake the water from my hands and end the call.

Where the fuck is she?

She should be home.

Answering my goddamn call.

It wouldn’t bother me so much except she didn’t answer an hour ago, either.

Now I call Dec, who’s supposed to be on Lucie duty.

“What?” he says in that innocent voice that makes me suspicious every fucking time.

“What?” I snarl, mimicking him. “Where the fuck is my wife? It doesn’t sound like you’re home.”

“Calm down.”

“Declan, are you home?” My voice drops and is now dangerously quiet. I think he gets the hint.

“I’m not,” my brother says. “I’m in a bar of?—”

“Fuck.”

“Calm down, Cal. In a bar of a restaurant. I’m in the corner drinking a soda.” He sounds disgusted. “Seems your little bird wanted to stretch her wings.”

“And you let her.”

I stalk out of the bathroom in the basement of the pawn shop, gripping the phone tight as my brother speaks.

“Come on, Cal. You can’t stop her. And I didn’t realize she was a prisoner. You know there’s a difference between prisoner and wife, right? Didn’t you say way before this you didn’t care what the de Rosa girl did—outside of blatant betrayal or y’know, shooting you dead—because you had the deal?”

I did say that.

Before I met the wrong de Rosa girl and married her.

Now… Fuck. It’s complicated and annoyance swells in my chest. “Who is she meeting?”

“Ah,” he says with a forced laugh. “That.”