Page 57 of The Echo of Forever

“Why not? You two could be friends. In fact, I think she’d fit right in with your little crew.”

She hummed.

“I agree, which is why I gave her my number. When she’s ready, she’ll reach out. You’re doing a great job of giving her time and space.”

That had me looking over at her again.

“We friends now?” I asked.

Violet chuckled.

“You’re still annoying, but annoying is fine, I guess.”

“What about Finnegan?”

She didn’t say anything, and my smile stretched.

“I don’t need friends,” I told her, meaning that shit. “But I want them for her. She needs people she can rely on, people who ain’t just me.”

Forever and I had plans to align ourselves with outside families. We talked about the prospect of opening Everwood up to more, at least to the family we were building within the city. It felt attainable, until it didn’t.

Until she was gone, and I was grasping for straws on how to get her back. And then the engagement was announced, and I decided right then to get everything we talked about and have it ready for her return.

None of this belonged to me.

The alliances. The properties.

My fortune. My heart.

Everything I was, am, and wanted to be belonged to Forever Reid Cannon.

“I don’t have the capacity to convince anyone of anything, but that’s the beauty of having friends who possess exactly what you lack. "

She was feeding my soul if this meant what I thought.

“That means Lucia is coming here soon?”

Millicent had agreed to sponsor the whole crew. That meant I’d have eyes and ears on her every move from this moment on.

Violet had an interesting group of friends, wives from different crime families with their own set of skills. But Lucia was different.

Stories of her moniker, Scarlet, crept into the city from time to time over the years. That’s how I learned there were more secret societies than ours, ones that didn’t rule over cities.

The Red Society existed, and she was one of them, a mafia princess bred to kill.

“Lucia would never miss an opportunity like this,” Violet said, starting toward the entrance. “Count her and the rest in.”

I waited until she was inside and continued on foot back to my place, a block away.

Sleep didn’t come easy, and walking around the city at wee hours had become my new normal because of it.

I glanced at my watch.

Fifty-two hours.

The phone that matched Forever’s was on the counter; instead of taking it with me, I routed the calls to my personal. Right when I picked it up, it came to life in my palm.

“My forever,” I answered, sitting to pull my sneakers off.