Page 84 of The Villain's Beast

“Things you’d know if you were where you’re meant to be,” Fletcher told him.

“I went for a fucking walk,” he grumbled.

“My father knows about the debt,” Fletcher continued, unbothered.

“That’s why he…bought me,” Bellamy said softly.

“He what?” Luca asked, head jerking toward the other side of the table where Bellamy sat beside me.

“Maybe stop wandering off,” I suggested.

Luca held up his hands in surrender and leaned back in the chair, lips sealed. I didn’t blame him for his frustration, his exhaustion. I felt all of those things and more, but it was years of punishment and isolation from my father that had given me the tools to manage those feelings and not slit my own wrists. Though, it would be a lie to say that on more than one occasion, the bottom of the pool hadn’t felt like a warm hug I never wanted to leave.

“I need proof that Francis North is taking money from other families,” Vince said simply. “Other places…then we can deal with him.”

“When this is said and done, he’s mine to deal with.” Even to my own ears, my voice sounded deathly steady and nearly lethal.

“I’ll put the request in.”

“It’s no request.” I said. “If you want proof, he’s mine.”

Vince licked his lips and gave me a quick jerky nod of his head.

“What about the Sinclairs?” Daren asked, and all of us looked down the table toward Fletcher.

“We’ll take care of it,” Vince answered, glancing at Fletcher. “Unless you want to wring the life from your dear daddy’s neck too?”

“I would rather he lose everything and live,” Fletcher said, looking right at me. “I want him to lose the things he cares about most in this world so he understands just how much he’s taken from me.”

“This is…” Luca interrupted, shoulders tense as he shoved his chair back from the table. “This is too much, I’m sorry. This is laughable.”

“Sit down,” I warned.

Luca was half up, hands braced on the edge of the table and as he lowered himself back into his seat, the glare he shot me was sharp as daggers.

“We’ve all spent our whole lives sucking North and Sinclair cock.” Luca gestured broadly, spit flying out of his mouth the angrier he got. “And now you just show up out of nowhere with the answer to all our problems? Where have you been for our.Entire. Fucking. Lives?”

“Luca, baby.” Daren reached over and curled his fingers around Luca’s wrist. Luca stared down at the connection point like it was a new development he didn’t understand, but he didn’t brush Daren off, which felt like a step in the right direction. Beneath the table, Bellamy kicked the side of my shoe, and I gave him a barely noticeable nod of agreement.

“Checks and balances,” Vince said with a shrug. “Francis and Miller were taking things too far, going beyond the expectations that came with their status.”

“And what? You show up to take them down a peg?”

“Our plan was to let them self-implode, if you want the truth.” Vince smiled and spread his hands on the table. Luca sat up straighter, tension knotted up the length of his spine.“But after Sinclair had me put a tail on his son and his newest investment, I realized it could get a lot more fun if we didn’t.”

“So, what then?” Luca asked. “What happens now?”

“Now I give my father the information he’s after,” Fletcher said.

“My father is going to get spooked when his debt comes up for collection,” I said, the next steps of the plan feeling like barbs in my mouth, even though it was a fantasy I’d held since the age of sixteen. “He’ll come to me. He’ll want me to move against Fletcher. Against the Sinclair family as a whole.”

We’d already talked about this entire chain of events while Luca had been out sulking on campus. We’d played through every possible scenario, every move, every action that my father and Fletcher’s father could take when their very rickety houses of cards started to crumble. The conversation had been enlightening, but angering at the same time. I could see the same feelings mirrored in Fletcher’s face as Vince made his suggestions about how we should act next. The both of us had spent so many years living in fear of retribution, when everything my father claimed to own was built on other men’s money and his own lies.

“Your father will come to you,” Daren said to Luca, who still looked like a panicked deer in headlights. “He’ll tell you this is the chance you’ve been waiting for.”

“You don’t know that,” Luca rasped.

“Men like your fathers are predictable,” Vince said, reaching into his waistband and pulling out a pistol. “Men like us are not.”