“Yeah.” Akara smiles. “Way to go, Jack.”
“What were you thinkin’, Jack,” Donnelly pipes in.
“Dammit, Jack,” Quinn sighs.
“Yeah, fuck you, Highland,” Oscar cuts in playfully.
Jack is smiling a hundred-watt smile. “I’ll take those as compliments, and honestly, this is one of the best seasons we’ve ever produced. And the longest. The studio gave us twice as many episodes.”
I heard that from Jane. She said the season is airing later than expected because they needed more time to edit the footage, and they were given a new air date.
April.
“Have all our clients signed off on the footage already?” Quinn asks.
Affirmative.
He’s been in security for over a year, not fresh blood anymore, but he hasn’t been a bodyguard while the docuseries is airing. It’s good that he asks questions. I’ve led men who try to act cool, pretending they know shit when they know nothing.
Jack explains, “Everyone shown on-screen has okayed the footage in the trailer. For the actual episodes, we still have to go through the rough edit with some family members.”
Jane pinches her eyes closed. She’s dizzy.
I brush a strand of hair off her cheek. “Need the bathroom?”
“Mmmhhmm.” She shakes her head but slumps more against me.
I need to take her back to Mackintosh House.
Gradually, we all start exiting the pub into the frostbitten cold. I ditch Tony with a longer, stricter stride. I’m so far ahead of that shitbag, he’d have to run to catch me.
Breath smokes the frozen night, and I wrap my jacket over Jane’s shoulders while she burrows her body against my warm chest.
Bodyguards crack caked ice off the windshields, turn ignitions, and I slide the door open to a compact black van.
“Banks.” Tony bombards me, a furious beat from fisting the back of my shirt—and I can’t let him touch me while I’m holding her.
“Don’t,” I warn and face his blood-boiling anger. My veins sear just as blistering hot right now.
Jane stirs, probably sensing my tension, and she cranes her neck over her shoulder.
Drama is shooting off in multiple directions.
“Were we not just having a good time?” Oscar asks in genuine concern. He opposes his little brother on the stoop of the pub, a twinkling holiday wreath hung on the shut door.
Quinn glares. “Bro, just drop it. We’re on-duty.” He tries to walk off, but Oscar grabs his arm, and Quinn rotates and swings.
“Quinn!” Joana clutches his waist and drags him back, but his knuckles already met Oscar’s jaw.
That’s Fight 1 at my twelve o’clock.
I can’t watch long because of Fight 2 on my three.
“You forced me here,” Beckett sneers at his twin brother. “You want the truth? I expected this from Moffy and Jane, but not from you.”
“Are you done?” Charlie glares.
Beckett laughs with hurt, breath visible in the cold. “Get me out of here, Charlie.”
“No.”
Fight 3 is on my ten. Behind the gurgling exhaust pipes of a blue car, O’Malley confronts Donnelly.
“Hey, I heard your dad is being let of prison this week.”
I’ve seen this happen before. With Farrow not in earshot or view, O’Malley is less afraid to go for Donnelly’s jugular. Fight 3 is about to be a knockout bloodbath.
Alarm triggers my instincts, and I reach for my mic to alert Akara, but I realize that the cord is yanked from the radio.
Shit. I scan the gravel parking lot for the Omega lead.
“Banks,” Tony snaps. “You’re not riding home with my client.”
Fuck off. I spot Akara at the furthest car, popping the hood. “Akara!” I yell and point in the direction of Fight 3.
He might hate me right now, but we’re still teammates and willing to die for the same cause.
“Yeah, he’s getting let out,” Donnelly answers O’Malley.
Akara sees and sprints after them.
“Yeah? Looks like you’re missing your meth-head family reunio—” He grunts as Donnelly tackles him, and Akara wrenches him off O’Malley before either guy can throw a punch.
“Jane is drunk,” Tony snaps at me. “Incapacitated. She can’t consent to jack shit right now, which is why protocol dictates that her bodyguard take care of her—you aren’t her bodyguard, Moretti.”
I’m about to ignite Fight 4.
My nose flares, rage a flaming ball in my lungs. “I’m not just a fucking bodyguard to Jane.”
I’m her boyfriend.
Tony laughs. “Right, you’re her boyfriend’s brother. Great.” He claps mockingly. “Just because there are two of you doesn’t mean you get double-dibs on the same girl. Unless you two are with her in some kind of weird twincest threesome thing. Which, really, isn’t that shocking considering you both stuck it in the same chick in high school.”
Fucking lies.
“Shut…up,” Jane says drunkenly and tries to swat him but she pats the air, and then whacks my cheek. I clasp her hand, almost smiling.
In a split-second, she somehow just smothered a raging fire in my body.
I don’t lay into him.
He hates that.
Tony rubs the corner of his lip. “Let me give you some advice, Moretti. You should never let girls speak for you and definitely not fight your battles for you. Man the fuck up.”
Anger. I’m burning alive in pure fury. “Women are better than men. Better fighters, better lovers—and the fact that you come from where I do and can say and believe shit that demeans women makes me sick.” I know his grandma.
I know his aunts.
I think of my mom, my mom’s wife, my aunts, my grandma, and I wouldn’t exist if it weren’t for a twelve-year-old girl who left Italy with no one and came to America with nothing.
Brave. Bold. Strong women rule my world, and I love them.
Tony cringes, hurt flaring. “Don’t turn this into some sexist shit. You know that’s not what I meant.” His voice is softer.
“Hey.” Maximoff strides over with knotted brows. “Is there a problem?”
Tony repeats the same shit about needing to “take care” of his client, and I realize the best route for Jane is her best friend.
Family outranks bodyguards, and if Maximoff wants to carry her, protocol says, don’t get in his fucking way. After a short conversation, Tony follows protocol and lets her cousin help.
I hate passing my drunk girlfriend over to anyone, but she won’t be afraid in his arms.
Maximoff cradles Jane while he climbs into the van, and she hangs onto his shoulders and murmurs, “Thatcher?”
“It’s me, Janie,” he whispers.
Tony tries to shove in front of me to claim the last open seat, and I block him from entering, about to take that one.
“Banks.” O’Malley wipes dirt off his forearms. “One of the cars won’t start up. We need your help.”
Fuck.
My brother is a mechanic.
While he tinkered under cars, I was a thirteen-year-old busboy and line cook. I lied about my age to land a job, and making chicken parm isn’t a skill my brother will need in Philly.
I know basics for car repairs, and I can feel my way through this. But I hate that I have to ease out of the van and drop my boot to the ground.
Leaving Jane.
Two words I hate thinking. Two words I never want to hear.
21
THATCHER MORETTI
Jane clings to the toilet bowl, and I press a cold washcloth to her clammy forehead. She hasn’t puked yet, but she’s been toying with the idea for fifteen minutes. Quiet in a mental battle.
Everyone else must be asleep after the pub clusterfuck, chatter nonexistent, but I hear the loud wind skating across the Scottish Highlands and slapping against the stone house. Floorboards and walls creak around me, and my ears pick up the tiniest of noises in vigilance
that I don’t need tonight.
Zero threats.
Zero targets.
I’m just her boyfriend. She’s just my girlfriend. It makes me feel seventeen again. Before the Marine Corps, before I went to war—back when I’d hang out at the Quickie-Mart with Banks. Smoking cheap cigarettes and drinking slushies.
“I owe you one,” I tell my brother, my phone resting on the floral tile. Near a brass claw-foot tub. I was on a video call, but with bad reception, the screen went black.
“I’ve owed you way more and you never collected.” His voice crackles with static. “We’re always even, you know that.” He curses in Italian.
“What?” I stare hard at the phone, wishing the picture would return.
“I can’t find the fucking car keys.” I imagine him running around the townhouse. It’s late in Philly, and he should be leaving for the Hale’s mansion soon. He’s on night-duty for Xander.
“Check your pockets.” I gently comb Jane’s hair back, and she blows out a controlled breath.
“Nothing there.”