Total pages in book: 120
Estimated words: 121946 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 610(@200wpm)___ 488(@250wpm)___ 406(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 121946 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 610(@200wpm)___ 488(@250wpm)___ 406(@300wpm)
“So . . . you do want to bang her.” Lorenzo’s smile never drops.
Bastard.
I walked right into that one. But I’m on edge when it comes to Payton. Overprotective and reeling from what happened.
“Jesus, Lorenzo. Give the guy a break,” Jax says as he enters the room and takes a seat beside Cyrus. “Did I miss anything important, or are we here to break Romeo’s balls?”
“Nothing other than the fact that Trent is hard up for the girl living in his house. His stepsister.” Lorenzo, apparently, has a death wish tonight because if he doesn’t shut the fuck up, I’m going to kill him.
Would that make me the new head of the mafia?
“Dad fucked her sister, so at best, that would make Payton my aunt, which she’s not since Dad and the sister were never married,” I inform him, my voice curt and to the point.
Cyrus cracks his neck. “As much as I want to chitchat with all of you pussies, which I don’t by the way, I have better things to do. Can we get to the fucking point? No more interruptions.”
Not surprisingly, Cyrus is the serious one.
“Someone tried to hurt her, and they wanted it to look like it was me,” I tell the men at the table.
* * *
“She’s going to be okay?” Matteo asks.
“Mercifully, she is. Concussion. Bruised ribs. A sprained ankle. That’s it, and she got lucky. She didn’t get the brunt of it, but still, not the point. The point is, someone tried to kill her, and I have a feeling I know who it is.”
“Paul,” Jax finishes.
I nod.
“That fucker,” Lorenzo hisses.
Matteo leans forward in his chair. “Why do you think he went after her?”
“As much as I hate to say it, I think it’s because he thought she was important to me.”
“Well, she is, right?” Matteo assesses me.
“I have no idea. My feelings are complex, to say the least. All I can tell you is it didn’t start this way.”
“Welcome to the party, brother.” He laughs, and I’m happy Matteo finds my suffering so entertaining.
“The thing is, from an outsider’s point of view, I was always with Payton. She lived in my house. He must have thought that she meant something to me. That we’re involved. So, he went after her to hurt me.”
I care about her.
It’s obvious at this point.
I can deny it, but it won’t do me any good. Paul wanted to hurt someone I care about. Mission fucking accomplished. To be honest, he’s not that nostalgic. Emotional connections don’t exist to him. Hurting Payton was a means to an end to disrupt my life, thereby disrupting my business.
But I don’t care about my business.
I’m not gonna admit that in front of a room full of my clients, who trust me with their billions . . . but going after Paul isn’t about the hedge fund.
It’s about revenge.
I won’t let him get away with what he did to Payton.
I lean forward, placing my elbows on the table. “We need a plan.”
“Fuck the plan. We need to grab that motherfucker and torture the hell outta him.” Angry Lorenzo has replaced the annoyingly playful version. For once, I welcome it with eager arms.
“Or we could try to do this in a more civilized fashion,” I answer him, but only because I think torture is temporary.
“Civilization is for pussies. We took his money. We fucked him out of everything. The man doesn’t want civilized.”
Lorenzo has a point.
“Okay, so we take him. Then what?” I ask.
Normally, this is where I step back and let the guys do their thing, but for Payton, I’m all in.
“We torture him, obviously.”
“Guys—” Jaxson chimes in, but Lorenzo lifts his hand to silence him.
“Nope, you have no say in this,” Lorenzo tells him.
“Then why am I here?”
“For someone so smart, I thought it would be obvious.”
Jaxson shoots Lorenzo a nasty look. “You need someone to locate him? Great.”
I turn to Jax and incline my head. “Oh, cut the shit. If you didn’t want to do this kind of work, you wouldn’t be here. You get bored of all that government crap you do.”
“Yep, that’s why I keep coming back,” he says, playing it off as sarcasm, but we all know it’s the truth. “Because all the government crap is boring, and I miss you guys.”
“He loves us.” Lorenzo grins at Jax like an idiot, and I’m pretty sure Jaxson will one day have his revenge. He’ll probably hack his computer and give him some crazy bug.
Jax leans back against his seat. “Okay, I’ll do it. Once I get the intel, who do you want me to send it to?”
“Me,” I tell him, rapping my knuckles on the velvet table. “Encrypted files on a hard drive with instructions for us on where and when to meet you.”
He rolls his eyes. “Or I can just send a text asking you to grab drinks with me, and I’ll tell you in person.”