Total pages in book: 116
Estimated words: 110550 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 553(@200wpm)___ 442(@250wpm)___ 369(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 110550 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 553(@200wpm)___ 442(@250wpm)___ 369(@300wpm)
“—firefighter has confirmed from the aerial ladder. The second-floor apartment was occupied at the time of the bombing. There is a body inside.”
SILENCE STOLE THE AIR—SMOTHERING sound, breath, and movement in the car. Sunny, Sienna, and I didn’t speak. Didn’t look at each other. Didn’t breathe loud enough to let the other know we were alive.
Harlow was a beautiful place at night. Its secrets were blanketed under neon lights, laughing couples flitting from club to club, and the buzz of a sleepless city. It was all a multicolored blur as I laid my head against the window, watching my tears fall in our mirrored reflection.
“Why are we doing this?” My voice couldn’t climb higher than a whisper. “How will it make any of us feel better to see where it happened in person?”
“It’s not Genny.” Sunny didn’t speak in his usual bright, why-frown-when-a-grin-looks-so-much-better-on-me tone, but that optimism was there anyway. He would not believe Genny was gone—even as the cops wheeled out the body bag. “A look around will prove it. None of the charred crap in the wreckage will be hers. After we confirm it, we can move on to tracking down where she really is.”
“Lying low in a place that doesn’t have a stitch of Caddell around,” Sienna said from the back. “The more I think about this, the angrier it makes me. Part of me wanted to believe it was an innocent person who was being threatened. Harmless fashion majors get high-end couture jobs, not gangsters. But it can’t be that simple.”
I raised my head, turning aching eyes on her. “What do you mean?”
“This has gone on for months. Months and months, guys. If this was an innocent person who didn’t want to do this, they could’ve figured out a way to sew in a warning like they did those trackers.”
Sunny and I shared a look. I didn’t know what went through his mind, but that thought hadn’t crossed mine.
“You’re right.” I sat up straight. “After the clothes are finished, they go from the Closet to the garment bags to the customer. A Brotherhood minion wouldn’t have a chance to check the clothes before they go to you, Sunny. A little note sewn inside your pocket, and the innocent people they sold out would be warned. Either they had a pretty sweet deal and didn’t care what happened to the Johnsons, or they know exactly who you are and want to take you out like the rest of their friends.”
“Not a victim of the Brotherhood, but an actual brother working in Caddell House,” Sunny said. “They couldn’t fake their way in there. They’d have to be a real designer with talent that earned their job, correct?”
I nodded.
“So, what does a designer working their dream job with one of the top designers in the country have to be mad at the Merchants about? Snyder said they wanted to free the city, but it sounds like this guy is doing pretty well for himself.”
“Revenge against your dad. Against your parents,” Sienna said. “For a crime that can’t be washed away by money, fame, or a career.”
“That can’t be the motivation for every brother in this gang,” Sunny replied. “My folks haven’t been that busy.”
“True.”
“Then it’s greed,” I said, tone flat. “The Brotherhood pays them handsomely to sew in some trackers and go on like nothing happened. If a few bombs blow up and people d-die, why should they care?”
Sunny laced his fingers through mine. Miraculously, he smiled. “She’s not dead. My sister plans to be the one to bury us. She’s told us so multiple times. Genny will take no pleasure in it, but evidently our balls will lead us from one stupid act to another until testosterone is the cause of our early demise. Getting taken out first because we figured this out before her?” He snorted. “She’d come back from the dead before that happened.”
I tried for a smile in return. “I love that sunny outlook,” I said simply.
We didn’t speak for the rest of the ride. Again, I did not know what was going through their minds, but there was a single thought in mine. The person who gave the Brotherhood the means to track Genny down while she was alone and outnumbered, was no harmless innocent.
And Bane would teach me everything I needed to know to ensure they suffered twice as much as Genny.
I will be someone so feared, no one dare hurt the people I love again. I will be a Merchant.
Sunny pulled up to the curb, dragging me out of my thoughts. We climbed out as Liam parked. He and Bane fell in beside us, staring across the street at the burned-out wreckage that was the tavern.
Most of it was gone. What the explosion didn’t incinerate or blow seven blocks away, was left to be consumed by the fire. We ducked under the police tape, shining flashlights on charred booth remains and splintered wood. Sunny said we were looking for proof Genny had never been here. Why did it feel like we were looking for something else?