Page 15 of Reckless Seduction
My father is going to kill me.
FIVE
“You took your sweet-ass time, Kiernan.”Seamus tilts his head back, leaning slightly in his chair as I approach, sensing my heavy footsteps against the worn wooden floor. We’ve been trained since we were young to always be on alert. To look. Listen. Feel. Honing the senses that could easily save our lives.
And they have.
“Got a beer for you.” He is sitting at one of the small tables near the bar, my father casually sitting across from him. It’s still early, nearly seven in the morning. We spent the entire evening cleaning up the mess in the alley. We didn’t get back to the bar until nearly five. They both have towels draped over one shoulder, their shirts dotted with wetness. They’ve been hard at work. Lucky for us, the bar is closed tonight. We never open on Sundays unless it’s for family.
One thing our father instilled in us growing up is the reward of family and hard work. And the understanding that a leader doesn’t just watch from the sidelines while his people do the work. He gets his hands dirty. He digs in.
“If you humble yourself to your people, they will be more apt to follow you when trouble brews. Our community is our family, and we treat family with honor and respect. We don’tdemand respect like other families might. It is earned, and you must earn it from those who have your back.”
“We have a problem,” I mumble, taking the empty seat next to my brother. Seamus and my father frown, waiting for me to continue. I gulp down half my beer and lean back in my chair, a ragged sigh escaping me.
Fuck.
“Do leave us in suspense, brother,” Seamus drawls dramatically.
I run a hand down my face, groaning as I think about how I plan to word the shitshow we’ve gotten ourselves into.
“I don’t think the girl is lying about being stranded,” I start. “Patrick confirmed her car did indeed stall. But from the looks of it, it was tampered with.”
“Tampered with or meant to look like it had been?” my father asks.
“I honestly believe she was just in the wrong place at the wrong time,” I tell him. “From what I can make out from her text messages, she caught her fiancé cheating on her, drove somewhere to get away, stalled in our parking lot, and drank her weight in whiskey.”
“That the bad news?” Seamus arches his brow.
“Bridgett gave me her background details.” Shit. Father is going to murder us. “Bailey Jameson is the adopted daughter of Senator Richard Crowe.”
My father snarls at the senator’s name.
It isn’t a secret in the underground that Senator Richard Crowe has a hard-on for trying to send my father to jail—him and the rest of the mafiosos in the city. He fancies himself a white knight, a Harvey Dent, but he is no better than any of us.
In some ways, he is much worse.
The only difference between the criminal empire and him is that he presents himself like a fucking king. Royalty.Untouchable. The dark truth of who he is hidden behind the façade of the wealthy businessman. His hands are only clean because he pays others to do his dirty work.
“We need to come up with a plan,” my father murmurs. “Find out how close she is to her father. What she knows. Maybe we can use her as a bargaining chip.”
“You think she knows anything?” Seamus asks. “She may be his daughter, but there is no guarantee she knows anything useful. Hell, we didn’t even know he had a second daughter.”
Seamus has a point. How the hell do we miss that Crowe has another daughter, or that there is a union between him and Knight? It doesn’t feel right.
“She has to know something,” I interject. “From what I gather, her stepmother is pissed at her for leaving her fiancé. Apparently, their marriage is a large opportunity for him.”
“Do we know why?” Father questions.
“Not the particulars,” I admit with a small shrug. “But we know who. That’s the other bad news.”
“Just what we need,” Seamus mutters, polishing off the rest of his beer.
I take a deep breath. “Her fiancé, Drew Knight, is the son of Magnus Knight.”
“Well, shit.” Seamus whistles.
“That definitely changes some things,” my father muses, stroking his two-day stubble. “One thing is for sure, though.” He looks up at me with an amused smirk. “You’re going to have to work on your makeup game with that shiner you’re sporting. I suggest heavy concealer.”
