Page 154 of Sins of Innocence

That didn't used to matter. But I didn't used to have a woman waiting for me at home, or daughters I promised I'd be there for breakfast with.

After Noah puts a blood pressure cuff on his wrist and a pulse monitor on his finger, I let McLaren have the honor of injecting him.

She stabs the needle into the man's jugular and presses the plunger on the syringe forcefully. "Take that you son of a bitch, asswipe with a death wish."

Even knocked out, his body jerks in reaction as the chemical cocktail hits his bloodstream.

He does not go into cardiac distress though. His pulse rate increases to that of a man running rather than sleeping, but his blood pressure doesn't go into the danger zone.

Leaving him to settle into the full effects of both drugs, I pull a chair in front of the man on the left, sit down and wait for him to wake up.

It takes less than five minutes for his eyes to start fluttering. Another fifteen seconds before they open and he blearily stares through me.

I kick his chair to get his attention. It doesn't move, but his body feels the vibration from my kick and his gaze sharpens with fear.

I dangle the kerchief he'd been wearing tied around his bicep. "What gang are you with?"

He wets his lips and stares at me.

I kick his chair again.

"Hollow Point Kings," he croaks out.

A small but extremely violent gang that has been gaining territory in Queens over the last few years.

They're street thugs, dealing crack, hiring out muscle and accepting low paid hits that don't require finesse. Their business doesn't intersect with ours.

To my knowledge, the Shaughnessy Mob has no dealings with them.

Ten minutes later, I know they had street rats watching Áine's apartment building. It's in their gang's territory, so when we were observed leaving the building, it was easy to pull in a hit crew within minutes.

Unlucky for them, they were nearby and got tasked with the hit.

It doesn't take much more to learn that his friend who shot me was lead on the op. The other four men who pretended to mug us are gang members pulled in for the job. And the objective was to kill me and Áine, but she was the primary target.

Nothing I hadn't figured out on my own already.

"Who contracted the job?"

"I don't know, man." He sniffs, tears clogging his voice. "I told you. Ask Venom, man."

I don't know what kind of drugs are already in his system, but he took something. Talk juice doesn't usually make our captives weepy.

"Venom got the cool street name. They call me Snacks. How lame is that?" he complains.

"About as lame as going up against the Shaughnessy Mob," Noah says, flicking his toothpick in the trash. "You gotta be next level stupid to do that."

"You're the mob?" Snacks looks around the interrogation room. "I thought the mob was a bunch of old men laundering money through dry cleaners."

Dry cleaners? What the fuck?

"Is this Venom?" McLaren grabs the middle guy by the hair and yanks his head up.

"How'd you know?" Snacks asks, his eyes wide.

"Because you just told us this was the boss," McLaren replies with disgust.

"Then why'd you ask me?"