Page 2 of Justice II

Disgusting. I know.

The thought of it made my skin crawl. But she deserved that and so much more for killing my daughter’s horse. This bitch did it because she was jealous of Skye.

Kira walked around pretending to care about my daughters, when all she wanted was me. And when she couldn’t have me, she tried to hurt them. So, I decided to destroy her family’s legacy. It was a small price to pay for breaking my baby girl’s heart and traumatizing everyone else in my household.

The thing about an infestation, there was no coming back from it. Even if she were to exterminate, this is a PR disaster that will follow her and her family for years. No one will want to eat there ever again. The name that her family spent forty years building was destroyed in a matter of a few days. See, that’s what the fuck happens when you fuck with a Banks.

When they go low, we go to the ninth circle of hell and eviscerate everything you love.

As I leaned back in my plush leather office chair, I scanned the article. The headline alone was enough to make me smile.

THREE MARCELINE’S LOCATIONS TEMPORARILY CLOSED AFTER RODENT AND ROACH INFESTATIONS

Underneath it was a picture of one of the locations with a bright red closure notice taped to the front door. I skimmed past the history of the restaurant chain until I saw Kira and her brother, Kyle Boutte, listed as co-CEOs. Neither one of them had made a statement.

What could they even say?

Their publicist did all the talking, calling it an “unfortunate and highly unusual occurrence.” She claimed the restaurants had always maintained the highest standards of cleanliness and said the Boutte family was cooperating with health officials to determine how all three locations could have been affected at the same time.

They knew somebody had done this shit on purpose.

Proving it was going to be another story.

I looked at that picture of the closure notice again. I took pride in going to bat for my daughters. And hitting Kira well below the belt. All three restaurants gone in the blink of an eye. Decades of their family’s hard work becoming a punchline across the DMV before lunchtime.

To say I was satisfied was an understatement.

Kira fucked with my family. Now hers was paying for it.

I checked the time to see that I needed to head home to my family. I’d spent the day combing through numbers, managing the casino, and looking over deals for Freetown. Now, it was time to see my favorite girls.

Living in a house full of feminine energy put me on alert and had me always in protective mode. I was thinking lately about getting a security guard to sit on the house for whenever I wasn’t there. After that situation with Midnite, I didn’t like leaving them alone.

Kira could’ve taken it further and gone after the girls, Skye, or even Rita. And I can’t have that. There’s nothing more precious to me than them, and I couldn’t let her get her hands on them. I was giving her grace by not putting her to sleep for murdering Midnite. If she approached them again, she was going to the grave.

Fuck grace.

I got up from my desk and started to gather my things as my mind circled on Skye. She had been the object of my obsessive thoughts these days. And things hadn’t been good between us.

Skye had barely looked me in the face since we found Midnite. For the last week, she’d been moving around the house like she was somewhere else. She still took care of my grandmother and the girls, but the shit that existed between us had changed. We hadn’t touched in over a week. I can’t lie, it was bothering me.

I figured seeing that horse dead had fucked her up more than anybody could have predicted. Skye wasn’t built for shit like that. She could watch all the murder shows she wanted, but seeing death on a screen and standing in front of it were two different things. I hope she wasn’t starting to feel like it was unsafe to be around the house.

At this point, there was no losing her. She’d been an angel to my family. Rita adored her. Dream loved her. And I could tell Storie was beginning to accept her.

I’d given her space because I thought she needed it. But a week was long enough.

I shut down my computer, grabbed my keys, and left the office.

The casino was bustling with more and more money pouring through it each night. As I swaggered across the floor, I chucked the deuces to employees, frequent gamblers, and friends who were dropping in.

As much as I loved this spot, I had been running on E. It was time for a mini vacation. Just a weekend and I wanted it with her.

By the time I made it home, the smell of onions and garlic hit me before I made it out of the foyer. Dream was sitting at the kitchen table talking my grandmother’s ear off, swinging her legs underneath the chair while Rita nodded along, not really hearing a word of it.

Skye was at the stove, working her magic. But I could feel the distance as soon as I walked in the room. What the fuck was going on? Was this chick thinking about leaving the family? Was I gonna have to put a chain on her ankle and keep her around?

I chuckled at the thought as I entered and greeted all of the ladies.