Page 90 of Sinful King
“Don’t mind him,” Blair said, barely keeping her own laughter back. “It’s just you’re a really good storyteller and he always laughs in the middle of good stories.”
I bit back another chuckle and chose a grin instead.
It was clear he needed to get this off his chest for it to make complete sense. But I was probably one more soliloquy away from shooting him.
“The Ahmeti family has been wanting to get revenge for what you did for a while now,” he went on, looking past me at my grandda. “I get why you did it though. Loyalty seems to be an O’Sullivan thing. You thought they killed your wife so you went after anybody associated with the Albanians. The Ahmeti’s took the brunt though.”
I frowned.
“Thought they killed my wife,” my grandda parroted as if he hadn’t heard him right.
“You were wrong and I can prove it.”
Invaluable.
“I’m a guy that likes to mind my business, but I came here looking for something specific. What I found was disorganization and a lot of rodents from different families linking up together. I wanted to partner with her…“ he pointed to Blair. “…until I learned she was connected to you, but now that I’m standing in front of the both of you, you’ll do as a unit.”
I sighed.
“The deal on the table is what?” I asked, hoping for a short and concise response.
He chuckled.
“I’m from Everwood,” he revealed. “Born, raised and rejected. They got something of mine and I’m about to take it back. I want you to be my gun supplier. Your merchandise is worth triple your rate, that’s what I’ll pay you. With that comes complete control over the iron pipeline until someone puts me in the dirt.”
Everwood had always been a do not touch zone.
The Collective had complete control over that territory.
“It was the Constanzo’s,” Blair said out of nowhere. “They made it look like the Albanians and bid in the midst of chaos.”
“Every agreement up until now comes with an expiration date and Augusto didn’t have the funds to renew or wouldn’t give them. His son had worked out a deal to keep it,” Demetrius said in response. “I took advantage and now we’re here.”
There were pieces missing from the story but felt more connected to why he was doing all this than anything.
“The true owners of the pipeline being The Collective,” my grandda surmised. “How many steps ahead are you?”
“This is it right here,” was all he said. “I’ll succeed and no one will touch you.”
My da might try to kill me for doing it, but I held my hand out for him to shake anyway.
“I need to clean up your mess and a few others before we make this official,” I said, feeling like this really wasn’t over in the slightest for him. “But this is my conditional response.”
He nodded and took my hand, releasing after a firm shake and stepping forward to leave.
“That friend of yours is unstable,” he said after pulling the door open and looking over his shoulder at Blair. “She’ll never get to me but once she finds out you made a deal with her father’s killer, who knows what might happen. Take my advice and put her down now.”
When the door shut behind him, I turned and tucked my gun under Blake’s chin before he could react.
“Do you take me as some kind of joke?” I asked, releasing a much needed breath now that that long winded muthafucka was gone. “I’ve been agitated since stepping foot in New York and I’m close to killing anybody I feel is a threat to my fucking wife. Will you ever ask her to walk into a room without announcing who all in that bitch again?”
Blake shook his head and I shook mine.
“Open your fucking mouth!”
“No,” he shouted. “I won’t but he was harmless. You let him go.”
I laughed.
