My attention here was imperative.
The New World Sparrows, or NWS as we’d started calling them, were our biggest threat.
So, I caved in.
I slipped a pill out of the bottle, carefully tumbling the round tablet onto my palm with as little noise as possible as my beads of poison rattled against each other, then I drew it into the nook of my fingers. Pretending I was covering my mouth, I slipped it between my lips and swallowed it dry.
The nausea soon went away.
The shakes stopped.
My brain cleared up shortly after, and I managed to tune in properly.
“What kind of group is this? One that exists in the shadows and uses criminals they’ve blackmailed to do their dirty work?” Vasov, the Russian leader, sneered. “This sounds like a children’s story. You’re making it up.”
Rex pressed his elbows to the table and retorted, “You can think what you want, Vasov, but they’re real. They’ve existed for far too fucking long, managing to escape our attention. Now we know about them, we can work on eradicating them.”
Vasov mocked, “I’m the king of cocaine on this godforsaken island, I don’t need to do shit. I’d just bet that you want us to wasteourresources on hunting down this fairy story so you can grab—”
“You’re a moron, Vasov,” Zhao, the Dragon Head of the Triads, snarled, not letting the Bratva Pakhan finish. “You just proved how out of touch you are. Cocaineisn’tking in Manhattan anymore. Hell, it isn’t king in New York.” His lips twisted. “Heroin is the new emperor.” His eyes narrowed, his smugness overpowering thanks to the strong poppy routes he’d spent decades cultivating. “And long may it reign.”
Vasov slammed his hand against the table, his outrage clear, and when he surged to his feet, I was the only one who could possibly understand the agony he endured when he realized, too late, that he’dforgotten.
My patella had been shattered, my other leg hit too, muscles torn and shredded, bones in my femur forever damaged like it had been under a butcher’s knife.
His kneecaps, on the other hand, had been decimated by a sniper’s bullets.
The sharp cry of pain had me wincing, while the rest of the men, my father included, looked upon him with feigned disinterest.
Did he but know it, Vasov had just shown weakness amid this pool of sharks.
They’d scented blood, and now they were going to be out to get him.
Prick.
Rex, however, had different priorities than territory that had nothing to do with him. He was based in New Jersey, the lucky bastard, and had no jurisdiction in our city. The only reason he was here was because when Declan had explained the particulars to Da, in Da’s eyes, the man’s cause was a worthy one.
A good son, Aidan Sr. had declared, should and would kill to avenge his mother’s honor.
And that was why Rex had the blood of three men on his hands.
Because my da had allowed it.
Wasn’t he kind-hearted?
“You’re not getting the bigger picture here. I’ve got my people looking into this group, but I’m telling you, they’re more dangerous than you want to think.”
I cast my father a look, felt Finn, my best friend, tense up at my back, becauseweknew he was right.
We were the ones who’d recently been affected by these NWS cunts, we’d been touched by them, and had almost lost my nephew and sister-in-law as a result.
We knew they were a shadowy organization that worked amid the Alphabet agencies—at least, that was what we’d come to believe. For all we knew, they were everywhere. In the jails, in the courts, in the churches. Wherever corruption ran rife in this city, hell, this country, they were probably there. Nibbling away at the foundations of democracy while pretending they were its face.
Fucking bureaucrats—couldn’t trust any of the cunts.
My mouth twisted into a sneer at the thought before I asked, “How do we eradicate them?”
“We have to find them first,” Rex pointed out. “We need to band together to do that.” He peered over his shoulder at the fresh dead who were bleeding out onto the warehouse floor. “All I do know? TheFamigliawas their front. You can’t trust any of the Italians.”