Always with this one qualifier: as long as you don’t muck things up. Right before one or both of them would hear for maybe the ten thousandth time from Mr. Hands-Off about everything he’d built withthose two hands.
It’s time for you to run things your way, he’d told Danny when he made the announcement that he was stepping back from the Wolves, at a press conference that was supposed to be about Danny and turned out to be all about Joe Wolf.
It had taken hardly any time at all for Danny to be reminded, as if he needed reminding, that there had only ever been one way in the Wolf family.
His father’s.
Only now it was hissisterin the way.
She had crushed their father by walking away from him the way she did. From the time he was a kid, Danny had never thought anybody or anything could hurt Joe Wolf. But she had. It almost made Danny jealous—that she mattered that much to him.
Danny clenched his fists, still picturing himself punching a hole through the glass in front of him. Feeling like a grenade with the pin already pulled. But then he’d been feeling that way since the reading of the will.
His sister had spent just about her entire adult life acting as if the family wasn’t worthy of her. Somehow, though, she’d remained the fair-haired child up until she told their father she was leaving and not coming back. The one who’d been the smartest. The one who’d been the best athlete in the family. The one Joe Wolf had loved the most, even though she was the one who told him she didn’t want to end up like the rest of us.
Including him.
Especially him.
How many times had they all heard that one?
A pack of wolves,she’d always called the men in the family.
Only now she was the one he’d rewarded.
He took his phone out of his pocket, walked across the room to make sure the door was closed, and made the call.
His brother answered right away. He was the type. He’d always acted like if he waited until the second ring, the phone might explode in his hand.
“We need to go after her now,” Danny said. “You’re the best one to do it, and we don’t have a lot of time before the league meetings.”
“Understood.”
“I need you on this,” Danny said.
I’ve always needed you when I want something.
“By the time we finish with her, she will be begging us to take it all back, starting with her precious voting shares.”
Danny walked back to the window. How many people in sports had a view like this? Owning everything he saw down there? No wonder guys like Gallo were willing to do anything to get it.
“You know how to do this.”
“I do,” Jack said to his brother. “And I know exactly where to start.”
“Where?”
“Her past,” Jack said.
“Any particular part?”
“How about all of it?”
Sixteen
BEN CANTOR, THE DETECTIVEinvestigating Joe Wolf’s death, was waiting for me in the parking lot at Hunters Point after practice, leaning against my car.
“I’m unarmed,” I said.