Chapter 8

Beasty"s steps reverberated even after she made it to the hallway. Was the fucking girl stomping?

Then her door slammed shut.

Shaking my head, I went searching for Lake.

I didn"t have to go far. He was facing off with Gio and Adrian out in front of the house but not far enough out that Beasty could see them.

"That was out of line. I should teach you a lesson for that." Lake clenched his hands into fists at his sides.

Since we partnered with the Castillo brothers, I hadn"t met Gio very often. Maybe a handful of times. He preferred to deal with Lake. As someone who managed every fucking thing about Atlas" and Kim"s careers, that had been fine by me.

Gio had two buddies he worked with, and I"d never met either one of them in person. Looking at Adrian and his crazy eyes, that was a blessing.

"What the hell is this about a job? Beasty isn"t a pawn for you to use with your fucked-up family." I rushed forward to get in Gio's face.

He narrowed his eyes on me as Lake threw out his arm to keep me from getting in Gio"s face. Adrian still had on that irritatingly gleeful expression.

"Joaquin," Lake warned. What the fuck was he warning me about? He was out here doing the same damn shit. Why was it okay for him to get in Gio"s face but not me?

"Not a chance, Lake. These assholes don"t get to waltz in here and fuck up our lives just because they"re Parker"s little footboys." My temper flared hot. I knew it, Lake knew it, but there was nothing I could do to stop it.

Even the tips of my fingers tingled like I needed to flip my cards. I"d like to flip one straight at Gio's face. If done the right way, those things hurt like a bitch.

"Lake, if you don"t want trouble," Gio turned hard eyes on Lake, "and you want to keep receiving tips that could save your girl"s life, then control your dog."

"Dog?" This guy was fucked in the head. I launched toward him, but Lake caught me around the middle and slung me around.

"You"re not helping!" Lake yelled at me.

Adrian laughed and braced his elbow on Gio"s shoulder. "You didn"t tell me that these guys were such a fucking razz of a time. I would have started going to meetings with you more often."

Gio sighed. "Lake, it"s fine. Let him go."

He said that as if Lake was on his side. This motherfucker.

"I need to find out why they"re here. Control yourself or go the fuck inside," he whispered in my ear. After giving me a tight squeeze around my chest, he pulled away and faced Gio and Adrian.

"Like we said, Beasty isn"t a pawn. She doesn"t exist for you. Hell, she doesn"t exist for Parker. Is that clear?" Lake rolled his neck from side to side.

"We"re not here to cause you problems. In fact, we"re trying to help yo–"

"You help settle your own vendettas." Lake cut Gio off.

"The Pescis are our collective problem. You made it that way when you sent Stevo"s head back to them." Gio sounded like that got under his skin.

Even though I felt the same way–it had been stupid of Lake–I had this sick satisfaction that we were causing trouble for Gio. I just wished I could drive that splinter a little deeper under his skin.

"I told you before, they"re not going to actually move forward with the charges. They don"t want their dirty laundry aired like that." Lake shook his head, showing great restraint when he tucked his hands in his pockets.

"Doesn"t matter. They still want to ruin your lives for fucking with them. They"re a vengeful bunch."

Adrian grinned. "But lucky for you guys, so are we."

Gio swung his head around to give Adrian another look. It went ignored.

If Beasty hadn"t just offered herself up to men with mafia ties, I"d think their dynamic was hilarious. They were worse than brothers. But they didn"t get that when they gave Beasty a way to fuck with us.

And that was what she was doing.

Fucking with us.

She wanted things. Things we wanted to give her, but we weren"t doing it on her terms. So, the little shit was trying to force our hand and give us an ultimatum.

"We would only need her for a night. Maybe twenty-four hours, but I doubt it will come to that. Think about it." Gio turned and shoved Adrian"s shoulder to make him start walking to their car.

"Don"t forget," Adrian called over his shoulder. "We have Beauty"s number." They both slid into their car and slammed the doors shut.

"Did he just threaten us?" My voice went high at the end. That was the most ridiculous conversation I"d had in a long time. And my fingers didn"t tingle anymore.

"I think it was a promise," Lake said begrudgingly. He watched them drive away as he walked back in the house.

Inside, the living room was completely empty.

"Where did they go?" Lake glanced around, scratching the back of his head.

"You missed all the fun of Beasty giving us an ultimatum. Either we give her what she wants or she"s going to work with Gio and Adrian," I deadpanned.

He met my stare, understanding flared in his eyes.

"Beasty went up to her room," I added.

"Then where are Kim and Atlas?"

"I don"t have a clue," I said as I listened. No sounds came from the kitchen or from the study. Atlas probably went to our room.

Leaving Lake behind, I headed to our room. Wherever Kim and Atlas were, I couldn't hear them from the hallway. We made sure if nothing else, we"d have complete privacy in our bedrooms.

I opened our door and harsh whispers cut short.

"Don"t stop just because I showed up," I snarked as I headed straight to Atlas. I was impressed by how calm he stayed during that whole shit show. He was still much calmer than I"d have given him credit for considering Beasty"s threat.

We should be thankful she didn"t threaten to leave.

"What are you all looking at?" Lake came in behind me.

They glanced our way. Kim was guilty as hell, but Atlas…

Ah, he was furious. He just hid it better than I did. Atlas always had a cold sort of temper.

The tops of Kim"s cheeks darkened as we got closer. "Did you know he did this?" He stared straight at me.

Furrowing my brow, I edged around the couch where they were sitting. On the screen of Atlas" laptop was a crystal clear, color image of Beasty.

She moved around the room and dropped something on the bed. The thing, which was some kind of hair clip, gave off a soft whooshing noise.

"You are shitting me," I said slowly, unable to take my gaze off of the screen.

He had surveillance on Beasty.

Lake didn"t say anything as he bent over to get a closer look. Beasty moved over to Quilliam"s enclosure and sat down beside it, running her finger over the plastic. He was asleep. It was still during the daytime, so he had no idea that his human waited for his attention.

It was like she chose a support animal that couldn"t give her the emotional support she needed.

I barked out a laugh. It didn"t take a genius to know that we were in the same category as Quilliam. She wanted answers, and we were reluctant to give them to her.

But not for the reasons she thought.

For me, I didn"t want her to look at us like we were scum. Worse than that, what would stop her from walking out once she knew everything we'd done? If she felt threatened, she"d leave.

I didn"t give a fuck that she said she wouldn"t. The past spoke for itself.

"No, I didn"t know he did this," I added, just in case it wasn"t overtly clear that I had no clue he watched her. Not to this degree.

"This would have made my life so much simpler when we were kids," Atlas mumbled, turning back to the screen. He"d said something similar recently and I couldn"t remember where or what for.

Then it clicked. This was new.

Lake slid by me and took a seat next to Atlas, bending close to the screen to see what Beasty was doing. "This is great quality. Who did the work?"

"I found someone in the Network who"s good with computers and surveillance and shit." Atlas turned back to the screen and crossed his arms as he leaned back. Well, he was just fucking content to watch her like a creeper.

Sighing, I rubbed my forehead. Atlas wasn"t a creeper. He was just misunderstood. Like we all were. Like Beasty was.

"We can"t watch her like this." I dropped my hand and faced the guys fully.

No one answered me.

"Kim," I said, raising my eyebrows. He had always shown the most amount of conscience in his warped way. But the little shit didn"t hold my gaze. He barely flicked me a glance before taking his undivided attention back to Beasty. "You can"t seriously want to watch her this way."

"We need to know what she"s going to do. You heard her. She hates that we work in a club with so many women. She"ll leave if she thinks we"d cheat on her."

"I just, what?" That wasn"t anything close to what she"d said. Or what bothered her. Kim loved his stories but this one was so far in left field, I had the need to call him on it. "That"s not what she said and you know it!"

Kim spared me a brief glare. Atlas and Lake pretended like they weren"t even part of this conversation.

I released a strangled noise in the back of my throat. Everyone said I was the bad egg. The alcoholic. The gambler. And you know what? I was those things, but I knew my limits, and I could see the world in crystalline clarity.

These idiots? They were going to toss everything good we"d built in our lives in a dumpster fire. Just by being idiots.

At the noise, Kim turned his head my way, finally giving me his full attention. But it wasn"t the obstinate expression from before. His face broke into something painful to see.

"I can"t lose her again, Joaquin. It will destroy me," he quietly pleaded.

Atlas sneered like I was the problem. "You can leave it all up to chance if you want, but I"m not going to let her walk away. She wanted us. Now she gets us. This need...this obsession to watch over her? This is who I am. And if she thinks she won"t get punished for her shit, then she"s got some tough lessons coming her way."

Neither Kim nor Lake objected to his crazy ass. What the fuck?

"We need to prove to her that we"re not going anywhere. That she"s important to us," Lake mused, like he had the universe figured out.

"I think she just wants to know that she"s important to us, but she doesn"t need us yet." Kim traced a delicate finger over the screen where Beasty was resting her head back against Quilliam"s house with her eyes closed.

"We need to condition her. Train her to our touch and our touch alone. Drive her crazy until she"s begging for it." Atlas started speaking faster as if with each word this idea was the gold that was going to go around her feet and weigh her down until she couldn"t run.

"I like it. She needs to be just as obsessed with us as we are with her. Since she"s been back, it"s obvious that she"s not as attached to us. We need to change that." Lake nodded.

All three idiots still stared at the laptop.

"It"s settled. We"ll edge her so hard, she won"t be able to function without us. She"ll need us, like we need her."

"God dammit," I grumbled as I spun around to leave them to their crazy. "I need a fucking drink."