Chapter 2

2

His father had made his funeral plans beforehand. All Gideon had to do was wait. And watch. Even though they'd known for a long time that Aldo was dying, it still didn't seem real not having the old man around. They hadn't gotten to see each other much over the years, what with Gideon being in hiding and Aldo having to maintain his secrets, but they always remained in contact somehow.

He'd said his goodbyes to his father already, in a private ceremony attended by only Gideon and his team. They were the only people who mattered. The only people whose loss and grief was real.

He stood now with a hand shoved into the pocket of his slacks as he held a pair of binoculars to his eyes with the other, staring down at the public graveside service. A crowd was gathered to send off Aldo Winters—a giant, a powerhouse, a lethal motherfucker when the need arose. As far as everyone else knew, there were no family members present. Gideon was all his father had left, but to everyone else, Gideon Winters had died many years ago.

From his position on the hillside, nobody would be able to tell Gideon's identity were they to look up and glimpse a figure standing there. It wasn't reveal time yet. No, that would come in two days, but he was antsy. Ready to get the ball rolling.

He couldn't wait to see those motherfuckers' faces. Wished again that his father could be around to see all the years of hiding, of planning, finally come to fruition.

Samir stood at his side, equally silent, ever watchful and alert while the rest of the team waited in the SUVs behind them.

The Council consisted of seven members to ensure there would always be a tiebreaker. A seat never ever sat empty. Membership was inherited and members remained on it until they died. But before being officially sworn in as a member—if they didn't have a child or family member that was fit and suitable to inherit the seat—they had to put forward a name, their choice of who they wanted to take their seat should they die or be killed. Those names were called proxies, and they were vetted extensively before being allowed into the records, because what would prevent a proxy from simply killing off a member and taking over the seat?

So far that hadn't happened, but attempts had been made.

Gideon's mother had been Aldo's proxy until Gideon was born. As Aldo's only child, Gideon had been automatically entered as his father's proxy. And then the attempts on his life began. As blood relation to The Council founder, the Winters's seat held the most power. It was tiebreaker, final decider. And holder of the purse strings. To take out Aldo and his son meant whoever possessed that seat would have unlimited power and control.

Upon the death of a Council Member, a new member was sworn in three days after the burial. At that point, all surviving members gathered in a secure location for that task.

Gideon would be showing up then.

He couldn't fucking wait.

Through the binoculars, his gaze landed on each member of The Council as they stood at his father's grave, paying their respects. The Council only ever met up, all of them in one place, for funerals and important votes, like inducting a new member.

Aldo had known all of that, of course, which was why, once he'd gotten the cancer diagnosis, he and Gideon had kicked their plans into high gear. His father's death signaled Gideon's resurrection. But he wished his father was there at his side so they could do it together. Aldo lost his wife, and to an extent his son, as well. The old man had tried his hardest to figure out who'd been behind the destruction of his family, but he'd gotten nowhere.

In a strategic move, Aldo's seat remained vacant. He hadn't offered up a new proxy when Gideon "died," which was what he was supposed to do. Therefore Gideon remained the proxy of record. But before he made his reappearance, he wanted to see who The Council would attempt to hand over his rightful position to.

Gideon would devote the rest of his life to making them pay.

The group down below began dispersing once the service was over. A fine drizzle dampened Gideon's hair and skin, and he lowered the binoculars, gazing up at the gray skies.

"I want each member followed," he told Samir. "Discreetly."

"Already on it."

Members of The Council were the most powerful people in the States. They were a criminal organization, yes, but they were people in all levels of the judicial system, appointed and removed politicians, and had their talons all the way into the White House. It'd shocked Gideon the first time he'd witnessed his father issue an order to the actual President of the United States, his jaw dropping when he'd watched the actual follow-through on TV mere hours later. It'd been nothing to his father, and that kind of power was enviable, making people do anything to obtain it.

Gideon turned away, facing the vehicles. "Let's go."

On the ride back to their hidden compound, he tuned out as Samir issued orders and took reports. Gideon's inner circle was only four deep. They were the only ones he trusted near him, to see him vulnerable, to know his thoughts. He'd learned at a very young age that people couldn't be trusted, and after being in hiding for so long, the smaller his circle, the better. But that didn't mean he didn't have an army out there on the streets, working for him, with him, to ensure all the strategizing, all the preparation, was fruitful.

The men who worked for him didn't know his identity, not yet. But they would, soon enough.

Back at his place, he strode into his office, his four shadows at his side as usual. Gideon sat behind his desk and met Samir's steady gaze.

"Everything in place?"

Samir nodded. "Just like Aldo told us, each member only has two bodyguards with them."

That was another part of the rules of The Council—it ensured all members were on the same playing field whenever they congregated. Some members didn't like each other, and the rule was to prevent them from starting a fucking war. But that two-man shit worked perfectly for Gideon's purposes. While they all sat around with two men each, he'd be strolling in with his small army.

"I sent you the reports you asked for." Marco spoke up, nodding at the iPad sitting on the desk in front of Gideon.

He picked it up and opened it, quickly browsing the reports on each member of The Council. They had so much info on them already, much of it supplied by Aldo, but these reports from Marco were recent, from the past week.

Gideon hated surprises, so he preferred up-to-the-minute intel, which helped him remain in control. He scrolled, lifting an eyebrow when something interesting caught his attention. He held up the iPad, the screen toward Marco, and tapped it with a finger. "Are we sure about this?"

Marco grinned. "Of course."

"Then tug on that rope, huh?" Gideon spoke to Will and Kaleb. "Let's see what falls out." Didn't matter how much ammunition they had, they could always use more. And even with the reach and resources The Council had, they didn't have his team, who were so fucking stealth with their shit it was insane. They were invaluable, and he knew they were ready and willing to die for him. They'd do anything for him, and he would do the same because they'd saved him when he was isolated and inundated with nightmares, battling PTSD, and unsure of who to trust.

They continued to save him. Just like Gideon, they'd been betrayed and cast aside, forgotten about, with no family except for who they chose. He wanted to ensure their sacrifices weren't in vain.

Over dinner, they went over their next moves, choreographing how they wanted everything to play out. Gideon wasn't under the illusion that it would all happen exactly how they laid it out over beers and burgers, but he wanted it to be as close and as clean as possible.

He didn't doubt there would be casualties, but he didn't mind that.

The Council shot first all those years ago; he'd just be returning fire.

Gideon sat in the back of the SUV parked a short distance away from The Council's meeting spot, waiting for said meeting to commence. The Council didn't have a set location whenever they met up, but they were creatures of habit. There were only a few places they could possibly use because of security concerns, so Gideon and his team had scouted all five until they'd found the one.

Then they'd prepared.

Now, the time had come. In a few minutes, Gideon would make his way into that meeting and set in motion a plan that'd been in the making for years. It was all coming together, and he salivated at the thought.

He and the others in the SUV watched the meeting on an iPad, thanks to the cameras and microphones they'd installed after The Council had done their own sweep. Before a meeting was held, security always swept the location to ensure it was free of cameras or listening devices. But Gideon had people on the inside who did what needed to be done.

He watched now as members of The Council filed into the room, each one taking their seat at a horseshoe-shaped raised dais.

Gideon fisted his hands as he stared at the screen. He knew every member of The Council by name and was privy to their darkest secrets. That was the thing—they all knew each other's secrets. They just couldn't use them. Gideon didn't have that problem. He would stand before them with no weaknesses they could exploit, no secret to hold over him.

He was about to be a whole fucking nightmare for them.

"They're all in place," Samir murmured.

Gideon's lips curled. And so they were. All Council members had taken their seats. Only the podium remained empty. "Our people?" he asked.

"Ready on your command."

Gideon kept his gaze locked on the screen. The members didn't take their bodyguards into the actual meetings. No, the bodyguards got to wait nearby in an overflow room, all of them armed and sitting around idle. "Show me the bodyguards," he told Samir, and with one tap of a button, the screen split into two, showing both the meeting and the waiting bodyguards. Some of the guards were talking to each other, others were silent, on alert, waiting. But they didn't move from that room, because to do so would mean death.

Only the seven members of The Council were aware of what occurred in those meetings. For anyone else to try and listen in, it would mean a death sentence. So, like good soldiers, the bodyguards all sat around and waited until they were needed.

They couldn't leave because the safety of their bosses was still tantamount.

All of that worked in Gideon's favor. "Begin."

Samir relayed his one-word order to the others out of sight. Sleeping gas would be pumped through the air vents, knocking out every single bodyguard. Gideon watched as it began to take effect. As bodies began dropping, one of them crawled toward the closed door on his belly, but he found that act useless. The door had been barricaded from the outside. He was the last one to go unconscious.

On the iPad screen, one of the members—Ennis Canto—was speaking. "And so, even as we mourn our fallen, I would like to introduce you to our newest member, Heath Lyndhurst."

Gideon squeezed his eyes shut briefly, then opened them to meet Samir's gaze.

"Marco's team is doing their research now," his friend told him.

Since they didn't have a clue beforehand who the new member would be, they'd had no way to investigate. But they had a name now, and Marco's team was the best at what they did.

In the meantime, Gideon opened the vehicle door and hopped out. "Let's go."

With no one to stop them, and members of The Council otherwise occupied, they walked through the building. His fingers twitched as he stood in front of the massive closed doors. Everyone on the other side of it was in some way responsible for his mother's death, for his exile, for his father's broken heart. He could taste revenge on his tongue, so delicious it made him salivate, gave him goose bumps and shivers.

Beside him, Samir nudged his shoulders. "Ready?"

Gideon smirked. He'd been ready since the first time they'd come for him. "Ready." He waited, biting down on his patience, as Samir shot at the doors, riddling them with bullets before kicking them in and stepping back.

Gideon entered the room first.

All the members were on their feet. But helpless, because Gideon's men were already on them, having emerged from their hiding places in the back. Each member had a gun pointed to their head and they all stared down at him with sneers filled with contempt and the promise of retribution.

"Whoever you are, you've just made the biggest mistake of your life." That was Ennis Canto speaking. Guess he'd appointed himself the official spokesperson.

At the podium, the new guy—Heath Lyndhurst—stood, shaking, but trying to hide it. Afraid but doing his best to mask it. Gideon strode over to him. He was older than Gideon, by the looks of it, but not by much. Tall and skinny, red hair and brown eyes. Freckles, too, Gideon saw when he was close enough to touch.

"You are trespassing," Heath told him in a haughty tone, one reserved for men with more money than sense. Who thought they held power until rudely disabused of the notion. "You have no idea?—"

Gideon lifted his hand and with a flick of his wrist, he slit Heath's throat. He didn't bother moving out of the way of the arterial spray, so his suit got bloodied. Heath's eyes went wide and he grabbed at his throat, making a gurgling sound as he collapsed onto his knees. Gideon nudged him onto his back with a kick to his shoulder.

Then he stood at the podium and gestured as he spoke into the mic. "Esteemed members of The Council, please take your seats."

"Do you know what you've done?" Joseph Morrow. He used to golf with Gideon's father. Ten-year-old Gideon remembered him being a nice man. Adult Gideon knew of his hunger for young flesh. He was way older now, inching closer to his grave every day.

"Who are you?" Prislaya Chopra. She'd taken her seat after Gideon had been exiled, but he knew her secrets. Knew of her sadistic streak and unquenchable blood lust. She didn't flinch when the gun at her head dug into her scalp. "What do you hope to gain from this?"

"Clearly, you know who we are." Ennis Canto. "You have to know you will not walk out of here alive." He'd taken his place on The Council by proxy, the husband of Virginia Canto, who'd inherited from her father. She'd died giving birth to Ennis's only daughter and heir.

"I know who you are, yes." Flanked by Samir and Kaleb, with Marco and Will at his back, Gideon met the gaze of every one of those members. "But you also know me." He smiled. "Or have heard of me." Hands in his pockets, he ignored the body at his feet and rocked back on his heels. "When I was thirteen, you came for my life and took my mother's instead. You didn't relent, though. You kept coming until my father faked my death and sent me away. His death brought me back, and I have to say…" He grinned at the confusion on their faces. "You don't look happy to see me."

"What are you saying?" Chinh Dang, the only other woman on The Council. "What is your name?"

"My name is Gideon Winters. I have come to claim what's rightfully mine."

A riot of voices rang out.

"Impossible!"

"He's dead!"

One of them shot to his feet, mouth hanging open, only to be shoved back into his seat by the man holding the gun to his head.

"I don't believe it for a second."

"Imposter!"

Gideon chuckled. "I would think there'd be more of a welcome for the prodigal's return."