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“But only if I have to… right?”
“That’s right,” I mumble. “Fuck.”
With that, I turn and march after Ray.
The rugged Irishman is only here because the rest of his clan wanted to stay home with their families. Every single one of the Kilpatrick men are married now, and there was no point in any of them coming to witness this mess in-person.
Fuck. If even one of those pale bastards had held off on getting married for even a year longer, then maybe they’d be here instead of me. But no, they’re all madly in love. Bastards.
Before Sophia’s letter, I would have thought they were fools for giving themselves to a woman like that. Now, I know that I’m the fool.
… Maybe I should have just married the first girl I could have stood to be around. But that’s not me. I’ve always been a picky fuck. It’s going to be the death of me.
“Are you carrying?” Ray asks, when I catch up to him on the other side of the bridge.
“They said no weapons,” I remind him.
“And you listened to them?”
“Of course not. I’ve got a switchblade taped under my boot and a pistol in my pocket bible.”
“Pocket bible?”
“No one ever opens a bible. Especially not the Greeks. It’s hollowed out and filled to the brim with everything I need to kill those Mediterranean fuckers… if it comes to that.”
“It won’t come to that,” Ray tries to assure me.
“Don’t fucking tell me what it will come to,” I snip back. My nerves are being pulled tight. I’ve been a part of countless high-stakes negotiations before. Hell, in the past, it’s where I’ve excelled the most. But this is different. This isn’t just a matter of life and death.
It’s a matter of marriage.
“Are you going to keep your head about you, lad?”
Right now, Ray’s rank in the Kilpatrick Clan hardly matters to me. Under normal circumstances, I’d either have him killed or I would kill him myself for being so blasé around me. But the truth is, I kind of like the fucker, and I like that he isn’t afraid of me—even if he should be.
All of my life, I was attached to the most fearsome man on the planet. My father. Sergey Barinov.
No one dared speak back to me. And without my brothers around to keep me in check, I often felt like I was going mad from all of the ass-kissing.
Thankfully, the Kilpatricks wouldn’t kiss my ass to save their lives. It’s a nice feeling, even if I still won’t let anyone else even dare think about talking to me that way.
I’m a king, after all. And no one can be allowed to forget it.
Least of all Sophia Xiphias.
“I’ll keep my head,” I mumble. “… But I might take hers.”
“You kids will never learn…” Ray mumbles. Shaking his head, he steps up to the crumbling bayou mansion’s door.
The Irishman might be a decade older than me, but that doesn’t mean he knows more.
Still, I don’t push the matter. It’s business time.
Before I can do it myself, Ray balls up his fist and knocks.
“I don’t like that we let them get here first,” I mumble, as we wait for an answer.
Through the dusty, half-cracked windows, I can see the Greek cars on the other side of this crumbling ruin. This place only has two ways in and out of it.
