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He wasn’t going to let another young woman come to harm on his watch.
***
Blake parked his truck a discreet distance from Savannah's apartment building, the shadows swallowing him as he settled in for a long night.
Her apartment building was in West Garfield Park. Blake knew this square mile of the city well. There was more gun violence here than anywhere else in the city—a shooting roughly every other day. Two-thirds of the murder victims here wereunder thirty. In Blake’s line of work, you had to know facts like these.
Facts that stopped you sleeping at night.
The building was a rundown brick structure with peeling paint and broken windows. A flickering streetlight cast eerie shadows on the graffiti-covered walls. The distant sound of sirens filled the air, a constant reminder of the dangers that lurked around every corner. Cars zoomed by, their engines roaring and tires screeching on the potholed road.
Blake kept his eyes trained on Savannah’s top-story window, his gaze unwavering. At around midnight, he caught a glimpse of movement in her apartment. His adrenaline spiked, and he readied himself to spring into action. But then he saw a small woman appear at the window in pink pajamas, clutching a stuffed animal to her chest.
Savannah.
His heart clenched with unexpected tenderness at the sight of her. In that instant, he knew. He would bet his entire life savings she was a Little.
"Damn it," he muttered under his breath, rubbing his tired eyes. "What have you gotten mixed up with, Savannah?"
She disappeared from view, then reappeared with what looked like a glass of milk. She drank it in small, considered sips, all the while looking out of the window, her gaze fixed skyward. It was impossible to see the stars with all these streetlamps, but it looked as though she was trying her best. Then, she walked away again, leaving Blake staring at the empty window.
***
Blake yawned as he stood beside Nash and Jax, the three brothers forming a somber triangle around the cold, gray headstone.
“Is our sister’s grave boring you, Blake?” asked Nash irritably.
Blake grunted. “Of course not, asshole. I didn’t get much sleep last night.”
Nash rolled his eyes. “Who you fucking this time? Redhead number one or redhead number two?”
Blake gritted his teeth. Today was not the day to fight with his brothers.
The graveyard was in a quiet part of the city, but it wasn’t a beautiful place. It was overgrown, with a view of an industrial park. Chloe deserved better, Blake thought bitterly, his eyes tracing the engraved date of her death.
He swallowed hard. "We all failed her."
"Hey, man," Jax said softly, placing a hand on his shoulder. "I know today is tough, but we're in this together, alright? We made a promise to Chloe, and we'll keep it."
"Totally," Nash agreed, his voice thick with emotion. "Three years on, and we’ve achieved so much already. Saved good lives. Ended bad ones. We’ll never stop fighting. Doing what has to be done."
Blake laughed grimly. “Achieved so much? Are you fucking kidding me? There’s people dying out there every day. Innocent people. We’re barely making a dent.” His gaze flicked toward his parents’ headstones now. How had three of his family members died already? Every day, he vowed to kill every one of the bastards who’d caused it to happen.
“We’re building up to it,” said Nash. “Once we get to the heart of this city’s corruption and take down some of the major players, the whole system will start to collapse. You remember our goal, right? Stamp out needless violence and gang activity in the city for good?”
Blake nodded, forcing a smile for his brothers' sake, but inside, the weight of their mission pressed painfully against his chest. Some days, it just felt impossible. A couple of the gang members who’d been involved in the shootout that inadvertently killed his parents were serving time in jail, while others roamed free, god-knows-where. As for Chloe and how she’d died—well, they didn’t have a lot of leads.
"I just hope it’s possible,” said Blake.
“Of course it is,” snarled Nash. “You better not be flaking out on us, brother.”
Blake gritted his teeth. “I'm sick of trying to go after the politicians. It almost never works. They have too much power, too many connections. I don't want to get so caught up in that stuff that we neglect the people who need us right now.”
“This is how we help the people who need us,” Nash shot back.
Blake gritted his teeth. Nash, as a former DEA agent, loved going after the kingpins, the guys who were at the center of the web. Blake had spent enough time in special ops in his military days to know that sometimes taking out the enemy was less about going after the big dogs and more about protecting the little guys. He'd seen enough soldiers die for the sake of bringing down the big names, and he couldn't help but think that maybe their efforts would be better spent on the smaller battles, the ones that saved lives.
And personally, he’d rather kill a thousand of the sneering, lowlife assholes on the streets than waste his time on one crooked politician.
