Page 9 of Hard Bargain

The rest of the drive passed in silence. As they moved deeper into the city, the surroundings changed. Streets narrowed, buildings aged, and the signs of neglect became more apparent. Dominic recognized the neighborhood immediately.

He slowed the car and pulled over a block away from Knox’s apartment complex. He killed the engine but didn’t get out right away. His gaze settled on the building through the windshield—old brick, iron railings rusted thin, and windows patched and uneven.

He took it all in without effort. There were three floors, one entrance, and a fire escape on the side. Lights glowed in only a handful of windows. He spotted the sightlines, the potential vantage points, the time it would take to enter and leave if necessary. Every detail settled into place.

Then, without hesitation, he opened the door and stepped out.

Chapter 4

Knox

Knox woke with the uneasy, suffocating feeling that he was late for something. His eyes snapped open, breath catching halfway in his chest as disorientation hit him all at once. For a split second, nothing made sense—only the echo of a gunshot still vibrating through him, and the weight of a deep voice reminding him of a debt he didn’t understand.

His heart pounded hard enough to hurt. He didn’t know where he was, didn’t know if he’d made it out of that alley, if any of it had been real. Then the ceiling came into focus. The thin crack running above the light fixture. The faint hum of the refrigerator bleeding through the wall. Pale morning light leaking through the blinds, striping the room in uneven lines.

Home.

He dragged in a slow breath and forced it out through his nose, staring up at the ceiling until the panic lessened enough to manage. It didn’t disappear, but it receded enough to function.

He swung his legs off the bed and sat there for a moment, elbows braced on his knees, hands dangling uselessly between them. His fingers were steady now, but he could still feel last night in his body. The tension hadn’t left. His muscles felt locked, like they hadn’t gotten permission to relax.

He clenched his jaw and pushed to his feet, forcing himself into motion. If he stopped for too long—really stopped—he had the uneasy feeling he wouldn’t be able to start again.

He paused outside his mother’s bedroom door, listening.

Nothing.

She was probably still knocked out, like most mornings—buried under the familiar mix of wine and sleeping pills. Relief flickered through him, brief and ugly.

He moved toward the kitchen, poured himself a glass of water, and drank it straight down. Then another. His stomach churned, but hunger felt distant and irrelevant. He had just set the glass down when the buzzer cut through the apartment, the sound piercing and sudden.

A jolt shot through him with enough force to root him where he stood, breath caught somewhere it couldn’t escape.

It rang again, longer this time, more insistent. No one buzzed this early. No one buzzed at all. His pulse kicked hard, a familiar spike of adrenaline flooding his system before his brain could catch up.

You owe me now.

The words slid back into place as though they’d been waiting. He swallowed and moved toward the door, each step slower than it should’ve been. He leaned forward and looked through the peephole.

His stomach dropped.

The man from the alley stood on the other side, perfectly still, his presence as composed in the morning light as it had been in the shadows. He looked even more out of place here, too commanding for the worn-down building behind him.

Another man stood beside him, similar in height and build, but looser in the shoulders. His gaze roamed the building like he was memorizing exits out of habit.

For a moment, instinct screamed at him to step back, to pretend he wasn’t home, to let the buzzing continue unanswered until they gave up. But they didn’t look like men who left without answers.

The man’s gaze lifted and locked directly on the peephole. Knox jerked back as if burned, his heart slamming against his ribs. He pressed his tongue to the back of his teeth, forcing himself to steady. Running wouldn’t help. Hiding wouldn’t help.

Slowly, he reached for the lock and opened the door.

“Good morning,” the man said, calm as ever, as though they were meeting for coffee instead of revisiting a murder.

Knox didn’t respond.

Up close, there was nothing to soften him. The light stripped away the shadows but did nothing to diminish the severity of his features. His skin held a warm olive tone, his face was cut from hard lines, and the dark stubble along his jaw made him look even more dangerous. His white shirt was crisp, sleeves rolled up enough to expose his forearms. Dark ink traced over his skin in intricate patterns before disappearing beneath the fabric.

His hazel eyes were fixed on Knox in a way that made it difficult to look away. There was something disturbing about that kind of attention.