Page 32 of Godless Saints

“Copy that, brother.”

“One more thing,” I said.

Misha looked up from his bag. “Yeah?”

“What do you know about Sawyer Whitlock?”

The grin died on his face. Just enough. That told me everything before he even opened his mouth.

“He didn’t touch the Writ himself,” Misha said quietly. “Paid some lower-level shit to ask around, then stood back far enough to keep his hands clean. Classic move.”

I kept packing my gloves and boxing gear into the bag. “Family?”

Misha dragged a towel across the back of his neck. “Old money. My father respects the Whitlocks, which means he either owes them, fears them, or wants them dead quietly. They make dirty work look like charity galas and patronage boards. Shell companies. Private security. Clean on paper.”

“And Sawyer?”

Misha’s mouth twisted. “He performs harmless too well. Catholic boy with the perfect smile. But I’ve heard things. Private islands. Family hunts. People who disappear after parties no one ever admits happened.”

He stopped smiling completely. That did more than the words.

“Mafia has rules,” Misha said quietly. “Bad ones, but rules. The Whitlocks don’t belong to anything with rules.”

I thought of Sawyer stepping between me and Moon like he had any fucking right to him. I zipped my bag closed hard.

“Find out what he really wants,” I said. “The Seat. Moon. Or both.”

Misha nodded once.

“On it.”

Misha clapped my shoulder and left, already yelling at Declan about another round before the locker room door swung shut.

Jesus. That man had no survival instinct.

Sawyer Whitlock was dirtier than he looked. Good to know. Moon studied alone in the east reading gallery from seven-thirty to nine. Better to know.

I stripped, already planning the shower. Had to smell clean for my preppy boy. Sawyer could wait. Gallery first. Moon couldn’t. Every time he looked away, jaw locked, body still saying yes anyway. Another yes. Another fucking yes. He thought he was resisting. He was only teaching me exactly where to put my hands.

CHAPTER 8

MOON

My pen froze. The east gallery was quiet except for the soft tick of the old clock above the stacks. Tall windows let in the last of the gray afternoon light.

Maggie, the little black Academy cat, landed on my notes like she’d never been told no in her life. Her paw landed straight in the inkwell. Black ink exploded across forty minutes of Black Chalice projections in one glossy, spreading disaster.

Of course she stepped in it.

One perfect black paw print stamped itself right over Vesper’s top line.

I stared. She stared back, tail flicking once. Zero remorse.

“You work for Vesper, don’t you?” I muttered.

Her tail flicked again, smug. My jaw locked. Control. One fucking thing. One small thing.

I reached to move her. She dug her claws in and shredded the edge. Heat crawled up my throat. Not the cat. The projections were already ruined before her paw hit the page. My focus had fractured the second I heard him say jal-haess-eo-yo again in my head, the syllables still roughened by Ireland and far too carefully practiced for a man who claimed nothing mattered. Every time the pen touched paper since, I heard it.