And so, the war begins. “No,” I say. “Not Logan.”Chapter Twenty-SevenADRIAN
My rejection of Pri's meeting with Logan hangs heavily in the air, but Pri remains unfazed. “Why don’t you ask me why I want to meet him?” she challenges.
“Well, I do want an excuse to kill him.”
Something flickers, perhaps even softens in her eyes at my protectiveness but again, she doesn’t back down. “That could be killing the hand that feeds us,” she says. “I believe that in the right one-on-one setting, I can get him to make admissions I could record. Maybe big ones.”
“No,” I say, firmer this time. “You and him, one-on-one, in private, no. End of discussion. Not him. Give and take, sweetheart. You go to the office, you see your mother, you don’t see Logan. Everything in my gut is screaming no on that one and it’s not all personal.”
“Pitt is dead. Witnesses are dead,” she argues. “We almost died. We have to stop the bleeding.”
“It never stops while Waters is alive.”
“Then what is the point in all of this?” she counters.
“Hell if I know,” I say. “That’s a question we all should have asked when we went after him years ago and started this. What is the point? What is the endgame? What it isn’t is you dead, Pri. Start with your mother. Decline Logan.”
“Adrian—”
“See what your mother says,” I continue, “and then decide what comes next. Isn’t that fair?”
“Are you going to stay open-minded about Logan?”
“I won’t want to, but yes,” I agree. “I will.”
The voicemail on her phone buzzes and she glances down at the log. “It’s from my father. It’s the first call. It’s often delayed.” She inhales and puts the reply on speaker. Her father’s voice fills the line. “We need to talk, Pri. Immediately.” That’s it. There’s nothing more.
“Well, that told us nothing.” Pri comments, before she says, “What’s our plan?”
“Lucifer will go with you to the office,” Blake says. “I want you to leave him with your team and tell them he’s a contractor hired to aid the investigation. He’ll look for trouble and safety concerns.”
“And when I leave for dinner?” Pri asks.
“Adam and I will be with you,” I answer.
“You have a warrant out for your arrest, Adrian,” she argues. “Don’t you think certain forces might be luring you into the open where you get picked up and arrested? And don’t you think now that they know we’re seeing each other, they know that you’ll be near me?”
Savage rounds the corner and jumps into the conversation as if he’s been there the whole time. “Adam’s a master of disguise. He’s going to dress Adrian up as a chick. He’ll be real pretty.”
I ignore Savage. “No one but our team will know I’m present.”
“If you’re wrong,” she says, “and you’re arrested, no matter what skirt Adam puts you in, you’re dead.”
My lips quirk. “Rest assured, sweetheart, I’m not dying in a skirt.”
“It’s not funny.”
“I’m not laughing.”
“I am,” Savage assures us.
Pri inhales and lets out a breath. “I’ll get my things.” She heads for the stairwell and I let her go.
I inhale and walk out of the kitchen, exiting to the patio, leaning on the balcony. I’m a bastard for getting close to her. She will never be free of Waters now, even if I walk away from her. The door behind me opens and shuts as Savage joins me, leaning on the railing beside me. “Jack and Jill went up the hill—”
“And I broke my foot up your ass.”
“That doesn’t rhyme.”
“You sure about that?”
He scrubs his jaw and glances out over the horizon, his tone turning serious for once. “I fell in love with my wife when I was in med school and a new soldier, a young, good guy. Ironically, it was her father who dragged me into the assassin’s life, which is a long story. Bottom line, I left her to protect her.”
I glance over at him. “And?”
“And it still came full circle. I came back to save her and thank fuck she saved me in the process.”
“What are you saying?”
“You might not be ready to admit it, but you love her. And you know it’s too late to walk away. Adam will give you Captain America good boy advice which is fine and dandy. I use his moral half the time, anyway. Meanwhile, Blake won’t say much because he knows he’d do exactly what I’m telling you to do.”
“Which is what, Savage?”
“Stay. Destroy Waters. Better yet, kill him.”
“You do know he’s in jail, right?”
“Yeah well, sounds like a personal problem to me. Figure it out.” He turns and walks away.
I stand there, staring out at the hill country that had once been my home, and a plan comes to me. One I think only Savage would approve of.Chapter Twenty-EightADRIAN
I don’t linger on my plan to end this war, be it a right or wrong move. I know what has to be done. And I know I’m the only one who can make it happen. I’m the only one who can know.