Page 47 of Five Brothers

“Why should I tell you anything?”

“If you don’t set me straight, I’m going to think you all are extorting protection money from that nice woman.”

“Like Al Capone?”

He digs in his eyebrows, his air of amusement making him look younger than Trace. I follow the line of his lips as they lift to one side, brushing the stubble on his jaw as something swims in my stomach. His face is more oval. Trace’s jaw is more square.

I guess I’m staring too long, because he shifts in a way that makes him seem closer, and he drops his voice. “I would actually love the opportunity to set you straight,” he taunts.

The pulse between my legs throbs just once, so hard that I expel the breath I’m holding.

He plants both hands on the rack behind me, walling me in with his nose an inch from mine. “Will Trace mind this?”

I haven’t taken my eyes off his mouth. God, I’m hot. My blood is rushing too fast. “Why don’t you ask me if I mind it?” I whisper.

A current flows between us, and I know he’s going to do it before he does. He takes my jaw in one hand, squeezing it lightly, and I suck in a breath just as he’s about to come down, but …

He doesn’t kiss me.

He stares into my eyes, smelling like grass and vanilla and the beer coming off his breath. “Mariette can’t own the restaurant,” he says. “Or rather, she doesn’t want to risk it. She’s off the grid.”

Off the grid?

“She would’ve needed a loan,” he explains. “To get a loan, she needs accounts. To get accounts, she needs identification. To get ID she needs a Social Security card. Get it?”

I stare at him. “Yeah.”

She’s undocumented.

He releases me and looks away. “And I don’t know why the fuck I told you all of that.”

It still doesn’t make sense. Business owners don’t need to befull-fledged citizens. “She’s been here since she was a child, right?” I press. “How has she not applied for permanent residency at least?”

“Because she would’ve been deported as soon as she applied, and she wasn’t young enough to meet the requirements for DACA.”

Right.

And by that time, this was home. She has family here.

Iron continues. “She stayed through several changes in ownership, one of them finally naming the place after her, because her key lime pie was the biggest draw to customers. About six years ago, after she’d worked here for thirty years, the current owner was about to lose it to the bank, so we bought it.”

“How’d you get that much money?”

It wouldn’t have cost seven figures, but at least in the low sixes.

Iron just sighs. “I have no idea. I was seventeen at the time. Macon took care of it.”

The old rumor about Macon and Army selling Oxy and Molly to the college kids back in the day to support their siblings after their parents’ deaths surfaces in my brain, but there were so many rumors about them that I never knew what to believe.

Iron states, “Mariette gets to stay in the place she loves, take care of her family, and we make sure she can do that.”

Got it. Not that I ever thought that they were taking advantage of her, but it’s one of the many reminders that the Jaegers bend and break whatever laws they feel are unjust, and that they are comfortable making that distinction on their own. What people don’t know until they spend time over here, though, is that it’s always in service to others. Macon could’ve taken that money and renovated the house. Bought a car. Moved. He stayed.

“You can’t tell anybody, Krisjen.”

I dart my eyes up to him. “You don’t need to say that.”

“No, I do,” he states plainly. “Because if you turn on us, it’ll be my fault, because I trusted you.”

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