Page 15 of Golden Burn

A video springs to life.

I’m standing in one of the consultation rooms with Greg and his shaking chihuahua. The video shows me bringing in several boxes and opening them to show Greg the bottles of tramadol. He counts each bottle and nods his head. The conversation is muted, but the exchange of cash between his hands and mine is enough to have my veterinarian license revoked and be sent to jail.

The footage shifts to another location. The camera’s out back—the ones I was sure had been faulty for years. Looks like I was wrong, because the image is crystal clear as it shows me putting the boxes in the car and slamming the trunk shut.

The screen fades to black.

Fuck.

I clench my fingers into fists to stop them from shaking and fill my lungs before coming to a quick decision. “If I do this, you bury that footage. It never sees the light of day.”

Odin nods. “You have my word.”

I reach forward, grab the pen, and hold it up for Dom to see. He points to a section of writing on the new contract in my hands.

“We just need you to sign here.”

6

Odin

‘What Goes Around.../…Comes Around’ - Justin Timberlake

The leather-bound chair has turned to a slab of concrete beneath me.

I’ve spent too much time in this room sorting through the paperwork and data needed to be prepared for the meeting that I both dread and eagerly await.

Dom has drafted the contract that will seal the Lombardos and the Bolt group into a new era of business. I’ve yet to sign it. My pride begs me not to.

It’s been ten years since I first started my company and built my empire. I could have crumbled when my life disintegrated in my hands, but I funneled my pain, turned it into the fuel that drove me. I took my inheritance from my son of a bitch of a father and started something of my own. My properties are spread across four continents. My wealth knows no bounds. And yet, my soul has never been satisfied.

Not until I realized what I’ve been running from.

The Lombardos.

In the aftermath of my devastation, I combed the streets searching for them. I wrestled a few into the dirt, killed for the first time, the second, and so on. But it was pointless. I was only one man. The weeds grow fast and they grow hungry in the Lombardos.

Cerbera is one of their main players. Determined and bloodthirsty. He took control of the Lombardo assets, found new partnerships in the underground hell pits of the world, and steadily clawed his way up the ranks.

Now, I’m back where I started all those years ago. But this time, instead of breaking a deal, I’m making one. And it just so happens we’ve circled back to the one thing that ruined me in the first place.

Marriage.

The only way to secure this deal is to appease Cerbera’s twisted mind. He wants me to marry Harriet. And he wants me to do it quickly.

It seems the Lombardos not only pass down their insatiable appetite for greed to their children, but the talent for holding grudges to their graves, too.

It’s infuriating having terms demanded by a snake of a man who makes his money off of the backs of the desperate. It’s even worse knowing I can’t refuse him. Because although I hate every single one of them, I want to control them even more. It’s not enough to kill them off one by one, since it’s clear they are more than capable of starting again with nothing but ashes in their palms. If I want to make sure the Lombardos never reach their previous bloody glory, then I need to make this deal. I need to be the one pulling the strings—the one they have to come to if they even want to lift a finger.

It’s the only way.

I’m interrupted from my tangle of thoughts by a soft knock at the door. Dom enters and hands me a folder. I know what’s inside it. Idespisewhat’s inside it. I place it on the desk, away from my vision.

“She’s in her room. I don’t think she’ll come back out for a while.”

I nod. My thoughts are too preoccupied.

Dom’s cheeks are pulling his lips into a straight, displeased line. He wants to make me feel bad about what I’ve done to Harriet. It won’t work. Every time I see her blue eyes, I have to resist the urge to poke them out of their sockets and hurl them into the ocean.

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