Page 59 of Glass Omega

“Oh, so you recognize him? Good that makes this so much easier.” Reading my chin on my palms, I waited for Shuuhei to react to the body next to us.

The head of the Saito family stared down at the still face of his man, his own expression neutral despite the storm raging in his dark eyes. “What did you do to him?”

“Me?” I asked, surprised. “I did nothing, though I’m still not sure if one of my own men who were gunned down had something to do with it. See, I found good old—Haruto—was it? Yes, Haruto. I found Haruto here at the center of a sea of my own men’s bodies and my weapons shipment completely gone.”

Shuuhei seemed to finally be connecting the dots, his gaze darting in between Haruto and me like a ping pong ball. “And you think I had something to do with it.”

I shrugged. “I don’t know, all signs point to it being a job done by the Japanese, which is strange because I thought we were allies.”

“We are allies,” Shuuhei insisted and I watched as the men behind him started to get a little bit twitchy, their hands shifting to their barely concealed weapons.

“Really, then why are your men looking as if they want to put a few more bullet holes in me and my guys?” I nodded at the men who shifted guiltily on their feet as Shuuhei whirled around to look at them, barking orders in Japanese.

I didn’t understand what was said—Japanese was one of the languages I could never truly grasp when I was being tutored as a young boy—but it was clear he was arguing with them and they were arguing back.

Then, they filed out of the diner except for one man, the one who had been arguing with Shuuhei the most. He remained standing right behind his boss, eyeing me like I was the devil coming to take him away.

“You didn’t need to send them out,” I told him, fiddling with one of the rings on my fingers.

Shuuhei leaned forward, his expression serious. “My men did not do this to yours, I swear it. Haruto has been missing for amonth now. We just figured he’d run off with one of his women. My family has been set up.”

I’d figured out as much before this meeting with Shuuhei. But now I had him right where I needed him to be. “Then prove it. Find out who killed your man, and inevitably it will lead me to who killed mine.”

Shuuhei glanced down at Haruto again, the tendon in his jaw twitching as he clenched it. “Deal. Can I take him with me? His mother deserves to be able to bury him.”

I nodded my approval and Shuuhei gestured to the man behind him. The guy ducked outside, returning with two others to carry the body out as Shuuhei himself slid free from the booth and turned to leave.

“Saito,” I called after him, making him pause. “Find out who did this or I will assume that it was you, and while I want to avoid a war at all costs, I will avenge the fifteen men of mine that were taken from this world far too soon and you are at the top of my list.”

Shuuhei nodded solemnly, swallowing hard before he turned to leave, the golden threads of his embroidered suit jacket catching on the bright afternoon light outside as his men closed rank around him.

We waited for them to clear out completely before Collum leaned down next to my ear. “Should we head back to the estate now, Mr. Keane?”

“No,” I said, standing up from the booth and straightening my suit. “There’s one more stop I have to make.”

Ethan Chandler’s screams were still ringing in my ears as I sat in my study for the first time in weeks, sipping on two fingers of whiskey and trying to put all of my raging thoughts into order.

He’d been home and was, of course, holding a dinner with potential donors when I arrived.

When he’d refused to speak to me in another room, I’d put his face into a very hot bowl of soup right in front of said investors. I didn’t give a shit whether I embarrassed him or not. The man deserved it after yanking his daughter’s health insurance away the way he had.

I’d first made a deal with Chandler in order to secure political clout when the man eventually ran for governor of the state. One thing my father had always reiterated to me in between long-winded lessons was that it was always beneficial to have enough allies with everyday legitimacy in your pocket in case you needed to get out of a tight space.

It had made total sense on all fronts to marry Peregrine Chandler. She was what I was looking for in a wife: younger, removed from the traditions of the Keane family, an omega and a fertile one at that, and she came with the political backing of her increasingly powerful father.

Never did I stop long enough to really consider what I was signing up for and today when Rhodes called me to tell me that Chandler had pulled her insurance had been enough for me not to care about Chandler’s fucking support even if he became the president of the whole damn country.

I would find another politician to support, and if I had anything to do with it, I was going to end Chandler’s political career in the process.

I’d just add it onto my never ending to-do list, right under finding out who the fuck was messing with my business if it wasn’t the Japanese.

My money was on Alessandro Amante.

The man was still pissed that I’d stolen his bride right out from under his chosen pack’s noses. It made the most sense for him to be the one fucking with me and my bottom line now.

Or at least it did on paper.

As I sat staring out into the garden, mulling over the events of the past two weeks, the pieces just weren’t fitting together the way they usually did when I puzzled my way through a problem.

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