Page 60 of Sunrise Malice

“I have that handled,” Julien says quickly. I’m worried the two men might start dick measuring but instead Ronan just nods like he understands.

“This business with Dusan is already ugly,” Ronan says.

Julien grunts in reply. “That’s an understatement.”

“You killed his favorite cousin.”

“His favorite? Nobody told me about that.” Julien looks unhappy as he leans back in the chair. “Dusan crossed plenty of lines himself.”

“But you still started this damn conflict.” Ronan glares at Julien.

“Don’t blame him too much.” Valentina interrupts and seems to soften her husband’s anger. “From what I hear, there’s another power in the French world these days?”

“My Grandpère is visiting from Marseille. Technically, he’s the head of our organization.” Julien says this as simply as he can but I hear the emotion in his voice. There’s a deep note of frustration written all over him, and I’m surprised at how adept I’ve become at reading his moods.

“Technically?” Valentina asks.

“I’ve been running my organization with a lot of autonomy for a long time.”

“His grandfather is the reason this war got started,” I say, and Julien shoots me a hard look. “What? You weren’t going to tell them, but it’s the truth.”

Reluctantly, Julien tells them about how his grandfather went behind his back and orchestrated the initial attack on Dusan’s facility. “If it were up to me, I would have left things as they were.”

Valentina and Ronan share a loaded look that I can’t quite interpret, and I have a brief stab of jealousy. They seem to have a really deep and meaningful relationship, and I don’t know if I’ll ever have anything like that in my life. I feel something growing between me and Julien, in the way I can read his emotions and how I can almost guess at what his intentions are just from his body language, but I don’t know if that’ll bloom into something more or if it’s just that I’m slowly getting to know him.

And it doesn’t matter. I have to remember that I’m not married to Julien because I love him.

While Ronan clearly loves Valentina—it’s obvious by the way he looks at her and almost defers to her opinions.

“In general, I’m not a fan of starting wars,” Ronan says and gestures at Julien.

“Says the guy that slaughtered a motorcycle gang not all that long ago.”

Ronan grimaces. “I wasn’t given much choice.”

“Then you understand how I’m feeling. Grandpère might’ve backed me into this situation, but it isn’t like I can walk away from it, especially not anymore. Dusan dropped a bomb on my fucking doorstep. He nearly killed my wife.”

Ronan glances at me. “While I appreciate the chivalry?—”

“If you’re about to say something about our arrangement, you should watch yourself,” Julien growls and I have to put a hand on his knee to make him calm down.

I glance over and Valentina’s staring at us thoughtfully. She’s got a little smile on her face, and I quickly pull my hand back from Julien, afraid of what she’s got running through her head right now.

“I’m just saying that the Hayes Group isn’t in the war business right now. We went through too much with Cormac’s betrayal and everyone’s too raw.”

“War is bad for the city,” Julien says, finally getting to the argument we came here to make. “With the help of your people, we can finish off Dusan and end this before it gets to the point that the police are getting involved and the Biancos start throwing around their weight. If you recall, we have an alliance now, and typically allies help each other.”

Ronan’s jaw works. “I was under the impression our friendship was a business alignment.”

“And I was under the impression that you weren’t a fucking coward,” Julien snaps back.

“You French piece of shit,” Ronan says, half standing. “I never wanted to marry anyone in my family off to you, but you gave me no choice, and now I’m fucking stuck with you.”

“You think I like this? Coming to you and asking for help? I’d rather cut off my own fucking hand.”

“Then go ahead and do it,” Ronan snarls.

“Boys, that’s enough.” Valentina’s voice cuts them both off. I grab Julien’s elbow, tugging on him and giving him a serious look.

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