Page 30 of Stay Toxic

In reality, he’d been killing everyone and anyone that might or might not have an answer to his questions.

My phone rang, pulling me out of the contemplation of my father, and I stopped next to Brecken’s car.

I pulled the phone out of one pocket and placed it to my ear as I went into the other pocket with my free hand and pulled out a GPS tracker.

“Yes?” I said distractedly.

“Your boy is in my territory.”

I sighed. “Cayden.”

“Why is he here?” he drawled.

“You know why he’s there.” I sighed. “Three dead, all in your territory. You should be happy that I’m only nosing around asking questions and not beating the hell out of you for allowing that to happen to my men.”

“Your men shouldn’t be in Houston, Semyonov,” he stated carefully. Too carefully. “You have any way to get them home safely tonight?”

I frowned as I bent down and placed the tracker onto Brecken’s car.

“What’s good to eat there, Cayden?” I asked, hoping he wouldn’t answer how I somehow expected him to answer. “I’m thinking about heading down there to give my friend a ride home.”

Years and years ago, during a closed-door meeting between our fathers, Cayden and I had made a childhood promise to always take care of the other.

We’d bonded over our psychopath fathers.

On our first visit as young children, we’d of course thought that we would be good friends. Then we’d both been informed separately that we should never trust the other.

Over time, that distrust had formed a bond of trust, and even still, as adults, we’d never called what we had together friendship.

Acknowledging our friendship would be seen as hostile.

We were powerful on our own. Together, we’d be seen as threats and be neutralized. So we maintained our distance, helped out where we could without appearing that we were, and ultimately pretended like we weren’t as good of friends as we were to protect ourselves and our family.

But during that closed-door meeting with our fathers when we were perhaps fourteen or fifteen, we’d realized that just because we weren’t allowed to be friends openly didn’t mean that we couldn’t be friends in private.

That day, we’d come up with a plan to always offer help when the other needed it.

“How will I know if you ever need anything?” I asked my childhood friend who I wasn’t actually allowed to be friends with.

“If you call, or I call, and ask you…” Cayden hesitated. “If I ask you if there’s anything good to eat, and you answer with, there’s never anything good to eat, we’ll know that the other is in trouble and needs help.”

There’d been times over the years that we’d said the phrase to each other, and the other had always answered in a way that we knew the other was all right. But somehow I knew this time would be different.

There’s never anything good to eat.

“There’s never anything good to eat,” Cayden said, confirming my fears.

I stood up slowly and stretched my arms up high over my head.

“Okay, well if that’s the case, I’ll talk to you later,” I said.

“Get your men out of Houston, Semyonov,” Cayden said and hung up.

I immediately placed another call.

Ivan, the man that took care of things logistically when Alexi wasn’t around to do it, answered on the second ring.

He was panting, and I wondered if I’d interrupted him in the middle of sex, or a workout session.

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