Page 68 of How I Met My Mafia Monster

The Oleanders will weep when I take my vengeance. And it won't be these small fry who I take it out on. Nerium Oleander himself will know my wrath.

I'll put him in a hell he'll never wake from. But something else bothers me about what he said. It'll take some time for me to mull it over. The fact he's even here is a problem.

"This deal is between us, Cheveau. The Oleanders have nothing to do with it."

"And the human mob?" Anton says, sneering at me.

"Family, like we said."

Anton spits.

"Fine. Enjoy your meeting."

He strolls away. Was he only here to mock us and try to set me off? Or was there some larger purpose to him being here? Why would the Sluagh invite him in the first place?

Farad said the Oleanders gave them something to double cross us. It’s hard to imagine what’d be worth so much.

Cheveau grumbles as we chat, but he hangs back.

In the end, it’s one of the other guys who does the deal and gives us the guns. But the guns are real and they work. No matter how often I think it over, it doesn’t make sense.

“If they don’t want to help us,” Kyran says, as we pile into the car, “Why give us the guns?”

“The Oleanders had them in their pocket the last time we met. No amount of money was going to get them to budge.”

Zedona nods. “They’d been promised something they value more than money. If what you say is true, then the Oleanders must’ve wanted you to have the guns for some reason.”

“We checked them for sabotage and spells,” Kyran says.

“Why make us stronger?” I wonder aloud.

“To get you past your fear,” Zedona says. “When the time comes, they want you to be confident of your victory, so you’ll meet them in the streets. And that’s when their trap will spring, whatever it is.”

He’s not Fae and he’s not Raidh, but Zedona has been in the human mafia a long time. I have to think he has a lot of wisdom.

We ride home in silence, the question burning inside all of us.

Why?

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