Everything in my life has become a source of frustration. In the three weeks since Niko came to stay with me on what the Welfare hacks called “provisional custody,” I’ve come no closer to finding the man who killed his parents.

The boy has gotten worse, too. At first, I thought he was going to be okay. That he was young enough to pass through this nightmare mostly unscathed.

But I was wrong.

There’s a darkness churning in him. He’s afraid, he’s angry, he’s lashing out at every opportunity with crying tantrums that last hours by day and thrashing terrors that last hours at night. Already, he’s burned through three nannies, each of whom has said they wouldn’t stay with him even if I doubled or tripled their pay. The last one, who left yesterday, didn’t even make it a week.

And the social workers keep asking me how he’s doing. I want to scream at them, He saw his mother dragged out of his house to be murdered right in front of him—how do you think he’s doing?

But I know I’m on thin ice with the law already. My midnight visit to Judge Herrington got the wheels moving, but he wasn’t lying when he said his hands were tied. There are some things money can’t buy, and apparently, cooperation from Child Welfare is on that list. So they keep calling, keep sending letters to my mailbox and people to my door.

It’s all been boiling up in me until now, when I’ve suddenly found myself bashing in the skull of this con artist chump who lied to my men when we went around town asking if anyone had leads on the Justice Killer. I should’ve known that he was a two-bit snake oil salesman just looking for a payday. I shouldn’t have even bothered getting my hands dirty with him.

But I’m off my game. Dmitry and Brianne’s deaths are still weighing on me, fucking with my head, dragging me down into sweaty nightmares of my own that have me waking up in a panic in the middle of the night again and again.

“He’s out cold, boss,” Pietrov reassures me as he pries my hand loose from the unconscious man’s collar.

I let go and look down. The man is puddled at my feet, his eyes vacant and glazed over. It’s obvious—I went too far.

“Get him out of here,” I sigh. I turn and stride over to the bar that sits in the corner. Not even bothering with a glass, I pour a shot of whiskey straight down my throat. It burns like hellfire.

Good. I need that. The pain helps me focus.

“Mr. Morozov?” comes a timid voice.

Frowning, I turn around and see my housekeeper standing in the doorway. She has her eyes aimed straight between her feet like she doesn’t want to be a witness to whatever you’d call the beatdown that just happened in here. She flinches but doesn’t say anything as Pietrov and another of my lieutenants, Slavik, drag the con man’s limp body past her and out of the room.

“What?” I snap.

“You have a visitor.”

My frown deepens. “Who is it?”

“She—she says she’s from Child Protective Services?”

Oh, fuck.

I forgot all about that. Today is the appointment for a check-in with CPS. They want to know how Niko is adjusting, how he’s feeling, what I am doing to make him comfortable. Most of all, they want to know if I can provide a good home for him.

I look down at my hands. They’re covered in blood. My face is, too, from where I head-butted the man being dragged out. My breath smells like whiskey and the collar of my shirt is stained with sweat.

I don’t look like a good adoptive father.

I look like a monster.

“Tell her to go away,” I snarl.

I turn to go back to the whiskey, but I notice my housekeeper hasn’t moved.

I whirl back. “What did I just say?”

The woman gulps and for the first time, raises her gaze and meets mine. “I did that already, sir, like you told me to do last time. She said that if you don’t meet with her within the next five minutes, she’ll call the police to come take your neph—the boy.” She’s wringing her hands in front of her and fidgeting like she wishes she could be anywhere else on the planet.

But her stare is firm. It cuts through the cloud of chaos in my head.

Fuck.

It looks like this meeting will have to occur as planned.