Page 58 of Wilt

“Nikolai.” Rush lets out a loud sigh. Grabbing the bottle of Macallan on my desk, he nabs a glass from the wet bar and pours himself a drink, refilling the glass already in front of me. “I came in here for a reason.”

I ignore him. We’ll get to that, whatever it is. “What do you think, Rush, of me asking for a big old chunk of Finnegan’s territory and businesses?”

He runs a hand over his face and swallows down half the drink, balancing a box on this lap. “I guess it depends on if he’s going to start that war?”

I snort. “If he starts one, then I’ll take it all. I’m just thinking about what I want, apart from Finnegan to suffer.”

Rush shrugs. “We could just kill him.”

I shake my head. That isn’t an option, and Rush knows it. “No. I want him to fucking suffer. So do you.”

He nods. It isn’t a lie, but there’s something on his mind. There has been since I finger fucked Rose at the dining table at Dietrich’s. If he wants her, he’s out of luck. He might be my cousin, but Rose is all mine.

I shake my head slightly, refocusing on the important things: work. I’ve spent all afternoon working from home. It should be easy, if tedious, work, but Rose is there in my head, interrupting when I don’t need it at all.

Suddenly, I look at Rush. “What were you saying when you came in?

“Yeah? You finally decided to listen?”

“I’m not in the mood for games.”

He finishes his drink and I take a sip of mine. “Peterson said there was a delivery a little while back.”

Now that has my interest. “Special delivery, I’m assuming?” I eye the box. I’m not concerned about a bomb. It’s not the style of any of my enemies and certainly not Finnegan’s. No, he likes things very close, very personal, and very, very nasty.

Besides, it would have been swept, like every package that arrives at the front gate. There are also no markings on it, just my name. I smile.

“Jesus, du—ah, Nikolai, don’t smile like that.”

I wait because clearly, Rush knows what’s in it and he’s got a point to make. I want to remind him, my most trusted second hand, that he doesn’t get to spout off at me, even if he’s my cousin. Seriously, I preferred it when Rush was all content in his role with limited responsibility.

Rush is loyal beyond anything and he’s not cut out for my job, but he’d step in if he had to. I know that. I also know he doesn’t want it. He can be vicious, hard as nails, willing to kill and do all the dirty things he needs to get jobs done, but he likes his role. Mine? That’s a different level all together. He could do it, but as I said, he doesn’t want to.

No doubt it’d reduce his fucking women and hedonistic extracurricular activities. No, he’s got something brewing in his fucking head.

“Out with it. I’ve got a busy schedule.” I do and I don’t. I want to go see Rose, maybe taunt her, maybe punish her, maybe just amuse myself. I have work. I always have work and my plan with Finnegan is intricate. Rose being Rose doesn’t help at all. I take another sip of my drink and bring her bedroom up as the main screen on my computer.

Rose is just sitting there, painting her toes with the polish I gave her. She’s wearing my shirt and it’s open, falling from one shoulder, one tit temptingly on display.

Shit. Fuck. I look up because my fucking pants get tight. “Well?”

Rush sets down his empty glass and fists his hands on the open box. “You’re smiling like you want this war and you don’t give a fuck what’ll happen to you.” He pauses. “Or her.”

“You care about Rosalind?”

“No. Yes. No. I mean, Nikolai, I care that she’s an innocent, no matter who her father is. I care about you. I love you, man. You’re all the family I have.”

I rub the bridge of my nose before I set my gaze on him. Emotions make me uncomfortable. “Finnegan didn’t have one fuck to give when he killed your parents. Your father I could almost give him a pass over, if I was that type, but your mom? There are fucking rules, ones you don’t cross, and Derek Finnegan not only crossed about ten of them, he obliterated them.”

I worked my ass off to be in this position, to earn my place in this family. I wasn’t born into it, like Rush was. His parents took me in after my own died in a shootout. I was a child then, barely a teen, but they made me who I am today and gave me the name Wilder when I proved myself worthy.

I owe them everything, but in the end, I wasn’t able to protect them against Finnegan. Guilt claws through me, like it always does when I think about their deaths. It’s quickly followed by anger.

Fuck Finnegan. He’s going to pay, no matter what I have to do to make it happen.

“Finnegan thinks he got a pass, and he didn’t. Rosalind’s innocence doesn’t buy that, and it doesn’t give her a walk free card. Her innocence gives her nothing. I haven’t killed her yet, but many would have, carved her up after torturing her.” Raping her. Doing the things Finnegan did to my aunt. I know. I saw the fucking footage.

Footage that Rush will never in his life see. It’s bad enough I know the extent. He doesn’t need that shit show.

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