Page 38 of Savage Sin

Reaper’s heavy shoulders rise and fall. “In a nutshell.”

Ares and I both should have known better when Ghost was eager to get out of the life back home. We had no business offering him a place with the Savages. No one simply walks away from the Bratva. Not alive, anyway. Ares and I are the only exceptions I know of, and we are still fighting to keep their hands out of our territory.

When it came to Ghost, we lowered our guard. We needed help wiping the floor with one of Ares’ brothers and a set of psychotic twins trafficking half of New York City’s women. An exaggeration, but the number of people we saved, and those we failed, felt like a lot of souls to me.

“What’s the plan with Ghost?” On the outside, I keep my expression neutral. Years of hiding my emotions from the murder who raised me taught me to bottle anything remotely close to a feeling under a tight lid. But inside, my heart is raging mad with the knowledge someone tipped off the Colombians to my brother’s undercover presence inside their ranks and that someone is a man I thought of as a brother.

Colombian drug lord plus a Russian with my family’s formula plus Ghost equals flashing neon road signs.

“He’s missing, like you.”

“That so?” Pussy ass motherfucker knows I’ll kill him the second our paths cross. My fingers itch to reach for my guns and go hunting. It will be good practice for when I find Joaquin, but I need to take my advice and keep my anger on lockdown.

Reaper is shaking his head. “Easy, man. I see the murder in your eyes. Is that what all this is about? Revenge?”

“In a nutshell,” I use his own words.

Joaquin Cortes, Silas Antonov and now Ghost.Fucking Ghost.

It’s all clicking and one plus fucking one is equaling a lot more than just two graves I’ll need to dig.

I could explain myself or just get the job done. “You have what I need?”

Reaper considers me for a minute and the silence between grows heavy. “Keep your secrets, Rome. Don’t let them get you killed,” he finally says, looking none too happy about the web weaving around us.

That makes two of us.

Reaper rarely uses my given name. I haven’t heard it in so long it has me pulling my eyes off the ceiling of the warehouse to find him looking at me.

“We all gotta die at some point. I’ll try to keep that from happening too soon.”

He pulls out a bag of Euphoria and tosses it my way.

“What are you going to do with that? If Ares finds out I just gave you drugs he’ll kick my ass twice. Once for lying to him about you and then again for supplying you.”

He’s talking about the days when I would chase my demons away with drugs. I won’t lie. The temptation to lose myself to the sweet embrace of a good high is tempting every day I’m not dead.

“Fuck you, Reaper.”

“I didn’t realize Ares, and the Savages were getting into the cooking biz.”

“You know that’s not what is happening. Give me some time and let me do what I gotta do. I want to break apart the formula and see what they’ve changed about Euphoria. We have to know what’s in it to save lives until we get the shit off the streets.”

Reaper looks like he’s gonna fight me on this.

“Ares’ family has gotten into bed with the Colombian cartels. If they’ve really found a way to get kids hooked on what tore me up years back with none of the side effects of addiction, then we have a bigger problem on our hands than anything currently on the market can do.”

“Ares told me there’s no addiction problem. How is that possible?”

I shake my head. “That is what I want to find out. People pop these pills thinking there are no side effects. Until they drop dead on the spot. No warning signs. No Narcan. Just dead.”

“Fuck.”

“My sentiments exactly.”

“I learned a lot of shit about Euphoria back in the day. But this.” I hold up the baggie. “It’s new. Nothing like what I slammed back years ago. I can’t guarantee answers, but I need to try.” While I wait to find the source. But Reaper is on a need-to-know basis right now.

Reaper steps off his bike and hands me a couple of duffel bags from two large saddlebags. “Do what you have to, but do it fast. I’m here and not at home with my ol’ lady because Ares called me in to help find you.”

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