Page 3 of Grift

I shrug. Not my problem. It’ll get handled. But I need to get my damn head on straight and get cleaned up, fast.

A walk in the fresh air will do me good, so I take the long way around through the cold night from the back of the casino to the adjacent hotel. It’s not much to look at but the space helps me clear my head.

Traffic rushes by, the frenetic pace of the city evident in the relentless stream of cars passing by on the highways. Angry Boston drivers honk at each other. I look up, but the sky’s too obscured by winter’s early darkness and smog to reveal the stars I hope to see. The bleak environment is a good fit for my mood: flat.

It should feel good: blow off pent up steam and take care of a problem that’s been front and center at the casino for weeks. Even my father might spare a kind word or at least stop bitching about this particular problem.

For some reason though, I don’t feel anything. It’s getting harder to feel much of anything but anger, and even that seems more muscle memory than real fury. Sometimes I wonder if my emotions have just been worn down by all the dark shit I’ve had to do. Or maybe I was born like this, not wired to feel the right things. That doesn’t seem right. I’d felt a lot of things when I was younger, but they dulled out over time.

I stop at an outside utility tap and rinse the blood off my hands in water so cold that I hiss out a breath, then slide my phone out of my pocket and fire off a text to Callan. Callan’s my younger brother, but he’s my father’s right-hand man. He’ll bring him up to speed and I can make sure I get to this damn gala on time.

Using my passcode, I slip in through a back door to the Casino’s adjacent hotel and take a service elevator up to my room. Once I’m there, I strip off my suit – salvageable – and trash my shirt.

Stepping into the hot shower, I let the scalding water beat over me and enjoy the sting of it against my skin as it slowly thaws. It brings me back into my body and the sensation is enough to finish calming me down. When all the blood’s washed away, I rinse the shower and turn off the water flow.

By the time I’m out of the shower, my phone’s lighting up.

It’s Callan. “We’ve got a problem. On our way up.”

I just manage to pull on pants before the door to the suite swings open, my father leading the way.

There’s no praise in the hard lines of his face, not even the kind of passive joy he sometimes shows when one of his enemies has been meted some justice. Instead, James Carney is all blazing blue eyes, nostrils flaring, his face so red a new blood vessel burst into a spiderweb of veins on his cheek. Shit.

“What the fuck did you do?” he bellows.

I’m a head taller than my father, and his bellowing hasn’t scared me in decades. My eyes go instead to Callan, whose cool refinement isn’t broken by whatever has sent my father into his latest tantrum.

“The card counter,” Callan says helpfully, raising a cool eyebrow. “Did you check his ID? Get his name? Take a second to recognize the face, maybe?”

Check his ID. Why the fuck would I check his ID? But then of course, I immediately can think of a thousand reasons to know his name. Everything from naming the latest weight on my soul to mitigating the fall out if things went bad. Yet none of those things had occurred to me in the moment.

Clearly there has been fall out. I’m a man who acts from my instincts. Fight first, ask questions later. Maybe not the best choice to be judge, jury and enforcer.

“He’s a fucking Kensington,” my father is practically spitting with rage.

I still don’t move. Early on I learned that one of my biggest advantages in this family is wearing my size and my lack of fear like armor. The name rings a bell, but not fast enough, because Dad is winding up for another explosion when Callan steps in.

“Dad, Patrick, have a seat. We need a drink.” He’s already behind the bar, pouring the very expensive whiskey I’d prefer to drink alone. “Kensington as in Senator Kensington, White House hopeful and one of our biggest investors.”

Shit. Shit. Shit.

Of course. Now I can see the resemblance, the bland features that weren’t really handsome but had been forced into “better than average” with a decade of braces and a five-hundred-dollar haircut.

“He called Daddy within five minutes,” Callan smirks. But there’s no humor there.

What can I say? Under any other circumstances, this reaction might be what I get for having let the guy walk away at all after he’d been caught taking money from our casino multiple times. But the fact that this guy is the son of one of our most important allies? Even a dense thug like me can see that’s a big fucking problem.

My father rarely drinks, but he downs the thirty-year-old whiskey in one move, making a face. I knock my own back without flinching. Small comforts and all that.

“So what do you want me to do?” They wouldn’t be here if they didn’t want me to do something. The Carneys don’t keep their oldest son the payroll for his brains.

“Kensington called. He’s furious, talking about opening RICO investigations and getting you brought up on charges for assault at the very least. The kid’s in the fucking ICU and while he’ll definitely make it, they’re saying he’ll need reconstructive surgery. The Senator’s holding off for now after I pointed out that it’s not going to look great that his younger son is a thieving, drug-addicted gambler,” my father says. “But all I’ve done is buy us time.”

“And not much of it. He’s coming tonight to the gala,” Callan follows. “We’ve got a sit down planned in less than an hour.”

My father stands abruptly and looks me over again. “I’ve got something on Kensington that will hurt his reputation far worse than his son’s gambling. I was saving this for when he tried to pull his support from the project, which we all know is coming. But maybe there’s a way to pivot this so that there’s a better outcome for all of us. A more enduring connection that would keep Kensington in our pocket.”

Before I can speak, he adds, “But don’t you think for one second that I’m going to forget that you forced my hand in this. We’re on this timeline because of your actions, and the consequences are on you.”

He moves to the door. “You get yourself cleaned up and get your ass over to the gala. And the next time you practically murder someone on my property, make sure you know his god damned name first.”

He’s already in the hallway when Callan looks my way. “I’m afraid this still might land with you, big brother. Just not in the way you’re thinking.”

There’s a rush of cold air as the door swings shut.

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