Page 71 of Keep Him Like Secrets

“I’m gonna be putting up a security system. But I’d like it if you and your brothers could keep an eye on the place while it’s being renovated. Let me know if you see anything suspicious. Report it to me—or Bass here—immediately.”

“What’re you paying?”

You had to respect his guts.

Most criminals, once they realized they’d fucked around on the mob, would be begging for leniency, not demanding money.

“It’s a round-the-clock kind of job,” I told him, knowing he had other brothers home to keep an eye on the younger ones while he pulled a night shift. “Two hundred a day.”

It was chump change for me.

It would be enough to keep his family afloat. Without he or his siblings needing to risk arrest or retribution from other local crews by stealing over and over.

“No strings?”

“Not outside of not stealing from the place anymore yourself.”

“Won’t need to,” Cormac said with a shrug.

“Alright. Starting tomorrow. You got a phone?”

He gave me a tight nod, reaching for his pre-paid cell, then taking down my number, then Bass’s number too—just in case.

“If anything at all seems suspicious, give one of us a call. If whoever is there has access to a phone, take pictures.”

“Got it,” Cormac said. “No,” he added when I reached for my wallet to hand him money. “Don’t need your pity.”

“It’s not pity,” I said, handing him a fifty. “I amnotpushing that fucking thing all the way back to the club. I hope you stretched. Don’t want you pulling a muscle.”

With that, we made our way back across Brooklyn, with me stopping to grab a damn baseball cap to tuck my hair into before getting back to the club.

The cops had likely been and gone, and Soren was standing there in his stupidly nice suit that fit him in all the right ways. The jerk.

Gav was saying something to him, but broke off mid-sentence, raised a hand, and pointed toward us as we got closer.

Soren turned, eyes going wide as he looked at Bass and Cormac pushing the dumpster. Then, as his gaze slid to me, a smile was hiding in the corner of his lips.

“Guess I should call the cops back and cancel that police report, huh?”

“Don’t bother. They were never going to waste manpower looking for some stolen marble anyway. Around here, you’re better off handling that kind of thing yourself. So, here’s the marble. No harm, no foul. Sorry if you guys were looking forward to a few days off,” I called to a few of Gav’s workers who were standing around still.

“Come on, guys, let’s get this all sorted,” Gav said, moving over toward the dumpster.

“I’m going home to shower and change,” Bass said, looking sweaty and miserable.

“Cormac, be in touch,” I said, getting a nod from the teenager before he turned and walked off. He was trying to keep his gait casual, but as soon as he thought he was far enough away, he broke into a run—likely off to go buy some decent food to feed his siblings.

“Your driver is here… installing security cameras.” The suspicion was there in his tone.

“Serano is a man of many skills,” I said, shrugging. “Those cameras should have been up before we got anything delivered. This was our own fault.”

“I wasn’t expecting a delivery that fast. Gav heard I wanted a rush on this, and got a little carried away. He was sweating bricks about it. But, like you said, no harm, no foul.”

I didn’t miss the way his hungry gaze moved over me. Or the way my body immediately started to thrum with memory, with renewed need.

I had to get away from him.

Before I did something stupid. Like invite him back to my apartment to check out my sheets.

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