Page 102 of The Kings of Kearny

I looked up at his son. “Please tell me you filled him in on the way here.”

Jakob nodded and took a step back, ignoring his looming father, eyes locked on me. “This isn’t over between us.”

“I’m not saying it’s over. I’m saying I need a couple of days.”

His jaw flexed. Without another word, he turned on his heel and strode inside.

I got my stuff out of the car and followed after him a few minutes later. Liam blocked the doorway. Jakob was nowhere to be seen.

“Where’d he go?” I asked.

Liam met my eyes with the same unflinching focus as his son. “Probably down in the basement, kicking the shit out of a punching bag.”

“Good. You and I need to talk.”

He held out his hand. From the look on his face, he was as mad at me as I was at him. “Give me the thumb drive first.”

I fished it out of my handbag and passed it over.

He turned in to the house and headed toward his back office. I followed him, pausing to check in on Gran and Jennifer playing cards in the living room.

“How’s it going?” I asked.

Jennifer snorted. “She’s kicking my ass.”

I met Gran’s eyes over her head and grinned. “I told you she was a shark.”

Gran smiled back. “You want to join us?”

I shook my head. “Iliza invited us to stay with her and Fred for a few days.”

Gran’s expression lit up. “Really?”

I nodded. “Want to pack your things? I want to head out soon so we get there in time for dinner.”

“As soon as we finish this hand,” Gran said.

Jennifer let out a pained groan and laid her next card. From the hungry gleam in Gran’s eyes, she was about to finish her off.

Liam was at his desk when I walked into his office. He sat behind a computer screen with a pair of glasses perched on his nose. The sight did the trick of reminding me that he was human after all, aging and fallible as the rest of us. Gran and Jennifer were just in the other room, Jakob downstairs only a yell away. I had nothing to fear from Liam. The only way he could hurt me was with words, and I knew from experience that people only hurt you if you let them. The good thing was that I didn’t care enough about his opinion to be bothered by what he thought of me, and as I focused on that thought, I readied myself to go to war with him.

“There,” he said, closing his laptop. He set his glasses aside and turned to me. “I sent the pictures to Mike. He’ll get them to the Jokers. They should be out of Magnolia in a few hours.”

“Good. Thank you,” I said. No harm in being polite.

“What you did,” Liam started.

I cut him off. “Nope.”

He frowned. “Excuse me?”

“Nope,” I repeated. “You don’t get to sit there and pass judgment on me for what I did. Not after all the shit you put me and Jakob and my gran and your wife and God knows how many other people through.”

“Now you listen to me,” he said, brow creasing in anger.

“No,” I told him, voice even but firm. And then I said, just as calmly, “You’re going to lose your son.”

He blinked. I’d caught him off guard. Good.

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