Dirty Damage: Chapter 28

The Kangaroo is exactly what you’d expect from a place that serves watered-down piss and calls it beer. Dark wood, darker faces, and the kind of stench that makes you wonder if something died in here last week.

“This is a terrible fucking idea,” Artem mutters beside me, his usual grin replaced with a scowl that means business.

A few patrons are scattered around like forgotten garbage. Only the bartender is paying us any attention, his watery green eyes darting between me and the door like he’s expecting something.

“Ten minutes,” I say under my breath, moving toward the black door behind the bar. “That’s how long we have before this place fills up with more assholes than bullets.”

“Ten minutes? Since when did you become an optimist?” Artem follows close, his shoulder brushing mine.

Ready. Always ready.

“Since I started having something to lose.”

The words slip out before I can catch them, and I feel Artem’s knowing look drilling into the back of my head. He knows better than to poke at that right now, but I’ll never hear the end of it later.

It would be even worse if he knew how I spent the hours after the gunfight. Instead of diving into surveillance and recon like I normally would’ve, I was offline for hours, wrapped up in Sutton until I literally couldn’t keep my eyes open.

Every time I thought about leaving the room, I’d remember the fear in her eyes as she was crouched on the floor of the limo. I kept seeing a different outcome, one where she didn’t make it out of the car.

I needed to remind myself that she was alive.

Needed to feel her under me, around me.

I shove thoughts of her soft skin under my hands to the back of my mind as we approach the bartender.

“Private game back there,” he says, shaking his head. “Members only.”

I pull out a thick stack of hundreds, letting them land on the sticky bar with a wet slap. “Consider this my membership fee.”

His mustache twitches, eyes sliding to the ancient drunk at the end of the bar. A signal. Subtle, but not subtle enough.

He folds the cash into his palm and shrugs. “Your funeral.”

The door to the back room creaks like something out of a horror movie. The dank smell is even stronger back here—stale beer and the kind of desperation you can taste.

A single bulb swings overhead, casting shadows that dance on the water-stained walls.

“That mudak is setting us up,” Artem hisses in my ear.

“I know.”

“Then why the fuck are we sticking around?”

“Because we have time,” I say calmly.

We turn a sharp corner and I spot the poker table through the haze of smoke. Four men are hunched over it, but I hone in on Drew Anton immediately.

His lean, lanky build and white-blonde hair are even more distinctive in person than in the pictures that my security team tracked down. When he clocks us, he leans back in his chair, an oily smile stretched across his face that makes me want to shake Sutton and ask what the hell she was thinking.

“I don’t remember inviting more players to this game,” he drawls.

“We invited ourselves.” I grin tightly. “Kind of like you did last night.”

The other players shift in their chairs, hands drifting beneath the table where their hardware waits.

Amateur hour. If they were any good with those guns, they wouldn’t telegraph their moves like scared children.

“I don’t know what you’re talkin’ about, man,” Drew says, but there’s a tremor in his voice that betrays him.

So I show him what I mean.

I slam my hands on the table and flip it, sending cards and chips and drinks flying everywhere. The men jump back, falling over themselves in surprise.

One fumbles for his gun, but before he can get a grip on it, I’ve fired a warning shot.

Into his head.

The sound echoes off the walls as he drops, painting the floor sticky red.

“Anyone else feeling brave?” I survey the room. “I’m willing to stake my life on who the best shot in this room is.”

The smile has been wiped clean off Drew’s face. “Whatever you want with me⁠—”

“I want nothing to do with you,” I interrupt, stepping over the dead body. “You’re the one who decided to play with fire by attacking me last night.”

“That wasn’t me,” he stammers. “You’ve got it wrong⁠—”

I grab his shirt, yanking him close enough to smell his fear. “The patch on your jacket says otherwise. Want to try again?”

Suddenly, his expression shifts. His upper lip curls. “You don’t understand what you’re walking into,” he spits. “Old Gordy upstairs has already called for backup. You really think you can take on twenty guys?”

Behind me, Artem checks his watch. Our window is shrinking.

“I think,” I say, tightening my grip until Drew whimpers, “that you should be more worried about what I can do to you in the next thirty seconds.”

A bead of sweat trickles down his face. “What do you want?”

“The Martineks. Are they running this show?”

“No.”

Bullshit. Too quick. Too clean.

“So you just decided to play road warrior for fun?”

“You can’t prove I was there,” he sneers, finding his spine now that he can hear engines revving outside. “Maybe someone borrowed my colors. Maybe⁠—”

“Doesn’t mean you’re innocent.”

But he’s right. I never actually saw him. No one did.

And if this asshole really dated Sutton, she’d recognize his mark, wouldn’t she?

“You’re far from innocent yourself, aren’t you?” He lifts his chin.

I could kill him where he stands and call it a day. It would satisfy the itch I have to remove him from Sutton’s life permanently.

At the thought, I almost want to laugh.

She kissed me in front of my ex out of jealousy and here I am, thinking about killing hers. Talk about rapid escalation.

“Consider this a warning.” I shove Drew back until he rocks on his heels. “You and your bosses come for me a second time and there’ll be hell to pay.”

I turn towards Artem, who is already taking aim at the padlock on the back door. He shoots it twice, the metal shattering to pieces.

“Is this really about the Martineks?” Drew calls after me, braver now that there’s space between us. “Or is this about Sutton?”

The sound of her name in his mouth makes the hair on the back of my neck rise. Rage I can’t leash down growls deep in my chest as I turn to him.

His grin twists, crooked and salacious. “Believe me when I say she isn’t worth the drama.”

Artem grabs my shoulder, trying to haul me out. “We gotta go, O.”

I ignore him. “I don’t need your advice.”

“But that’s the upside of sloppy seconds.” He shrugs happily. “You can benefit from my experience. Once you’ve fucked her a couple times, she loses her appeal.”

I tear out of Artem’s grip and cross the room in three paces. My fist connects with his face, cartilage crunching beneath my knuckles before he can even drop his smarmy smile. Blood sprays as he staggers back, howling.

Footsteps thunder behind us and Artem curses. “Oleg! Let’s go, goddammit!”

I hate that I don’t have time to admire my handiwork, but we have to go.

I spit at Drew’s feet. “Next time, it’ll be a bullet instead.”

We crash through the back door just as the cavalry arrives, their shouts echoing behind us. Artem and I sprint around the corner where he parked the Range Rover and leap inside.

We squeal away from the curb, leaving acrid, burnt rubber in our wake.

“That was too fucking close.” Artem’s knuckles are white on the steering wheel. “Since when do you let dickheads like him bait you like that?”

I flex my bruising hand. The pain feels good. Earned.

“Since never.”

“Exactly.” He takes a hard right, checking the mirrors. “The minute he mentioned her name, you lost it.”

Artem isn’t wrong. I’ve never lost control like that before.

Not for anyone.

But instead of admitting that, I bark out orders. “Get surveillance on him. I want to know every move he makes, every contact, every fucking sneeze. Something here isn’t adding up.”

“You think?”

“I fucking know.”

The rest of the ride passes in silence. By the time we pull up to my building, the sun is setting and my mind is a war zone of possibilities.

None of them are good.

The apartment feels empty when I walk in. For years, I lived in this silence, but now, I’m used to music pumping through the speakers and the soft footfalls of Sutton’s bare feet in the hallway.

I grab the bottle of whiskey from the bar cart, pouring myself an all-too familiar glass, trying not to think about how quickly she’s gotten under my skin.

How hearing her name in Drew’s bloody mouth made me want to tear his throat out.

How the thought of her afraid in that limo makes my hands shake even now.

The door opens just as I’m contemplating a second glass. Sutton walks in looking like she’s seen a ghost. Her skin is pale, her eyes wide and haunted.

“Everything okay?” I ask, already moving toward her.

She tries to smile but it doesn’t reach her eyes. “Fine. Just… went to the grocery store.”

I glance at her empty hands. “What did you get?”

She looks down at her palms as though she expects to find something there. “I, um… didn’t find what I wanted.”

I move towards her. “Are you sure you’re alright?”

“Of course.” Another fake smile. “I’ve just been a little distracted since yesterday.”

I expect to be met with a barrage of questions about who the masked motorcyclists were, but she doesn’t bring them up at all.

What’s going on inside her head?

I step closer, drawn to her like gravity. “Don’t worry. I handled it. No more masked riders.”

“Are you hungry?” she asks, obviously changing the subject.

I grab her arm, pulling her against me. “Starving.”

When I kiss her, she’s stiff at first, like she’s fighting something inside herself. But when I hold her jaw, opening her mouth to me, she melts with a sigh.

I lift her, carrying her toward the bedroom, trying to convince myself that this is enough.

That I don’t need to know what’s hiding behind her eyes.