The Hellion (Wicked Wallflowers #1)(86)

I have to make this right . . . There has to be a mistake . . .

He froze. “It doesn’t make sense, Ryker,” Adair said from the corner of his mouth, in barely audible tones. With her emphatic defense, Cleopatra had surely realized as much. It had been why she’d sent him here.

Calum, with his long-heightened sense of hearing, gave him a dark, silencing look.

Ignoring it, Adair moved closer to Ryker.

One of the burly guards behind Killoran’s desk alternated his pistol between them. “Not another step,” the man barked.

In reply, Niall brought his pistol up, leveling it at the guard nearest him.

“Think about it,” Adair whispered, unfazed by the weapon pointed at his chest. “Killoran would have to be a bloody fool to not at the very least wait until the terms of the truce were met.” Cleopatra’s marriage. “Why would he act now?” he continued through flat lips.

Ryker flexed his jaw. “I don’t know,” he said grudgingly. “Perhaps it’s a mark of his arrogance.”

Adair shook his head. “He values his power and prestige above all. He’d not jeopardize that by harming either our club or family—”

“He’s already harmed our club,” Ryker put in.

“—before Cleopatra marries.”

His brother frowned.

“You know I’m right,” Adair pressed.

“You two over there. Quiet,” the taller guard in the corner of the room barked.

The door opened, and Killoran swept inside. “Black,” he called out. “Thorne, Dabney, Marksman. Always a pleasure.” He moved the way a king might at court, among his lesser subjects. Not breaking stride, he lifted his right hand up. His three guards, without hesitation, sheathed their weapons and filed to the corner of the room.

Adair followed their practiced movements better suited to soldiers and found a grudging respect for that complete control of his men and their routine.

Cleopatra’s brother perched his hip on the corner of his desk. “Black. I trust all is well with my sister?”

It was the first question put to them . . . not about their arrangement or business or any of the thousand other contentions between them . . . but his sister, Cleopatra.

Ryker grinned a coldly dark grin, devoid of humor and full of threat.

Adair took a step forward. “Cleopatra is fine,” he said quietly.

Killoran swung his focus over to him, his keen gaze saying he’d seen more than Adair intended with that assurance. Straightening, Cleopatra’s brother strolled to the sideboard and poured himself a tall snifter of brandy. “You had better hope she is, Thorne.” He paused, setting the decanter down. “For if she’s not,” he went on when he’d turned back, “I’ll off you all.” He followed that threat with a toast.

“Another threat,” Niall snarled, taking a lunging step forward. “After what you’ve done, Oi expect nothing more from the likes of you and your people.”

One of Killoran’s men matched his steps, but the head proprietor lifted another hand, gesturing his guard back into place.

“Oh?” Killoran grinned over the rim of his glass. “And what am I have rumored to have done—”

Ryker tossed the leather folio into the center of the room. It landed with a soft thwack on the Aubusson carpet.

His earlier bravado flagged, and Killoran hesitated.

“We know everything,” his brother growled. “We found your man lurking at the club. Next time, you’d be wise not to leave a Diggory calling card.”

Adair studied Cleopatra’s brother closely. One could always tell much about a person’s guilt by their reaction . . . or nonreaction . . . to a heated charge. Confusion darkened the rival proprietor’s eyes. He glanced over to Adair and quickly concealed that show. “Rather cryptic of you,” Cleopatra’s brother drawled. “I wouldn’t have taken you or your brothers as ones given to theatrics.” Glass in hand, Broderick strolled over and retrieved the folder. Returning to his desk, he offered his back to the assembled guests.

It was just another telltale indication of the other man’s origins—ones that Cleopatra had revealed. The rustle of page after page being turned crowded out the silence of the room. Killoran’s shoulders went taut, and his upper arm muscles strained the fabric of his jacket.

“Brewster was discovered inside the club.”

“I see that,” Killoran said evenly as he closed up the folder and turned it over.

“He’s going to Newgate,” Niall called out. “For arson and attempted murder, Killoran.”

The color bled from his face.

“And we’re having you investigated for plotting the fire,” Calum murmured, his calming soberness a marked juxtaposition of Niall’s hardheadedness.

“You’re making a mistake.” To Killoran’s credit, he responded dismissively to threats against himself. He set the folder down on the edge of his desk. “Brewster had no part in anything.”

“Then you—”

“If I wanted to destroy your club, Black, it would have been in ashes long before now,” Cleopatra’s brother impatiently cut in, his words an echo of her protestations.

In the first crack of his remarkable composure, Killoran dusted a hand over his face. “Outside.”