Hard Rules

“That’s right,” I say, already thinking of all the ways I could make her say my name again. “I’ve never seen you here before.”

“I’ve never been here before,” she counters and I have this sense that we are sparring, when we’re not. Or are we?

My cell phone rings and I silently curse the timing, some sixth sense telling me that the minute I let go of this woman, she’s gone, but I also have to think about whatever explosion Seth is trying to contain. “Don’t move,” I order, before releasing her to dig my phone from my pocket. I glance down at the caller ID to find my mother’s number, and just that fast, Emily darts around me.

I curse and turn, fully intending to pursue her, only to have Seth step in front of me. Considering the man equals my six feet two inches, and is broader than I am wide, he stops me in my tracks. I grimace and he arches a blond brow that matches the thick waves of hair on his head. “Looking for me?”

“You’ll do,” I say, reaching for my coffee and bypassing it to pick up Emily’s instead, or rather holding it captive for the return I doubt she’ll make.

“Good to see you too,” he says, the words dripping with his trademark sarcasm, which five years of knowing him has taught me to expect.

“Bring me good news for once,” I say, motioning us forward, leading the way through several display racks of chocolates and coffees, as well as a trio of empty tables, to claim a seat at a corner table facing the entryway.

Seth sits next to me rather than across from me, keeping an eye on the door, the ex-CIA agent in him ever present, his skills and loyalty paired with his no-nonsense attitude only a few of the reasons I recruited him from my firm in New York. He opens a large white envelope and pulls out a picture, setting it in front of me. “The private security company we contracted to do surveillance on your brother delivered this to me about an hour ago.”

I stare down at the image of my brother handing a large envelope to a man I’ve never seen before. I eye Seth. “Who is he?”

“He works for the FDA.”

Any remnant of pleasure I’d taken from the exchange with Emily disappears. “Obviously it’s related to the pharmaceutical division and I don’t even want to think about how many laws we broke in that exchange.”

“That’s why I wanted you to see it right away.”

“Do we know what was in the envelope? Do we know anything?”

“The FDA employee’s name and tenure. That’s about it, but I authorized the security team to follow him as of today.”

I glance at the picture, wrestling with anger that will get me nowhere but the hell to which my brother is trying to drag me. “This is the aftermath of last week’s stockholder meeting. I walked in there singing the praises of BP profit margins, with the promise that once the FDA approves our new asthma drug, it would allow us to let go of all the dirty money.”

“And all they heard was the chance to double their money,” Seth supplies. “Enter Derek, who promises to make it happen in a ploy to claim the table. You knew this could happen. We talked about it. Dishonest people don’t suddenly become honest.”

“No,” I say tightly. “They don’t. And I haven’t been operating with the same killer instincts as I did in the firm or this wouldn’t have happened.”

“Because you still haven’t let go of the firm.”

“It’s not the firm I haven’t let go of. It’s my brother. Because despite my denial, I knew staying meant my brother became my enemy.”

Seth leans closer. “Listen to me, Shane. I’m thirty-five years old. I did seven years in the CIA and five years of contract work all over the world before I happened to take a job that threw us together. I’ve seen monsters. I’ve seen criminals. I’ve seen your family and I say this not just as the person you hired to have your back, but the friend who would have it anyway.” He taps the image of my brother in the photo. “This man is your enemy. And I’m not going to let you forget it.”

“He’s also my brother, and this is my family, who I want to save.”

“You may not be able to.”

“I’m aware of that and if I don’t take this company as my life, the way I did my law career, I won’t succeed. And believe me, I’ve navigated enough family-driven litigation to know that blood divides as easily as it unites, especially when money and power are involved. I have to get ahead of this before we all end up bloody or in jail.”

“So we agree. This is war.”

“It’s always been war. I didn’t want to name it, but I am now. It’s time we go to battle.”

“Meaning what?”

“I played nice for my brother’s sake. Today he put me—us—into the line of fire with the law, and I’m done pulling punches. The number-one obstacle is my need for the board’s vote to gain control.”

“And when exactly is that vote? Because the last I heard, your father wasn’t exactly retiring to hit a bucket list. If he hadn’t dropped twenty pounds in six months, I could forget the man is dying of cancer.”

If only forgetting made it not true. “Whatever the case, a vote now would not be in my favor and since we’ve agreed there isn’t a cure for corruption, our board needs to go away. That’s the only way I can freely dissolve the root of all of our problems, which is Brandon Financial where my father’s spent decades hiding people’s money and doing dirty deals for them. The rest of the companies—trucking, restaurants, real estate, and steel—they’re nothing but shells to hide money for us and those clients.”