On days like today I want to burn the fucking world I’ve built to the ground and walk away.
Polaris survived years of men who decided what her body was for without consulting her. Signatures meant nothing in her world.Ourworld. I can’t extract myself from the problem given my stance in it.
The ink on paper like this is just decoration on a cage someone else built. I think about the way she pulled her shoulders in when Lorenzo stepped off that elevator, the instinctive contraction of a woman whose body remembers what her mind is trying to heal, and the violence behind my sternum sharpens to a point.
Santi's hand curls into a fist on the tabletop. He doesn't speak but the knuckles whiten and the ring on his left hand presses flat against the wood. He's thinking about Polaris too. He's always thinking about Polaris. The difference between Santi and me is that I hide it behind professionalism and he hides it behind silence, and neither method is working particularly well anymore.
Cassius' fingers tap twice against the armrest, the rhythmic pattern he falls into when he's processing. His eyes haven't left Lorenzo's face. He's already calculating what this contract means for Genesis, for the Syndicate alliance, and for the woman upstairs whose raven hair smells like lavender. Whose laugh, on the rare occasions she lets it loose, is so sweet that Cassius would mortgage his soul to keep hearing.
I pick up the document again and read it a second time while Lorenzo sits in silence. As much as I hate to admit it, the contract is clean. I can’t find a single fucking crack or clause that gives me grounds to refuse. Harrison's signature is legitimate as far as I can tell. The financial terms are within bounds. The marriage alliance, distasteful as it sits in my stomach, is a practice as old as the families who write them.
My word is my currency. Genesis operates on contracts. If I refuse legitimate business because I don't like the man presenting it, every deal this club has ever brokered becomes questionable. Every client who trusted our neutrality startslooking for another mediator. The Dark Floor runs on trust, and trust runs on consistency.
"Ten days." I set the contract down and meet Lorenzo's eyes. "I need ten days to verify the terms, contact Harrison Whitmore, and assess the competing claim before Genesis moves forward with enforcement. If the contract holds up, we proceed. If it doesn't, you and I are going to have a different conversation."
Lorenzo's grin spreads, slow and satisfied, and the sight of it makes the sour taste in my mouth climb toward my throat. "That's very reasonable, Mr. Constantine."
"I'm not finished." I lean forward and lower my voice to the register that has made harder men than Lorenzo Ferraro reconsider their evening plans. "If I find out this paper is dirty, if there is a single thread of coercion or fraud woven into these terms that you haven't disclosed, I will come for you personally. Not my runners. Not my crew. Me. And I won't be bringing paperwork."
His smirk wavers. The mask slips and I see the man beneath the tailoring. Cold. Calculating. Brittle. Then the polish returns and he stands, buttons his jacket, and extends his hand.
I don't take it.
"You can sit down with our escrow holder on the way out. She will write up the retrieval contract and you can deposit the full twenty million for the delivery."
He retracts the hand without comment, collects his briefcase, and walks out. The door closes. The room holds his cologne like an accusation.
"That man is wearing a mask thicker than his cologne." Cassius uncrosses his legs and leans forward, his elbows on his knees, his dark eyes fixed on the closed door.
"I know, but we can't pick sides here." I rub my thumb across the scars on my knuckles, feeling the ridged skin, the old breaks that healed wrong because I never went to a doctor. My father's hands looked like this. The hands of men who build things the hard way and hold them with force when the world tries to take them back.
"You could have refused." Santi's voice is quiet, his Spanish accent thickening the way it does when a decision sits wrong in his chest. "We all could have."
"On what grounds? The contract is clean. We took the meeting through proper channels." I press my knuckles against the table, the wood cool and smooth beneath the scarred ridges of my skin. "If we start refusing legitimate contracts because our guts don't like the client, we lose."
Santi holds my gaze. He's not backing down. He never does when it matters. "What’s the saying? Clean paper doesn't mean a clean deal."
"I know." I exhale through my teeth. "And I'm not sleeping well tonight because of it."
Cassius clasps my shoulder, his grip firm. "None of us are, brother."
Santi stands. He doesn't add to the conversation because the man never wastes a word when silence carries more weight. But he pauses at the door, his hand on the frame, and looks back at me with an expression I've learned to read over the years.
We'll handle this. Whatever it costs.
They leave. The door closes. I sit alone with Lorenzo Ferraro's contract on the table in front of me and the overhead light casting its warm circle across Harrison Whitmore's signature.
I pull out my phone and tap Massimo's name.
He picks up on the second ring. "Constantine. Twice in one week. Should I be worried?"
"You should. This is not a social call, Santoro." I keep my voice even, professional. One businessman to another. "Lorenzo Ferraro walked into my club this morning with a marriage contract bearing Harrison Whitmore's signature. He's hired Genesis to enforce delivery of one Sloane Whitmore."
Silence.
"I'm giving you ten days. Fix this before I have to come for her."
More silence. Then Massimo's voice, low and controlled, carrying the steel of a man who has already decided what he's willing to lose. "Understood, Constantine."