It was true that Killian got his own empire through several generations of McClarys before him. His father had trained him from the age of five to one day rule. But he’d been alone since he was ten. He raised himself. The city he owned and ran, he had held together by himself. His father hadn’t held his hand or fixed his mistakes. Killian had done it on his own.
“Stay off my turf, Cruz,” Killian said evenly. “I very much dislike repeating myself.”
Arlo inclined his head, but Killian caught the barely suppressed rage hidden deep in the other man’s eyes. He let it go. Arlo had every right to be pissed. Juan Cruz was not going to be pleased that his son managed to lose more than half their payment for a shipment that probably cost them double that to smuggle over. But that wasn’t Killian’s problem. Arlo was lucky Killian hadn’t asked for the full profit, which was in his right to do. There would have been nothing Arlo or Juan could have done about it. They might have been the Dragons of the east, but Killian dominated the north with some deep connections in the south and west. It would have been a bloodbath and the Dragons knew it.
No one moved or spoke as Killian headed to where the girl stood, purse clutched to her stomach. She didn’t budge when he stepped around her and started for the door. Max and Jeff led the way with the others left to follow in tight formation around Killian. Killian didn’t wait to see if she would follow. If she didn’t, well, that wouldn’t be his problem either.
At the front entrance, the guard stationed there quickly jumped back when Killian’s group emerged. He said nothing as they filed out, but his eyes lingered on the seven foot giant that took the end, guiding the girl through the doorway.
Frank had that effect on most people. He was twice the size of a regular man with hands bigger than Killian’s entire head and a body straight out of a bodybuilder magazine. His very presence installed a fear in Killian’s enemies no gun ever could. Not that his men didn’t carry. They all did. Killian didn’t and hadn’t in years. It was a personal choice. He had enough blood on his hands and, while he still lived in a world that required a daily dose of violence, he tried to keep the bloodshed to a minimal.
A scuffle from behind him had him glancing back just as the girl’s ankle twisted and she stumbled sideways. Frank caught her around the middle and nimbly set her back on her feet. He held on a moment as she limped on her injured foot a second.
“I’m okay,” she said at last, pulling away. “Thank you.”
Frank did what Frank did best, he inclined his head, but said nothing.
She glanced up to find the caravan had stopped and everyone was watching her. She blushed in the pale light spilling from the grimy light above the warehouse doors. Her hands nervously smoothed down her skirt and she adjusted the purse strap on her shoulder.
Killian took that as a cue to keep moving. All the while, he couldn’t help wondering what the hell he’d gotten himself into and how the hell he was going to get out. Unlike Arlo who had no qualms about using and abusing the weak, Killian had no such fetish. The girl was clearly someone in way over her head, or worse, she was some girl kidnapped from her country and shipped over. The Dragons were certainly not averse to human trafficking. It was, after all, their biggest trade, next to drugs and guns. Killian had never, nor would he ever, sell a human. His father hadn’t. His grandfather hadn’t. It was not the type of business the McClary’s had ever dealt in, because, despite how good the money was, they had morals. Oh, there was a time they dabbled in guns and there was an uncle, or cousin who had gotten himself into the drugs business. But he started dipping into his own product and wound up choking on his own vomit and dying and that had been the end of that. But the McClary’s had always been shippers. Transporters. They specialized in the safe passage of cargo and took forty percent of every cut, but that was before. All that changed after Killian’s dad died. It had taken years, but the entire company had been scrubbed to a near legal cleanse. The McClary Corporation no longer did transportation of the illegal kind. The money was less, but he still made a pretty coin through his many other business ventures. In no way was he a good, upstanding citizen, but he no longer had to play two sides of the law and that was something his family had never done. His grandfather would have been appalled.
Hands buried deep in the bowels of his pockets, Killian stalked to the limo waiting for him just were the gravel smoothed out to solid concrete. Most of the warehouse district was designed the same way, with gravel used as an almost alarm to forewarn the guilty of an oncoming presence. It was a pain in the ass and it left streaks of white on his best pair of trousers.
He glowered down at the white powder marring his hems and ruining his shoes.
That was his punishment for dealing with the matter himself, he thought miserably.
From his right, Marco hurried forward and yanked open the back door and held it.
Like Frank, Marco was one of the trusted employees Killian had kept on even after the purge. Everyone else had been fired the moment Callum McClary had been lowered into the ground. Their inability to protect his father had not been tolerated. But Marco was simply a driver. His father hadn’t trusted him with his life and Frank hadn’t been there that afternoon. His father had taken to dragging Killian everywhere since his mother’s death. Killian wasn’t sure if it was just to keep him close or because looking at Killian reminded his father of the woman he’d lost. But he’d sent Frank off to handle a different matter. It was an unusual move. His father rarely ever went anywhere without the giant. Sometimes Killian couldn’t help wondering if his father would still be alive had Frank been there.
A cool evening breeze swept through the group. A shiver passed through him that he brushed off with a roll of his shoulders. Behind him, the group stopped when he did. Without their feet disturbing the gravel, silence quickly followed.
He turned to face them and the girl. His gaze moved over their heads to squint at the looming structure and the anxious guard watching them with apprehension. But it was the snake he was guarding that prickled the sixth sense Killian had inherited when stepping into the family business. The one that warned him to be cautious.
“Call Jacob,” he told Dominic. “Tell him to be prepared.”
The dark haired man on Killian’s left inclined his head, but his brows were furrowed. “Think he’s stupid enough to double cross you?”
Killian gave an almost imperceptible shrug. “I think he’ll do what he can to avoid having to explain this to his father. Not that it will save him.” He smoothed a hand down the front of his suit. “I have every intention of letting Juan know exactly why I’m taking his money.”
“Arlo won’t like that.” While it was said with a straight face, there was amusement in the statement.
“That’s just too bad for him isn’t it now?” He rounded his attention to the other men waiting for instructions. “Take the car. I need a word with our guest.”
The girl flinched as though he’d reached out and smacked her. Her grip on her purse intensified until he was sure the cracked and peeling fabric might pop. But she didn’t run, or back down when their gazes met. He held hers for a full second before focusing on the figures fanned out behind her.
“Not you, Frank,” he said when the giant began to turn his massive frames in the direction of the SUV parked just ahead of the limo. “Ride up front with Marco.”
The giant gave a curt bob of his bald head before ambling to the passenger’s side door of the limo. But he didn’t get in, nor did the others make a move towards the SUV. He knew they were waiting for him to get into the limo first.
He faced the girl. “Ladies first.”
Her gaze darted past him to the open door then back, filled with a trepidation that almost made him arch a brow.