Chapter 280
Lance
I settled into the vinyl chair beside Felix's bed with the slow, deliberate ease of a man who had all the time in the world. The fluorescent lights hummed their monotonous tune overhead, casting harsh shadows across the sterile room. Felix sat propped against pillows, his hospital gown hanging loose on his diminished frame, but his eyes—those eyes burned with a hatred so pure it was almost admirable.
"Comfortable?" I asked, crossing one leg over the other. My tone was conversational, almost pleasant. The kind of voice you'd use discussing the weather or weekend plans.
Felix's jaw clenched. "Fuck you."
Davis stood behind me, his weapon trained on Felix's temple with the steady patience of a professional. The suppressor caught the light, a dull promise of violence held in check.
"Boss." Davis's voice was low, measured. He glanced at his watch for the third time in as many minutes. "Twenty minutes. Still no sign of Wesley. You think Thomas is playing games?"
I let the question hang in the air, studying Felix's face as fear flickered beneath the rage. His fingers twisted in the bedsheets, knuckles white. The heart monitor beside him betrayed what his expression tried to hide—his pulse climbing, climbing, climbing.
"Well." I drew the word out, savoring it. "Thomas has tricks for everything else. Contingency plans stacked on contingency plans, escape routes mapped in triplicate. But Felix?" I leaned forward slightly, watching my cousin's son flinch. "Felix is bleeding out on a ticking clock. There's no time for games when your only child is counting down his last breaths."
The heart monitor's beeping accelerated.
"He won't—" Felix started, but his voice cracked. He swallowed hard, tried again. "He won't just hand Wesley over. He's—"
"Desperate?" I finished for him. "Yes. He is. And desperate men make predictable choices."
Davis shifted his weight, the barrel of his gun never wavering. "If he doesn't show—"
"He'll show."
The certainty in my voice made Felix's eyes widen. He opened his mouth, perhaps to curse me again, perhaps to beg. We'd never know, because that's when footsteps echoed in the hallway outside.
Not the quick, efficient stride of hospital staff. These were heavier. Deliberate. The kind of footsteps that announced arrival rather than passage.
The door swung open.
Wesley stood in the doorway, backlit by the harsh corridor lights, and for a moment I couldn't reconcile this figure with the boy I'd known. Superficial cuts marked his face and arms—the kind of wounds that bled dramatically but healed clean. Nothing deep. Nothing permanent. But that wasn't what stopped my breath in my chest.
It was his eyes.
The Wesley I'd raised—the one who'd fumbled through adolescence seeking approval, who'd drowned his insecurities in Vanessa's manipulation and his grandfather's conditional affection—that Wesley was gone. The man who stood before me now carried himself with a coiled stillness I recognized from my own mirror. The kind of presence that came from walking through fire and deciding you liked the heat.
Behind him, a barrel-chested old man in designer sunglasses and a precisely trimmed beard leaned against the doorframe. Everything about him screamed old-world Italian aristocracy meeting new-world muscle. His suit probably cost more than most people's cars, but the way he wore it suggested he'd be just as comfortable in tactical gear.
His gaze locked onto mine, assessing. A slow smile spread across his face—the kind that revealed nothing and promised everything.
"Well, well." His accent was pure Philadelphia by way of Sicily, smoothed by decades in American boardrooms but never quite tamed. "Don't look so hostile, Mr. Lawson. No misunderstanding necessary here." He spread his hands in a gesture of openness that somehow made him more dangerous. "I insisted on the personal delivery. You understand—how often does a man my age encounter someone with this boy's potential?"
Wesley remained motionless, his expression unreadable.
"As for your family drama with Thomas?" The Italian's smile widened. "Not my concern anymore. The debt is settled. Though I confess—" He tilted his head, studying me with open curiosity. "—I cannot fathom why Thomas suddenly abandoned his hunt. But looking at you now?" He chuckled, the sound rich with genuine amusement. "I suspect you're the real victor in this little war."
He clapped Wesley on the shoulder—a gesture of approval, perhaps even affection—and then he was gone, his footsteps retreating down the corridor with the same measured confidence they'd arrived with.
The door clicked shut.
I was across the room before conscious thought caught up with instinct, my hands already reaching for Wesley's shoulders, my eyes cataloging every injury with the frantic precision of a man who'd already imagined the worst.
"Jesus Christ, Wesley—"
"Uncle." The word stopped me cold. Wesley's lips quirked in something that might have been a smile on a different face. "Since when did you become such a mother hen? They're scratches. Barely broke the skin."