bad idea

Chapter 36

"Look, I know this has nothing to do with what we're talking about, but why is Grande here?" Tommy asked, setting his pen down.

"Legal contract with her family for six months,"

"Damn... does Matt know?"

"Wait!" I shouted, standing up from my chair. "Get him here now actually!"

"Uh, okay..." Tommy followed out of the office.

If this contract was made while my parents were still alive, Matt had to know, he was my dad's right-hand man. So if he knew this whole time, why didn't he mention this before?

"You're worried about the wrong things, Kai. The Grande's shouldn't matter, we're in the process of dealing with the O'Briens,"

"O'Briens... like Otto O'Brien?"

"He's formed his own little group since we took him out of ours. Apparently, he's set for us," Matt answered.

"So why the hell is his fiancée signing our business deals right now?! We need to be holding her captive or something!" Tommy blurted.

"She doesn't know," I said simply. "We're tied to her family so if he tries to bring us down, he brings them down too."

"And she still loves you... she wouldn't let him do anything to hurt you or your business," Matt added, with a small smirk.

"So what are we gonna do?" Tommy asked, leaning back in his chair.

"You're gonna get as much information on Otto and the rest of his friends to order a hit on them while she keeps Ariana busy for the time being. You both know Willow and I only jump in when things get messy,"

"Except she keeps it spotless," Tommy chuckled, motioning to me.

"Matt, it's been years, why are we still doing this? We should just convert to a company, instead of this mafia-like shit. Things are already dangerous as is," I, however, was gonna object. Stuff was getting too risky lately and I didn't wanna play with any more fire in fear of things going south.

Back in high school, there was only Max to worry about, but now things were different.

So different.

Matt laughed as if he thought I was joking, but when he realized I wasn't, he rebelled immediately. "We're not throwing away years full of work to become a company,"

"We're already taking a big risk accepting Ariana, knowing her husband's plan... we're risking the lives of our guys and our entire operation. How many more people need to die?"

"I told you before Kai, you can leave this... all of this! But I'm not gonna let my brother's legacy go down like this—"

"-I am the damn legacy. This is what drove Willow and Victoria away from you, Matt." I scoffed, really aiming to hit his pressure point. "You never know when enough is enough, you push people to their breaking point and then you have the nerve to have these lies. I'm not sending my guys (who have been loyal to me for years) through something like this, knowing the risks. You won't lie to them either. You knew about this contract and yet I find out from Ariana!"

Matt chuckled, crossing his arms. "You think because you held down this business for a couple of years, you know everything? You don't know half of it, you can't even handle the half..."

"Kai, Matt, let's just calm down," Tommy mumbled, which we both ignored. He was always in the middle of many of our arguments lately and as much as I knew he hated it, he was always on my side.

Which I appreciated because it was nice to have someone always trying to see things through your perspective and if they couldn't, they trusted your opinion. That was Tommy.