"Who the hell are you?" Cole rasped, every muscle in his battered frame wound tight as a loaded spring. A deadly, paranoid chill seized his eyes. "Are you with the Blackwoods? Did they send you?"
It was the only logical explanation his mind could reach. Only a family with roots stretching into the city's deepest shadows could have peeled back his disguise so thoroughly.
Alex merely let out a quiet, amused chuckle.
"Relax, Raymond. I'm neither a Blackwood nor their dog. Just a man who can solve your problems without breaking a sweat."
Alex took half a step forward, closing the distance between them. The suffocating weight of Cole's aura rolled off his shoulders as if it were nothing more than a passing breeze.
"I know their names, their motives and where every last one of them sleeps at night,"
Alex said, his voice smooth and steady in the dark. "Accept my terms, Raymond, and I'll hand you your revenge on a silver platter."
