Paul slammed the office door behind him and twisted the lock. The Pit Stop’s back room stank of old smoke and stale liquor, but he barely noticed. His pulse was still hammering from the meeting, the Saints’ sharp eyes gnawing at the back of his skull.
Fifty thousand. Too much, too sloppy.
He dragged a hand through his hair and lit a cigarette, pacing tight circles on the worn carpet. The books had given him away, Owen’s calm little voice pointing at the numbers like he’d been waiting to do it. But it was only surface-level. Only the skim from the legit cuts—the bar’s drawer, the garage’s clean jobs, the diner’s under-the-table slips.
They hadn’t sniffed the real pot. Not yet.
Relief trickled through his chest like a slow pour of whiskey. The dirty streams were safe. The side deals, the
