Chapter 6 - What Gideon Chose Not to Do
Old Gideon would have killed Marcus Reed before breakfast.
New Gideon spent breakfast making pancakes for Sammy.
Badly.
Jo watched from the kitchen doorway.
Smoke drifted from the skillet.
Sammy stared at the black circle on his plate.
“What is it?”
“A pancake.”
“It looks like evidence.”
Jo laughed so hard she had to grab the counter.
Gideon turned.
“You could help.”
“I am.”
“How?”
“Emotionally.”
Marco entered, smelled smoke, and opened a window.
“Marcus moved.”
Gideon’s face changed instantly.
Jo hated how quickly the warmth disappeared.
“Where?”
“Warehouse Seven.”
“Men?”
“Twenty.”
“Cross?”
“No sign.”
Sammy looked between them.
Jo said,
“School.”
He frowned.
“It’s winter break.”
“Bedroom.”
“That means adults are lying.”
“Correct.”
Sammy took his pancake.
“I’m keeping this.”
“Why?”
“For science.”
When his door closed, Gideon turned to Marco.
“What’s Marcus doing?”
“Calling captains.”
Jo frowned.
“Captains?”
Gideon ignored her.
Marco answered,
“He says you’ve become unstable.”
Gideon almost smiled.
“Because?”
“You didn’t retaliate against Cross. You let Nathan leave court. You handed financial records to attorneys.”
Jo understood.
“He thinks restraint is weakness.”
“Yes.”
Gideon looked toward the city.
For seventeen years Marcus had believed what Gideon believed.
Fear maintained order.
Violence answered betrayal.
Mercy invited challenge.
Now Gideon was changing rules faster than men like Marcus could tolerate.
“Call everyone.”
Marco looked at him.
“Meeting?”
“No.”
“What then?”
“Tell them I’m dissolving street operations.”
Silence.
Jo stared.
Marco stared harder.
“Boss.”
“Legitimate freight stays.”
“Collections?”
“Closed.”
“Gaming?”
“Closed.”
“Port protection?”
“Cancelled.”
“That’s sixty percent of cash flow.”
“I know.”
Marco lowered his voice.
“You do this today, Marcus will call it surrender.”
Gideon looked at him.
“Let him.”
Jo felt something shift.
Not redemption.
That was too clean a word.
Choice.
Gideon was choosing to become a different kind of powerful.
It cost him immediately.
Three captains defected to Marcus by noon.
Two companies froze accounts.
A councilman called demanding reassurance.
Gideon gave none.
Then came the school incident.
Sammy attended a winter day program at his elementary school.
Jo had resisted sending him.
Sammy had insisted.
“I want normal.”
She understood.
At 2:17 p.m., a man wearing a maintenance jacket approached the side entrance.
Security saw him before he reached the building.
He carried no weapon.
Only a forged authorization letter claiming Nathan Bradley had permission to collect Sammy.
The man was detained.
Sammy never saw him.
Jo did.
When Marco showed her the camera image, she became furious.
“This ends.”
Gideon stood across from her.
“Yes.”
“No.”
Her voice shook.
“I mean us.”
The words hit him visibly.
Jo continued before she lost courage.
“Whatever this is.”
“We're not—”
“I know.”
She looked away.
“That’s part of the problem.”
Gideon became quiet.
Jo wrapped her arms around herself.
“Sammy was safe before you.”
“That isn't true.”
“Safer.”
Gideon could have argued.
Nathan had been paid years earlier.
She had been watched.
The conspiracy existed before New Year’s.
But Gideon understood what she meant.
His presence intensified it.
“My enemies now know Sammy matters.”
“Yes.”
“And me.”
She looked at him.
“Yes.”
Neither had said the word.
Feelings.
Affection.
Love was too early.
But danger did not care about labels.
Gideon asked,
“What do you want?”
Jo’s eyes filled.
“I want to go somewhere your name doesn't enter five minutes before you do.”
He nodded.
No fight.
No command.
That hurt more.
“I’ll arrange—”
“No.”
He stopped.
Jo smiled sadly.
“Still learning.”
“You need security.”
“I’ll take protection Marissa arranges. Not your men.”
Gideon wanted to object.
Instead,
“All right.”
Jo stared.
“That's it?”
“You asked me to let you go.”
His voice lowered.
“I’m trying to be a man you don't have to escape from.”
Jo nearly changed her mind.
That frightened her more than anything.
She packed that afternoon.
Sammy cried.
Not loudly.
He hugged Gideon once.
“You can visit?”
Jo closed her eyes.
Gideon crouched.
“If your mom says yes.”
Sammy looked at her.
“That is manipulative.”
Gideon almost smiled.
“Learned from the best.”
Jo moved into a small apartment arranged by Marissa.
No marble.
No private elevator.
Sammy loved it because a family downstairs owned a beagle.
For three days, nothing happened.
Normal returned in tiny pieces.
Cereal.
Laundry.
Job applications.
Jo interviewed at two accounting firms.
Then on Thursday night, someone slid an envelope beneath her door.
No photograph.
A flash drive.
Jo called Marissa.
Marissa called Gideon.
Gideon did not come.
He sent Marco.
That mattered.
The drive contained audio.
Nathan’s voice.
Marcus Reed’s voice.
A third voice Jo did not recognize.
Nathan said,
“You said Hale would die New Year’s Eve.”
Marcus answered,
“He was supposed to stay downtown.”
“What went wrong?”
“He walked.”
“And the diner?”
“Not part of the plan.”
Nathan laughed nervously.
“Then why have you had me watching Jo for years?”
A pause.
Marcus said,
“Because of the boy.”
“What about Sammy?”
“The trust.”
Nathan’s voice changed.
“You told me that wasn't active.”
“It becomes active when Hale dies without an heir.”
Silence.
Then Nathan whispered,
“So you planned to kill him.”
Marcus answered,
“I planned to inherit a city.”
Jo stopped the recording.
Her hands shook.
Marissa looked at her.
“It proves conspiracy.”
Jo stared.
“It proves something else.”
“What?”
“Gideon wasn't the reason they watched Sammy.”
“No.”
Jo looked toward the window.
She had left Gideon to keep Sammy safe.
But the threat had always existed.
Gideon had not brought danger into their lives on New Year’s Eve.
He had accidentally walked into a danger already waiting for both of them.
Her phone rang.
Nathan.
Jo stared at the screen.
Marissa said,
“Don't.”
Jo answered.
“Nathan.”
His breathing was ragged.
“Jo, listen.”
“What?”
“Marcus knows you have the recording.”
“How?”
“I sent it.”
She froze.
“You?”
“I’m done.”
“With what?”
“All of it.”
Jo heard fear.
Real fear.
Nathan whispered,
“I can prove who ordered the New Year’s hit.”
“Marcus.”
“No.”
Jo went still.
“What?”
“Marcus arranged it.”
Nathan swallowed.
“But somebody else paid him.”
Jo stared at Marissa.
“Who?”
A crash sounded through the phone.
Nathan swore.
Then shouted,
“Tell Hale Everett wasn’t stealing from him.”
The line crackled.
“He was hiding money from the man above him.”
“What man?”
Nathan whispered the name.
Jo had heard it once before.
At the Wellington.
A man Gideon had pointed out casually through the restaurant windows.
Police Chief Raymond Sloan.
The most respected law-enforcement officer in the city.
May you like
And apparently the man financing an attempt to murder Gideon Hale.
The call disconnected.
