I’ve checked the kitchen, the laundry room, and living and dining rooms. Nothing. I’ve looked in each bathroom and in Maddox’s room. Surely I would have noticed a large cat living in the same space I had for the last seven days?

“Where is Cat, you idiot?” Maddox bellows through the apartment.

“Bastard,” I grumble.

Just when I’m about to give up, I spot a fluff of fur move in the back, darkened corner of my closet. It’s not hard to miss since it seems to be Maddox’s stuff-all hole. There’s box on top of box and even more crap piled on top of that.

“Come on, Cat. Your keeper is home.”

“I’m not a fucking keeper. I should be the keeper of your ass. Bet you wouldn’t get in half the trouble you seem to be getting into lately,” Maddox’s deep rumble says directly behind me, causing me to jump slightly and knock a bunch of boxes on top of my head.

“Motherfucker,” I spit out.

I try to move the boxes out from on top of me. Maddox is no damn help since apparently I scared Cat enough to have her run over me, and I can hear Maddox cooing at her. Seriously, is he talking baby talk to a cat?

“A little help would be nice.”

“Yeah, it would, wouldn’t it,” he calls on his way out the door.

I spend a good ten minutes trying to wiggle my wide frame out of the avalanche of boxes. When I finally get myself free, I spend some time picking up the mess that stupid cat caused. I refuse to believe that I did this, but I still feel like shit for trashing Maddox’s house.

Right when I finish up, I catch something out of the corner of my eye. Bending over, I pick up the picture that must have fallen out of one of the boxes. Turning over the picture, I see a younger, happier, Maddox Locke. His arms, minus the tattoos that heavily cover them now, are wrapped around a tiny, blonde chick and he’s smiling a smile I’ve never seen on his face. He doesn’t have one ounce of the heaviness that cloaks him every second now. No, in this picture, he is the example of a man happy and in love.

“Where the fuck did you find that?”

Before I even have a second to reply, the picture is ripped out of my hands and crushed inside his fist.

“Want to talk about that?”

“Do you want to talk about your shit?”

I shake my head, knowing that I should but that I’m not there yet…and I’m not sure if I will be anytime soon.

“Is that part of your nightmares?”

“This is my fucking nightmare.”

He storms from the room, slamming the door hard enough that the walls shake.

I let myself fall back on my ass and lean up against the bed, my head falling to my hand before rolling it to pop some of the tension from my neck.

Three months ago, everything seemed so simple. When the hell did I start living some soap opera shit for my life? I know he’s right, and he clearly knows what it’s like to be living hell on Earth. I’ve known him for years and this is the first time he’s ever let me see anything that could be haunting him.

Maybe he’s right. I need to start moving forward, but I know in order to do that, I have to make sure I’ve done everything I can to avenge my brother. Right or wrong, it’s what I need to do.

So with a new resolve to start moving forward from this limbo I’ve been stuck in, I pull myself off the floor and start pouring out every bottle of liquor I have stashed around my room and his apartment.

***

Walking into Heavy’s for the gang’s weekly family dinner is the last thing I want to be doing right now. I’ve spent the last four days going over all of the information I have gathered thus far on Coop’s murder. Or I should say the man behind the snowball that formed into a massive boulder of events that led up to his death.

Dominic Murphy.

That sorry piece of shit has his finger on literally everything gun and drug related in the southeast. Until recently, he’s been like a ghost, completely untraceable. That was until I finally caught a break. It caused me to cash in just about every single favor I’ve ever collected over the years. As a bounty hunter, I’ve established relationships with a lot of men I’m lucky to have on my side. Everything from FBI, DEA, and a few local cops here and there.

Dom’s been spotted most recently right here in Atlanta. Last night, I was lucky enough to have some surveillance footage of him at a local bar sent to me. I know what he looks like, what his security team looks like, right down to what he had for breakfast. And now that I know where to find him, nothing will stop me from taking the next steps I need to seek my revenge for Coop.