A Life Chosen (Montreal #1)

Chapter Sixteen

“ J esus.” Mathias stepped into Tony’s office and shut the door behind him. “What’s wrong with you?”

It was clear the past few weeks had done a number on Tony. His eyes were dull and bloodshot, his skin pallid from lack of sleep.

“What’s wrong with me? This whole fucking place has imploded. Handing you Commercial was supposed to take a load off. Now I’m down two men—the two who happened to do most of the goddamn work around here.”

“Finally figured that out,” Mathias said, taking a seat. “Too bad it never reflected in my cut.”

“Haven’t missed the back talk,” Tony snapped. “We’ve got contracts coming out our ears and no one to collect. Soon, everyone’ll be shitting on us, thinking they can take our money and run.”

“You’ll manage,” Mathias said, pulling out his cigarettes and offering them to Tony. The older man took one and let Mathias light it for him.

“You seem perky. When are you leaving again?” Tony asked with a sneer.

Payback. Mathias scowled. “Seems everyone’s in a hurry to get me out.”

Even though he’d officially been out of commission for the last couple of weeks, Mathias still wore his suit, pressed and all. That was one thing that remained unchanged—no matter how difficult things got, he would not let anyone see him ruffled. He blamed his mother for that. There was strength in vanity.

Tony waved his hand, smoke curling through the air. “I’m talking logistics. When are you out of the city?”

“End of the week,” Mathias replied shortly. “They’ve already pulled Moretti. It’s a fucking mess.”

“Hey.” Tony grinned. “Now it’s your fucking mess.”

Mathias sucked on his cigarette, unamused. “Who have you got replacing me?” he asked, deciding it was time to address the elephant in the room .

Tony snorted. “You wouldn’t believe who was gunning for the job.”

Mathias flinched even before Tony spoke the name. “Motherfucker,” he growled, his jaw tightening.

Tony eyed him warily. “I put a pin in that real quick. Piero couldn’t make a dime if he rubbed two nickels together. I’m not letting him near my division.”

“Saved by incompetence,” Mathias muttered bitterly.

“Is the kid looking forward to the big move?”

“What?”

“Nadeau,” Tony drawled. “Kid like that probably never been out of the city.”

Mathias exhaled a stream of smoke from the corner of his mouth. “I’m not taking him with me.”

Tony’s eyebrows shot up. “You of all people should know how hard it is to find good help. You’re gonna go through the trouble of training another monkey?”

“I need him here. I need both of you to have your ears open.” Mathias thought of the list. Tony’s name. He decided against mentioning it. “Piero’s gone quiet now, but it’s only a matter of time. As soon as succession is on the table, he’ll strike.”

“If he tries anything—”

“He already has,” Mathias said, tapping his ash. “And look what happened. You hear anything, I want to hear it.”

His boss nodded slowly. They sat, smoking in silence. Tony was thinking in black and white. Loyalty and treason. When the lines were drawn through the family, alliances would not be so clear.

“Can’t say I’m not pleased Nadeau is staying. I need the manpower. And the offer still stands—I think he’s up to running his own team.”

“No,” Mathias said, surprised at his own vehemence. “Nothing too visible. You make him a captain, there’ll be talk. We don’t need the attention. Assign him to one of the old hands, and get him to do the heavy lifting.”

“Don’t know how happy the kid’s gonna be when he finds out you got him demoted.”

Mathias waved him off. “He’s a fucking grunt. He’ll do as he’s told.”

“I’d watch it, Mathias,” Tony warned, wagging a finger. “You jerk him around too much, and he ain’t gonna stay loyal for long.”

Mathias tapped his left hand agitatedly against the desk. The old man didn’t know shit.

“By the way, one of Belkov’s men dropped this off earlier,” Tony said, hauling a plastic bag of cash onto his desk. “Enough to cover the month up until now. Wonder who twisted his arm.” He glowered at him .

Mathias shrugged. “Maybe he was feeling generous.”

Tony thumbed the butt of his cigarette. “I told you not to see him.”

“Fuck, Tony. You’ve got your money, so stop bitching.”

“You wait and see how you get on managing your own territory,” the Collections head scoffed. “Though the bar is set pretty low. If you were to somehow make money instead of losing it, you’d be doing well. Better than Moretti, at least.”

“On that,” Mathias began, treading cautiously. “How do I get the Reapers clearance for one shipment a month?”

“What? Into Montreal?”

He nodded.

Tony laughed, shaking his head. “ No bueno. They’re in direct competition with Narcotics.”

“They’re here already—got their own supply line. Only they’re bringing it overland.”

“You give them port access, and they’ll bring in three times as much and flood the market.”

“On our terms,” Mathias said. “We skim a cut for every kilo. I know our supply can be patchy, especially when the Feds south of the border get jumpy. We’d ride this during the lulls, still make money, and lower our risk at the same time.”

Tony squinted in suspicion. “What are you up to, Mathias?”

“There’s money to be made in Hamilton—more than you think.” After dismissing Moretti, Mathias had gone on his own tour of the city, familiarizing himself with the lay of the land. “The port might as well be unregulated—offers short sea shipping between the two cities. We can push product into Ontario, widen our scope. But Truman holds all the keys. And we have no clout out there. I need something to bargain with.”

“Well, fuck me,” Tony said with a smirk. “Why am I surprised you’re not sitting back and cooling your heels? Let me talk to De Luca. You grease the wheels with Giovanni. We’ll need council buy-in.”

Mathias hid a smile. Family politics be damned. Just a whiff of cold hard cash was enough to get Tony off his ass.

It was almost ten on a Sunday morning, and Rayan found himself still in bed. All the downtime was messing with his regular routine. Mathias had left for Hamilton two days earlier after instructing him to go and see Tony at the office on Monday .

He lay under the duvet, the room cold enough to discourage a trip to the kitchen for food. There was the faint stirring of an erection he could coax to life if given the necessary attention. On the bedside table, his phone began to buzz. Rayan reached out and pulled it to his ear.

“I need you to do something.”

No longer just a stirring. Mathias’s voice—flat, authoritative—had the effect of sending all the blood rushing between Rayan’s legs.

“There’s a safe in the wardrobe at the apartment,” Mathias continued.

Rayan knew the one.

“Code is eighteen, fifty-six, thirty-two, oh seven.”

He repeated the numbers, committing them to memory.

“Right. Take out a couple grand, two—no, three—grand. Put it in an envelope. Drop it off at 2087 Saint Urbain.” There was a rush of static. It sounded like he was driving. “She hates the envelopes,” Mathias muttered, his frustration evident. “Put it in with something else—a bag of fruit or a fucking baguette.”

Rayan raised an eyebrow. “Okay.”

There was a pause, longer than expected. “I didn’t stop by before leaving,” Mathias said finally. “Just check in, make sure everything’s all right.”

Before Rayan could ask who he was checking on, Mathias hung up. Rayan glanced at the blackened screen and tossed the phone onto the bed. He reached beneath the covers, first needing to resolve a more pressing matter.

When Rayan showed up at 2087 Saint Urbain later that afternoon, an older woman opened the door. As he met her pale-blue eyes, it was clear she was Mathias’s mother. The man had her nose and the same strong chin. Rayan realized he was staring and handed her the paper bag of apples, not sure whether he should offer an explanation. In the bag, he’d stowed the envelope of cash taken from the fortune Mathias had locked away in his safe. While the stack of money didn’t have an effect on Rayan, Mathias’s trust in him did. The safe held not only cash but also bond certificates, several foreign passports, identity cards, and title documents. And Mathias had given him the code as flippantly as he would his lunch order. It was pathetic how good that made Rayan feel.

As it turned out, no explanation was needed. Mathias’s mother, with what he could only imagine to be a perfect Parisian accent, invited him in for coffee.

“He said to expect someone,” she said, busying herself in the kitchen, her long silk dress swaying as she moved.

She wore lipstick and pearl studs. Her hair was arranged deliberately. She looked like she should be holding court rather than making coffee. He watched as she took the envelope from the bag and slipped it into a pile of unopened mail on the counter.

“But I didn’t expect…” She paused, turning to him. “You don’t look like the rest of them. What’s your name?”

“Rayan Nadeau.”

“Pleasure to meet you, Mr. Nadeau. I’m Marguerite.” She opened the refrigerator door and peered inside. “Do you take milk?”

“No, thank you.”

“Where are you from?”

“Maskinongé.”

She laughed then. “But you’re not Quebecois!”

He smiled, not correcting her.

She filled a kettle with water at the sink. “Did you know he’s left the city?”

Rayan nodded.

She exhaled sharply, snapping the lid shut. “I suppose everyone knew but me. All I can hope is that one day, his children will be equally ungrateful.”

Rayan could only imagine the woman’s disappointment when that particular reparation did not come to pass.

Marguerite set out a plate of lavish pastries that neither of them touched as they drank their coffee at the kitchen table. He had little experience with these kinds of interactions—Rayan had been a child the last time he’d spoken to either of his parents. For the most part, he did what he was good at and stayed silent while she talked about her past, where she’d lived in Paris, and nameless people in a social circle he didn’t care to know. Her stories were embellished to the point of implausibility. And then, out of nowhere, she would say something about Mathias.

“I was too needy when he was young. I’d forget about him for days then be distraught all of a sudden if he left my side.” She laughed. “I think he preferred being alone—he was always so independent. And just look how successful he’s become.”

Rayan knew all about that kind of self-reliance born of necessity. He imagined a young Mathias trapped in a house with this fragile woman who talked to fill the silence, her desperation clinging to the air around him.

“Mothers are so hard on themselves, aren’t they?” she said with a reserved smile. “What does yours say about you?”

“She’s dead.” Rayan took a sip of his coffee.

“Oh.” Marguerite fiddled with the chain of her necklace. “Was she sick?”

She was lost .

“Yes,” he lied.

Mathias’s mother frowned, rearranging her cup on the saucer. “Do you know if he went to the funeral?” she asked, her eyes suddenly misty. “For his father?”

Rayan was ashamed to realize he didn’t know. He remembered the interaction with the woman at the hospital, how Mathias had denied ties to his father. He couldn’t imagine he’d gone after that.

Rayan shook his head, and she gave a sigh, flicking a delicate wrist laden with silver. “They wouldn’t let me go, of course. I thought maybe he might.” She lifted her napkin and dabbed lightly at the corners of her eyes. “You know, when he was a boy, he wanted to be just like his father.”

Rayan gripped his cup, a tightness in his throat, remembering Mathias’s words: “The man couldn’t have cared less. He’d have preferred I do something else.” He wondered if she knew how deep that wish had buried itself and the way it had twisted around her son, shaping him.

When Rayan stood to leave, Marguerite packed everything up—the untouched pastries, the apples—and sent them home with him. By the front door, his gaze fell on a small framed photo sitting on the entry table, the only one he’d seen in the sprawling apartment. Mathias, no older than ten, was unsmiling in a shirt and tie, a school logo emblazoned on his breast pocket. He looked straight at the camera, his features boyish but his eyes cold. Rayan felt a pang, struck by an overwhelming urge to take the picture. Instead, he thanked Marguerite for the coffee and let himself out.

He drove home. Rayan handed the bag of food and a fistful of notes to the man who lived in the alleyway beside his building. Once in his apartment, he changed out of his suit, threw on his sneakers, and headed back out onto the street, not sure where he was going. He zipped his coat up to his chin and disappeared into the crowd.