I also had money to make. I had to find somewhere to live. And I had to find a way to get through Luke and Ava’s rehearsal and dinner without totally losing it in front of everybody.

So I got up, got a shower, sorted through my bags and got ready.

I did this being careful. Not externally. Internally.

I was vulnerable. I knew this.

Yes, me.

Ally.

But I was.

I’d been shown the life I wanted. Tasted the fairytale. Then I let it slip away from me. I had doubts, second thoughts, and carried pain you wouldn’t believe. Hell, I didn’t even believe it.

So I had to forge ahead but handle me with care.

And that was what I was going to be doing.

My first trial was when I hit Daisy’s huge kitchen to find Daisy at the counter beating something in a bowl and Smithie and Shirleen sitting at Daisy’s kitchen table.

All eyes came to me and I knew they knew.

Whatever.

“Yo,” I greeted, strolling in.

“Ally,” Smithie replied, eyes never leaving me.

“Come sit by Shirleen, child,” Shirleen called, also keeping her gaze locked on me.

“You want pancakes, sugar?” Daisy asked as I moved toward the table.

I didn’t. The idea of food made me want to hurl.

“Sure,” I said and walked right up to Smithie.

Then I leaned in and kissed his cheek, muttering a distracted, “Hey,” as I moved around him and did the same with Shirleen.

After that, I sat down.

I looked out the window knowing that these people were nuts, but they loved me and they’d be careful with me. It’d be far easier to handle if they acted normally. But they were too kind to even think of doing that.

Therefore, I was bracing.

And in bracing, I didn’t see Daisy, Shirleen and Smithie giving each other wide-eyed looks.

“Uh… Ally,” Daisy called.

I tore my eyes away from the window and my mind away from noting there were ducks in her moat and I looked at her.

“Yeah?”

“Know you had a tough night, honey bunch, but Shirleen and Smithie are here for a reason,” she told me.

Fabulous.

I looked between them and asked, “Which one first?”

“Me,” Shirleen said so I focused my attention on her. When I did, she didn’t delay in declaring, “Your brother declines cases.”

My head jerked.

I didn’t expect to hear this. Demands to know what happened between Ren and me. Or how Ren wasn’t good enough for me. Or alternately how I should maybe give it more than three days of together together before I ended us. Or just kindness, and maybe sympathy.

Not a random detail about my brother’s business.

“Okay,” I replied cautiously.

“He does what he does. In other words, he makes decisions and doesn’t share why with me. But I see a pattern,” she went on. “He declines when we have a full caseload and the boys are stretched to the max. Usually, though, he declines if it isn’t enough of a challenge for their badasses to bother with.”

Suddenly, what she was saying cut through my melancholy.

I straightened in my chair.

“And?” I prompted.

“And part of my job is takin’ down the preliminaries of a possible case and reporting those to him. If he’s going to decline, usually he does it without a meet. That means he doesn’t decline, I do.”

I nodded.

She kept talking.

“He never says no without givin’ them a referral. Most of the shit goes to Dick Anderson. Occasionally he’ll want something referred to Sylvie Bissenette. There’s a player in town called Hawk who has specialties that aren’t Lee’s specialties and he’ll punt shit to him, too. This is rare. Most of his refusals go to Anderson.”

“Okay,” I again said cautiously.

“And now, some of them will go to you,” she finished.

Oh my God.

This was righteous!

“Shirleen—” I started, and she lifted a hand.

I swallowed annoyance at getting The Hand and shut up.

“Darius has talked to me and he says you’re good. He also says he’s gonna keep workin’ with you. Brody says the same. Lee has not come down on this and I’m waitin’ to see if he will. But regardless, my nephew doesn’t talk shit to me. He says it straight. So if he says you’re good, and I’ve seen the way you are, girl, I know you got somethin’, then I’m good with punting refusals to you. But Lee trades on his reputation, and the reason he refers to Anderson, Bissenette and Hawk is that he trusts them to take care of the business he refuses. Referrals reflect on him. You fuck up, that reflects on your brother. Not only ‘cause you got the same name, but you got the business because of his referral. But his referral is one given by me. You make me regret that once, that will be the only time I regret shit.”