“Makes sense. This where they’re at?” Bass asked when I stopped outside of a dive bar. Not even one of the fun ones that I would pop into on occasion. It was the kind of place with chronically sticky floors, warm beer, and bathrooms that likely had cameras in the stalls.

“Their apartment building doesn’t have somewhere to stash a dumpster. But since their father is always passed out here, it’s familiar to them.”

I walked around the corner to the small service yard.

“Pretty sure a bar this size doesn’t need two dumpsters,” I told Bass, waving toward where a mini one was sitting next to a more normal-sized one. “Want to bet that one weighs something close to two thousand pounds?”

“How could those kids push something that heavy?”

“Industrial casters made the load lighter for pushing or pulling. Most people could easily push or pull five times their body weight with one of these,” I told him. At his blank look, I shrugged. “I may or may not have moved a bunch of electronics that fell off the back of a truck when I was still making my name as a soldier in the family. Did a bit of research on how to move that much shit without a car.”

“Hey, that’s ours,” a wobbly, pre-pubescent voice called, making me turn to see a tall, skinny Gallagher who had to be about twelve.

“Actually, it’s not,” I said. “Where’s your older brother? We need to have—oh, good,” I said when a copy-and-paste of the little kid, but with a solid five years on him, appeared behind his back.

Cormac Gallagher. Seventeen going on fifty, with his kid brothers to take care of and his father to drag out of bars each night.

“Saff?” he said, brows pinched.

“We need to talk about the dumpster. Actually, about the new nightclub in general.”

If I hadn’t been watching him so closely, I’d have missed the flash of desperation cross Cormac’s eyes before he tamped it down.

He’d likely already done some quick math on how much he and his brothers just scored. Even selling at a loss, that was some life-changing money.

I felt a pang in my chest seeing it. I’d been on the streets at his age, my desperation for money, food, shelter, an ever-present churning in my gut. I couldn’t imagine how he was dealing with the hunger and needs of five younger siblings.

“I’m listening,” Cormac said, placing a hand on his brother’s shoulder. “Go back inside.”

I’d bet that all the brothers had helped push the dumpster across town, each celebrating in their success. But Cormac wanted to save the younger ones from the loss. You had to respect the poor kid.

“Look, the family needs that club to be renovated and opened as quickly as possible. They’re going to be a… client of ours.”