Trent’s eye twitched. It was his only show of emotion. “You have two weeks to get out of my city,” he said, his voice a smooth ribbon of calm water hiding a deadly undertow. “I’m going to maintain my distribution. If your father wants to talk, I’m listening.”

“Your city?” Lee flicked his eyes over me, then back to Trent. “Looks to me like it’s split.” He arched his thin eyebrows. “Very dangerous, very attractive. Piscary is in prison. His scion is ineffective. You’re vulnerable from the veneer of honest businessman you hide behind. I’m going to take Cincinnati and the distribution net you have so painstakingly developed, and use it as it ought to be. It’s a waste, Trent. You could control the entire Western Hemisphere with what you have, and you’re pissing it away on half-strength Brimstone and biodrugs to dirt farmers and welfare cases that won’t ever make anything of themselves—or anything for you.”

A seething anger warmed my face. I happened to be one of those welfare cases, and though I would probably be shipped off to Siberia in a biocontainment bag if it ever got out, I bristled. Trent was scum, but Lee was disgusting. I opened my mouth to tell him to shut up about things he didn’t understand when Trent touched my leg with his shoe in warning.

The rims of Trent’s ears had gone red, and his jaw was tight. He tapped at the arm of the chair, a deliberate show of his agitation. “I do control the Western Hemisphere,” Trent said, his low, resonating voice making my stomach clench. “And my welfare cases have given me more than my father’s paying customers—Stanley.”

Lee’s tanned face went white in anger, and I wondered what was being said that I didn’t understand. Perhaps it hadn’t been college. Maybe they had met at “camp.”

“Your money can’t force me out,” Trent added. “Ever. Go tell your father to lower his Brimstone levels and I’ll back off from the West Coast.”

Lee stood, and I stiffened, ready to move. He placed his hands spread wide, bracing himself. “You overestimate your reach, Trent. You did when we were boys, and nothing has changed. It’s why you almost drowned trying to swim back to shore, and why you lost every game we played, every race we ran, every girl we made a prize.” He was pointing now, underscoring his words. “You think you’re more than you are, having been coddled and praised for accomplishments that everyone else takes for granted. Face it. You’re the last of your kind, and it’s your arrogance that put you there.”

My eyes shifted between them. Trent sat with his legs comfortably crossed and his fingers laced. He was absolutely still. He was incensed, none of it showing but for the hem of his slacks trembling. “Don’t make a mistake you can’t walk away from,” he said softly. “I’m not twelve anymore.”

Lee backed up, a misplaced satisfaction and confidence in him as he eyed the door behind me. “You could have fooled me.”