Jem saw the question in his face and simply shook his head. “You need to understand something, man. Locke isn’t that little boy anymore. He grew up, like the rest of us, only more wayward and fucking weird, and he’s far from innocent. It’s so easy to overlook that because of what was done to him, but at the end of the day, Locke is a bad guy. You keep losing sight of that.”
“It was tense with the two of you in the front yard after he’d driven the men out.”
“Yeah, well…”
“You seemed cold to him, Jem, having a go at him the way you did.”
“It wasn’t without reason. Locke’s fucked with this town over the years. You just haven’t seen it yet.”
Thames frowned. “I’m not sure it’ll change the way I think of him.”
Jem was silent for several moments. Then he said, “Let’s go for a short drive, Conor. I want to show you something.”
The drive was quiet. Jem drove in a purposeful direction, heading into downtown Blackwater. It was night-time on a weekday. The streets were quiet in residential areas. But as they began to approach downtown, there was life on every corner.
“Look around, alright?” Jem suddenly said. “Look real close for me and point out every place you see that’s bursting with people.”
Curious, Thames did just that. He pointed to a packed restaurant, a club with a line out the door, even a tattoo parlour that was standing room only.
“What can you tell me about these places?” Jem then asked.
“They’re packed.”
“How do they look, though?”
Brow furrowed, Thames responded, “Upmarket. Taken care of.”
“Kind of all the same, right? Shiny, glass windows, well lit, and if you look even closer, check out all the cars parked out front of these places. Ferrari right there, a Corvette behind it. When has Blackwater ever looked so fucking dainty?”
Thames didn’t understand his point. “Population boom?”
“Wrong.” Jem suddenly parked his mammoth truck in an illegal spot right across the street of another restaurant. He stared at it for a moment before levelling Thames with a hard look. “Since Max fucking Locke decided to take over.”
Thames mulled that over. “He owns them all?”
“Every single one of them. Tell me how the fuck that’s possible.”
Thames tapped the glass with his finger and shrugged. “He always had money.”
“No, he dressed well. Big difference.”
“He has a law firm.”
“Lawyers don’t make the kind of money he’s been throwing around.”
Confused now, Thames shrugged. “What’s he doing, then? Chop shopping like we’d planned to do?”
Jem shook his head. “No, your Uncle Fuckhead and Fuckhead Jr. cornered that market.”
“What then?”
“No fucking clue.”
“Have you asked him?”
Jem shot him a dry look. “Oh, because he’s always been such a forthcoming darling to me?”
When Thames didn’t answer, Jem clenched his jaw and shot the restaurant a dark look. “All I know is a few years ago our Blackwater boy started throwing money around all over the place. No one asks him a thing. Everyone paved the way for the guy, kissed his ass kind of thing like he owns Moses’ shoe. People are petrified of him.”
“Why are they petrified?”
Jem shrugged. “I don’t know. No one talks, Thames. Not a soul. But I noticed a trend. He kept driving businesses out, played dirty with the owners, forced a sale for him kind of thing. A lot of people left, Conor. A lot. Either he’s driven them out with money, or with the threat of violence. Now, I’m not gonna lie, these people weren’t without fault, but still pretty almighty of him to decide who gets to stay and who gets to go. And along the way to his rise to the top, he has literally kept nobody close to him. Nobody. Not his mama, not a girl, no one. Save for, perhaps…” His voice trailed now as he turned to look at him.
Thames felt his chest sink slowly. “Charlotte.”
“I doubt she knows anything, either, but…he looked after her, and we know him. He’s never been the kindred type.”
Thames suddenly felt a hot, prickly feeling run down his spine. “What are his intentions, do you think?”
“I don’t think he’s overstepped his boundaries with her. He doesn’t look at her in that way, but I think he’s got a soft spot for her. I think…if you think about it real hard, you might understand why. She’s been hurt, and he’s always gravitated to the broken birds, hasn’t he?”
“Because of what happened.”
“Yeah.”
“I’d have traded places, you know,” Thames said, feeling his chest tighten. “I