by Lane Hart
Both Knox and Cain are standing poised and ready to fight with their fists up.
“Back the fuck up. I texted that I was coming over.”
“Can’t be too careful,” Cain mutters as he lowers his hands.
“True,” I reluctantly agree. “Sorry. I know we’re all three a little stressed about how the next few hours are gonna go down.”
“Yeah, we are,” Knox replies. “And we’ll have to get used to you being a dick instead of silent. Guess a woman will do that to you, right, Cain?” he asks, nailing Cain in the side with his fist.
“Fuck you,” Cain bitches as he grabs his side. “And my reflexes are slow since I haven’t been training.”
“Things still good at Classic Ink?” I ask him since I’ve been so wrapped up in my own shit that I hadn’t had a chance to ask.
“Yeah,” Cain answers with a grin. “I did my first tattoo the day before yesterday, an American traditional eagle. The dude loved it so much he gave me a hundred-dollar tip.”
“That’s great,” I tell him, happy for him. “Glad it’s working out for you. And what’s Gabby up to? I’m surprised you left her back at the apartment alone overnight.”
“Well, I couldn’t bring her with us because it’s too dangerous, so she slept in the apartment above the flower shop last night. Not that she probably got much sleep. Apparently, there’s a big wedding today that they had to prepare a million arrangements for without much notice. Ironically, it’s actually here in this hotel,” he says with a grin.
“Hope they got paid in advance,” I mutter.
“You think Gabby’s gonna deliver them and set them up?” Knox asks Cain.
“Aw, shit!” the grumpy man exclaims. “Let me try and call her, tell her to keep her ass there at the shop.”
“Good luck with that,” Knox tells him with a chuckle. Knowing Gabby’s stubbornness, she’s probably already on her way here.
“Before you get on the phone, let’s go over the plan for this morning again,” I say, stopping Cain from picking up the receiver for a moment. “In a few minutes, two guards are going to come to the room. I’ll greet them while you two hide in the back of the bedroom. When they walk through, I’ll stay back so that you can jump them from behind and put them in a half-Nelson to choke them out. If one breaks free, I’ll help out."
“Cain’s bigger, so he’s gonna have the extra Glock in his hand to smash on the giant’s head before trying to choke him out.”
“Sounds good,” I agree. “Once we have the next two secured in the bathroom, we’ll need to get ready for one of the last two to come check on where Craig and I are. We take him down, wait for the last, and then I’ll go get Maylin, bring her over here to hide out safely in the bedroom while we wait for the asshole himself to show.”
“What if he comes up at the same time as the two guards?” Knox asks.
“He won’t. He’ll send the muscle because he’ll have enough to worry about with the last-minute wedding plans,” I say when I suddenly have an idea. “Let me talk to Gabby when you call her. I think we might need her…”
“Hell no,” Cain says.
“She can stay with the florist but maybe get a little clumsy…”
“Again, hell to the no,” Cain replies through clenched teeth.
“Gabby will be fine, and Jimmy would never hurt her in a public place like this. I don’t think…” I add. “He’s on probation, so he doesn’t want to go back to prison. I think that’s one of the main reasons he refuses to carry a gun.”
“I don’t like this idea,” Cain says with a shake of his head.
“The likelihood of Gabby getting hurt here with witnesses all around is low,” Knox agrees. “Let her create a distraction when she delivers the flowers, and then she’s out of here in the flower van before Jimmy even knows who’s responsible.”
“Fine,” Cain eventually agrees. “Only if she can fuck shit up out of his sight after the florists are done and heading out the door. I don’t want him to blame her or for her to lose her job”
“That’ll be perfect,” I agree since I don’t want to put Gabby in harm’s way either since she’s like a sister to me. “Call her while I check on Craig. How’s he doing anyway?” I ask when I start walking toward the back bedroom.
“He refused food but drank a few sips of water,” Knox informs me. “Oh, and I had to hold his dick twice, so he could take a piss in the hotel’s ice bucket.”
“Seriously?” I ask him in disbelief.
“We didn’t want to untie him, and he can’t stand up to reach the toilet,” Knox answers. “So Cain and I drew rock, papers, scissors, and I lost. All three rounds.” He shivers and says, “You fucking owe me big time, man.”
“Yeah, I know,” I agree. “Just a few more hours and hopefully it’ll all be over.”
“How does your girl feel about you killing Jimmy?” Knox asks. “Are you sure you want her in here?”
“It’s the safest place,” I argue. “And I think she’ll be okay with him dead. That’s the only way to protect her and her father for good; therefore, it’s the only choice.”
“Not to mention you want revenge for your mother,” Knox adds. “Have you told her about all that shit that went down?”
“No,” I answer with an exhale. “She’s got enough going on that she doesn’t need to know about my past.”
“Murder is serious. And once it’s done, the guilt is probably gonna piggyback on your shoulders and ride around on them for the rest of your life. You sure you’re ready for that?” Knox asks.
“Yes. I’ve been ready to kill him since the moment he held a gun to my mother’s head. My only regret is that I didn’t have a gun to blow his brains out that day,” I tell him honestly.
“All right,” Knox says. “I just wanted to talk to you about it one last time before it’s too late to take it back.”
“I won’t leave this hotel unless Jimmy Russo is dead.”
“Then we won’t either,” Knox agrees.
With a nod, I turn to walk through the bedroom, marching straight to the bathroom door. Craig is hogtied on the floor with a strip of duct tape over his mouth. When he looks up and sees that it’s me, his eyes narrow into a glare.
“Sorry,” I tell him. “Nothing personal. But Jimmy needs to die, and I can’t have anyone try and save him. As soon as it’s done, we’ll let you and the other guys go.”
Expression softening, Craig gives a nod of understanding.
“Do you need anything to eat or drink?” I ask.
After rolling his eyes, he shakes his head, but then nods to the toilet.
“Gotta piss again?”
Craig nods vehemently, and when his eyes lift, I’m pretty sure he’s grinning behind the tape.
“Knox!” I yell. “Craig needs your assistance.”
“Fuck! Again?” I hear Knox groan and then his stomps as he comes over and stands in the doorway with his hands on his hips. “Let me get the fucking ice bucket,” he says before turning around and disappearing.
“He doesn’t swing that way,” I warn Craig with a chuckle. He simply shrugs as much as he can with his hands behind his back.
I should tell Knox that Craig’s fucking with him, but nah. Cain and I can get a good laugh out of this later. It’s something to actually look forward to after the next few kidnappings and then the murder.
Chapter Eighteen
Ivan
All of the guards are tied up in the bathroom, each takedown going according to plan. Now I’ve got my gun cocked and loaded while I wait for Jimmy in the living room. Since we didn’t want to have to cover two hotel rooms, we brought Maylin over here where she’s safely tucked away with Knox and Cain so that we can keep an eye on her.
For a split second when she answered the door, I saw her in her wedding dress looking so gorgeous and innocent that it hurt. I made her change into her jeans and a plain t-shirt, not just because a beautiful bride would stand out when we make our getaway, but because once I
have blood on my hands it will be impossible to be around her looking so pure.
Do I think everything between us will change after Jimmy’s dead? Of course. How could they not? But despite that certainty, and how much I want to be with Maylin after this is all over, I can’t back down or walk away at this point. I’ve waited too long to avenge my mother, and it has to be me who pulls the trigger.
Finally, there’s the knock on the hotel door. The one that I’ve been waiting six years for.
Since Jimmy doesn’t have a key, I go over and open it for him, keeping my gun lowered and against my right leg so he can’t see it yet.
“Hey, what’s up?” I ask.
“What’s up?” he growls as he storms in past me in his black tux and looks around the empty living room. “What’s up is that none of my guards are with me and Maylin is missing from her room!”
“Oh,” I say blandly. “Well, that’s my fault.”
“Your fault?” he asks as he whips around to face me and I lift the gun to aim it at his head.
“You’re not getting married today because you’re gonna be dead,” I explain. “Now keep your hands where I can see them, even though we both know you don’t have a gun on you, do you?”
“Who the fuck do you think you are?” he asks before licking his lips nervously. There’s already sweat beading on his forehead, maybe from panicking about where his bride and guards are or maybe because he knows his time on this earth is running out.
“I’m the son of the woman you murdered,” I finally admit to him through clenched teeth.
Jimmy raises a dark eyebrow before he replies. “You’ll have to be more specific. I’ve killed a lot of broads in my day.”
I reach out and smack the side of his head with the gun hard, making him groan. Doesn’t this stupid motherfucker know that he just made it that much easier for me to kill him?
I should’ve already pulled the trigger, I know that, because the longer I delay the more likely something could go wrong, like he could lunge for me, trying to take the gun. But for some reason, I feel the need to tell him why I’m going to kill him first.
“Six years ago, you shot my mother, Annette Rivers.”
“Rivers?” he repeats with a creased forehead. “I only knew one Annette, but Rivers wasn’t her last name.”
“Well, then I’m guessing you didn’t get my mother’s full name before you put a bullet in her,” I remark. “She worked in a brothel and she was a good mother –”
“Wait! You’re Annette’s son?”
“So now you remember her after I mentioned the brothel?” I ask. “I’m surprised you haven’t killed more whores.”
“Oh, I remember her,” he answers. “She betrayed me. And in the process, fucked every man in the whole goddamn city.”
“Betrayed you?” I yell in indignation. “She was protecting me from you that night, you sick fuck! Guess you’re a pedophile too, going around killing women and fucking little boys or something?”
“Hell no, that’s disgusting,” he mutters with his face pinched. “You don’t know what you’re talking about. What she…”
“So then why?” I yell. “Why did you kill her?”
“Because you’re my son and she wouldn’t let me have you!” he exclaims.
“What the fuck?” I mutter, the gun muzzle lowering as I replay those bizarre words again. “No! There’s no way in hell that you’re my father.”
“I can’t believe it either,” he mutters. “All these years I thought you were long gone, halfway across the world…"
“You’re lying.”
“Why would I lie about that?” he asks.
Lifting my aim again, I say, “Because I’ve got a gun pointed at your head. You’ll say anything to try and save your ass.”
“I was there at the hospital when you were born. I have your birth certificate and baby pictures!”
“More lies.”
“I do! They’re at the house, in the bottom drawer of my desk!” he claims. “Annette was in labor for a whole day before you were born! It was…it was eleven thirty at night on April Nineteenth when you finally came into the world.”
No. Fucking. Way. How does he know my birthday?
“Come on. Lower the gun and we’ll go back to my office. I’ll show you your birth certificate and everything else,” Jimmy begs. “You were born Anthony Russo. My son! She didn’t want me to find you, so she must have told you your name was Ivan.”
Could he be telling the truth? Did my mother lie to me?
“The three of us lived in a little house together. Your nursery was covered in trains.”
“Like I would remember that shit,” I mutter.
“You may not, but I do.”
“You probably have more kids than you can keep up with,” I reply.
“I’ve only had one child. My wife gave me one son before I got locked up.”
“Wife?” I ask since my mother never said anything about being married. I always assumed my dad was one of the Johns and that she didn’t know who he was for sure. That’s what she told me every time I asked about him.
“We were married at Our Lady of Grace,” Jimmy says. “You were born nine months later, and then your mother…she went to the police, turned me in and sent me away for twelve fucking years!”
I was right. I should’ve put a bullet in his head as soon as he walked through the door. Now I’ve given him a chance to run his mouth, and he’s not wasting any time filling my head with all sorts of bullshit, none of which can be true. It’s impossible. I am not related to this monster!
“Your mother was from a poor family in New York, but they were full-blooded Italians. She was beautiful, so I knew we would make beautiful sons and daughters together even if I sometimes prefer men. A man couldn’t ever give me an heir but Annette could. Her father had a bit of a drug problem and owed me a debt. I convinced him to let me marry her for a clean slate and an eight-ball.”
“How could I believe anything out of your murdering mouth?” I ask.
“I have the marriage certificate back at the house too, along with pictures. Let’s go and you can finally see for yourself everything that your mother kept from you.”
Oh, fuck that. If my mother was his wife, it was only in the same sense that Maylin was about to be. Not by choice but by force. And if that’s true, then he probably forced himself on her to conceive me...
“She didn’t want to marry you, did she?” I ask through gritted teeth.
“No, but it was just more of an arrangement so that I could have children. Then she turned me in…”
I bet she turned him in to try and get away from him the only way she knew how.
“Did you rape her?” I ask.
“She just didn’t know what she wanted. I was good to her and gave her everything money could buy…”
Holy fuck.
All my life I assumed I was an accident, the one time my whore of a mother didn’t use birth control, but now I know the truth. Her murderer likely forced himself on her over and over again until he broke her and she went to the police. I’m the product of not only rape but a fucking psycho bastard. And my mother was so destroyed by him that she would rather live in a whore house fucking every man under the sun to survive, as long as it meant getting away from her husband.
“The only thing my mother may have kept from me was the truth about you. And if even half of what you’re telling me is true, I don’t blame her,” I say. “Maybe you’re telling the truth or maybe you’re lying. What I think is that, if you are my father, then you raped her because she never wanted to be with you. But either way, it doesn’t matter to me because the end result here today is going to be the same. You are gonna die for taking her life. Do you have any last words?”
“You’re my son! You can’t –”
My finger squeezes the trigger of the gun, and the silencer drowns out most of the sound as a bullet is fired right through Jimmy Russo’s forehead in the exact spot I’ve always imag
ined is where he shot my mother the first time. I lower my aim and pull the trigger again, putting another hole through the left side of his chest, where his heart would be, if he had one.
The asshole stays on his feet for a few long, silent seconds, eyes wide and mouth gaping in shock that I actually did it. I killed him because I don’t give a fuck who he was. He deserved to die.
Chapter Nineteen
Maylin
“Oh my God,” I exclaim, standing up from the foot of the bed when I hear what sounds like the pop of a gun. Twice. “What was that?” I ask Ivan’s friends, Cain and Knox, when I move closer to the door.
“Shh,” Knox warns me with his finger to his lips. He and the grumpy guy have their ears pressed against the door.
“We need to make sure Ivan’s okay,” I whisper to them since we could hear him arguing with Jimmy on the other side, but not exactly what they were saying. The words were mumbled but the emotion was clear. Both were upset.
The bedroom door is yanked open, and then the two guys barely catch themselves before they tumble over. Both straighten and then take steps back from Ivan, who is standing on the other side with crimson splatters on his shirt and face.
“Is that blood? That’s blood, isn’t it?” I ask in horror. “Did he shoot you? Are you okay?” I ask Ivan when I go over and start patting him down.
“It’s not my blood,” he says simply.
“Oh,” I mutter in understanding, letting my hands drop from him. Without further explanation, Ivan walks through the bedroom right into the bathroom where he turns on the faucet to clean himself up. Following behind him, I see for the first time just how crowded it is in the small space. Five big men are on the floor with a thick band of gray tape over their mouths and hands out of sight. It takes a second to get over the shock before I recognize them as Jimmy’s guards.
“Is Jimmy...did you kill him?” I ask Ivan when he leaves the bathroom. He stops in the bedroom and turns to face me, so I wait for his response. I know I could just look out in the main room and see for myself, but I don’t want to.
