The Family Business 2

by Carl Weber

  “Where the fuck am I?” I said out loud.

  The man rose from his chair and tossed me my clothing. “Get dressed!” he ordered. I hadn’t even realized I was wearing nothing.

  The sound of his voice awakened my memory, and suddenly it all started coming back to me—horrible things, like my cousin being shot in the head. Suddenly I knew where I was and who was barking orders at me. Miraculously I was still alive, but I was also still in his custody and still in deep shit.

  I sat up and said his name. “Alejandro.”

  He didn’t say a word, just stared at me, sucking on a huge cigar as I got dressed. Now I knew where the smell of sulfur had come from.

  I reached up and massaged my head. “What the hell did you do to me? Why does my head feel like a tractor trailer is driving through it?”

  “You’ve been sedated for the past few days. The headache will subside,” the lady replied as she stepped closer. Her lilac perfume jogged my memory. It was the same scent I’d noticed when she entered the room just before Manny pulled the trigger. She was the one who screamed and pushed his arm away so that the bullet landed somewhere in a wall above my head, rather than between my eyes.

  After she stopped my execution, all hell broke loose. Alejandro’s men were on me in a second, throwing me to the ground. I lost consciousness not long after that, and based on what she told me, I’d been out for a few days.

  I looked at Alejandro and asked, “Why am I still alive?”

  “You have my wife to thank for that.” He reached out his hand and pulled the woman back to his side. As she stood next to him, I noticed just how much younger than Alejandro she was. She looked to be in her late forties and very well kept, as opposed to Alejandro, who wore his age in the lines on his face. Even so, her body language told me that she was no trophy wife. She was clearly devoted to her husband.

  “Were it not for Consuela,” he continued, “you would be on a slab right now, just like your cousin Orlando.”

  It was jarring to hear my own name like that, but at least it let me know that they still hadn’t figured out my identity.

  I said to his wife, “Thank you, ma’am,” hoping that was enough gratitude and respect to satisfy Alejandro. She nodded her head slightly but didn’t speak.

  “My wife is a kind woman,” Alejandro said. “Our son Miguel is dead at the hands of a Duncan. Were it up to me, I would destroy everyone associated with that family. She, however, insisted the bloodshed should stop once we took care of LC’s son.”

  “There has been enough death,” she said.

  Alejandro took a puff of his cigar, blowing the smoke up toward the ceiling. Then he looked at his wife and paid her a compliment. “She is also very smart, my wife.” He turned to me and explained, “She helped me to understand that I was acting too hastily. That your death could be very bad for business.”

  I was confused. Alejandro thought I was LC’s nephew, not his son. How could my death be any worse for business than what he’d already done? Then he made me understand. It wasn’t about revenge anymore; it was about money.

  “You see, you are a very valuable asset—if it’s true what Orlando said, that you invented this new drug, H.E.A.T.”

  I nodded.

  “In a matter of a few days, my men have already sold all of the product that you brought to us. It is everything Orlando said it was. This drug could make me and my family very rich.”

  “Yes,” I spoke up, “that’s why LC sent it to you. It was a gesture of good will. He wasn’t looking for any trouble with you. He knows he has a good product and he wanted to cut you in on it.”

  Alejandro laughed mockingly. “LC Duncan doesn’t give a shit about cutting me in. He does only what profits him. He sent it to keep the peace.” He puffed on his cigar again. “And now that I’ve avenged my son’s death, I am prepared to move on. But LC made a mistake in sending you here.”

  “Why?” I asked, struggling not to lose my temper with this man who insulted my father.

  “Don’t you see?” he said. “Now that I have the chemist, I can create the drug myself. There will be no need to do business with LC.”

  I shook my head. “I won’t do that. I work only for the Duncans.”

  “I’m prepared to pay you ten times what they could pay you. How does five million sound?”

  “I don’t care how much money you offer me. I won’t do it,” I said emphatically.

  He jumped out of his chair, throwing his cigar down and bellowing, “Then you will die!”

  In half a second, one of his goons rushed into the room, his gun already aimed in my direction. I braced myself for the bullet’s impact, but no gunshot ever came.

  “No! Stop!” It was Consuela, stopping my execution for a second time. She was pulling on Alejandro’s arm, screaming at him. “You can’t kill this man! Please, Alejandro!”

  Alejandro gestured to his assassin, who lowered the gun but still stood ready to blow me away as soon as he got the order.

  Consuela was speaking rapidly to her husband. She sounded frightened. “You’ve already been warned by the cartel to end this thing with the Duncans. Killing his chemist will only escalate things. The cartel will come after you.” She was crying now. “Please, mi amor, I have already lost my son. I cannot bear to lose you too.”

  Alejandro hesitated, and I wasn’t sure if I would live or die. After a tense minute, he finally looked at his man and tilted his head toward the door. The goon stalked out of the room, probably pissed that he hadn’t been allowed to unload a few rounds into me.

  Alejandro helped his wife into the chair and spoke softly to her until she stopped sobbing. Then he stood up and turned to me, saying, “Again you can thank my wife for sparing you. I will send you back to New York, but I want you to deliver a message to LC.”

  I stood silently, hoping he couldn’t hear my heart pounding in my chest.

  “You tell LC that I could have killed you, but I chose not to. That is my gesture of good will. We are even now—a son for a son. This war between us can be done, or it can continue. The choice is his.”

  The ride to the airport was tense and silent for most of the way. Alejandro looked like he was still fuming over my refusal to work for him. If his wife hadn’t insisted on riding with us, he might have killed me in the limo.

  When Alejandro finally broke the silence in the car, he spoke with incredible arrogance, as if none of the events of the past few days had taken place. “Once he has time to think about it, I am sure LC will see things my way. We all stand to make millions with this new drug. There is no reason to continue this little feud between us.”

  I couldn’t believe he was referring to multiple murders as a “little feud.”

  “What makes you so sure he’ll even consider working with you now?” I asked, unable to hold my tongue any longer.

  He gave me a patronizing smile. “Ah, yes. I forget you are just a chemist and probably do not understand the workings of our business. Neither LC nor I are truly our own bosses. We both have people to answer to, and at the end of the day, our job is to make everybody the most money possible.” He finished just as we pulled up in front of the arrivals terminal at LAX. I wanted to tell him that I understood a hell of a lot more than he thought, and that while he might be somebody else’s bitch, LC Duncan sure as hell didn’t answer to anyone else. But I was too close to getting out of Los Angeles at that point, and I decided it was best to keep my mouth shut.

  Stepping out of the limo into the L.A. sunshine, I noticed the presence of heavily armed police officers on the curb doing random bag checks on arriving passengers. Normally cops were the last people I wanted to see, but in this case, they were like an added insurance policy as I prepared to make my exit from the custody of Alejandro and his wife.

  Alejandro led me into the airport, where he handed me a boarding pass, along with a fake ID. It wasn’t the same ID I’d been carrying in my wallet when I arrived in L.A., but it didn’t matter—that one was a fake to
o. As long as I had something to get me on a plane, I was good to go.

  “Don’t forget to deliver the message to LC. Tell him I look forward to working with him again,” he said as if we’d just had a pleasant visit and everything was cool.

  That’s when his driver came running into the airport looking panic-stricken. “They just called from back at the compound. Señor Rodriguez called and he’s not happy,” he said, out of breath.

  Oh, shit. This can’t be good for me, I thought.

  “What is it?” Alejandro asked. “We did what he asked. We sent back the son’s body.”

  The driver shook his head. “The body was not Orlando Duncan.”

  Alejandro’s face transformed into a mask of confusion. “That’s impossible. It had to be his body. We buried the bodyguards out in the desert.”

  “I know,” the man replied. “I buried them myself.”

  “So if that wasn’t LC’s son, then whose body was that? LC wouldn’t send anyone other than a close family member to negotiate—” Alejandro turned to me, slowly looking me up and down. I could see the light bulb going off in his head. He said, “It’s you, isn’t it? You’re LC’s son. You’re Orlando.” He was so mad his face practically turned purple.

  I looked around the airport lobby and considered making a run for it, but between Alejandro, his driver, and my still throbbing head, I wouldn’t get very far. Then I realized there was no reason to run.

  I almost laughed out loud as I shrugged. “In the flesh.”

  “You think something’s funny?” He took a few steps closer to me. “You son of a bitch, I’ll kill you right here.”

  I looked around at the armed officers, who had come in from the curb and were now stopping people in the lobby. “Really? And how do you plan on doing that with all the cameras and law enforcement in this terminal? That would qualify as a federal offense. Possibly terrorism.” I pushed closer to him, daring him to be that stupid.

  This seemed to deflate him a little. He knew I was right. There wasn’t a damn thing he could do to stop me from leaving now that we were in a public place.

  “This is not forgotten,” he threatened.

  “You’re right about that,” I sneered at him. “That was my cousin you killed.”

  “But not a son,” he yelled at my back as I walked away. “I will have revenge for my son’s death, Orlando! This is not over!”

  Sasha

  28

  As I sat in Encounter, the restaurant shaped like an alien spaceship in the center of LAX, I couldn’t help but think about Manny. He’d been consuming my thoughts ever since I put that bullet in his head back in Hawaii. It wasn’t exactly that I felt guilty about what I’d done. After all, business was business. The real reason I couldn’t stop thinking about him was because I knew I’d never get another taste of his good dick. My pussy was already missing him like hell.

  I tried to take my mind off of him by watching the planes taking off and landing, and imagining where the passengers were heading. That had worked for a while, but I was starting to get impatient as I waited for the call about my next assignment. My waitress looked like she was sick of waiting too—waiting for me to clear out from my table so she could seat some more guests. Fortunately for both of us, my phone rang just as she put the check on my table.

  I shoved some money into her hand so she’d get lost. No need for anyone to be nearby when I answered the call, however brief it was.

  “They’re on their way,” the Indian voice on the other end informed me, and then the call was over.

  I picked up my bag and strode toward the elevator bank, eager to get to work. There was another customer waiting for the elevator, so I pretended to be busy with my phone until the doors opened and she stepped on. After she was gone and I was sure no one else was around, I slid my hand behind the fire extinguisher to retrieve a key that was taped to the back. As usual, my employer had made sure that I was equipped with all the necessary tools to complete an assignment. I headed for the door where I knew the key would fit. Checking one last time to be sure there were no witnesses, I put the key in the door and headed up the stairs.

  The stairs led me to another door, which opened onto the roof. I stepped out into the bright sunlight and got to work. Reaching into my bag, I removed the binoculars and situated myself in the best spot to get a clear view of the outside of Terminal 6. Then I opened the bag again and took out the parts of my M-60E4 sniper rifle. Most people, even in my profession, couldn’t handle the intricacy of assembling the weapon in such a short time, but then again, there were few people as good as me. At school I not only broke all records for putting the gun together, but I could do it with my eyes closed. I loved the feel of the steel in my hands as I assembled it. Working with this level of firepower made me feel invincible, especially after I loaded the armor-piercing rounds that could rip through metal as if it were butter.

  With my gear ready and my sights set on the location, there was nothing left to do but wait. Ten minutes later, a black SUV pulled up in front of the entrance. I watched as two men got out and headed into the airport. I readied my hand on the trigger, knowing it was only a matter of time before my target came back out.

  A few minutes later, a third man jumped out of the driver’s side of the SUV and rushed into the airport. I wasn’t sure what was going on, but I stayed in place, ready to strike when the time was right. When the mark exited the airport a few minutes later, he was waving his hands around like something had agitated him. I squeezed the trigger and it was all over. He was on the sidewalk, people were scattering everywhere, and my job was finished.

  I disassembled the gun and checked to make sure the area around me was clean. By the time I reached the bottom landing and exited the building, a car was waiting for me. I hopped in and my driver pulled away from the curb, taking me away from the scene of the crime.

  I leaned back in my seat and made the call.

  “It’s done,” I told him. Alejandro Zuniga, the largest distributor of illegal drugs on the West Coast, was dead.

  “Good,” the voice on the other end answered. “Now I think it’s time you took a trip to New York and paid a visit to Mr. LC Duncan.”

  Orlando

  29

  I couldn’t remember ever feeling more grateful to be back in New York. As the plane touched down at LaGuardia Airport, I glanced around at the other passengers. Some looked impatient as we waited for the okay to take off our seat belts and deplane; others just looked exhausted. Not me. I was invigorated, because after a week with my life hanging in the balance, I had arrived home safely.

  With no luggage to collect, I was able to go straight from the gate to the airport exit, where I hopped into a yellow cab. I didn’t have my phone, so I couldn’t call to let my family know that I was safe and on my way. It didn’t really matter, though, because in fifteen minutes I would be home with them.

  On the ride, I couldn’t stop thinking of Trent and the way he’d stepped in to impersonate me. Why had he done it? It was possible he was just in a hurry to get the meeting started so we could get to the girls. Or maybe he was trying to prove himself, show me that he could handle things without me. The worst possibility, though, was that maybe he’d done it because I was on the phone with Ruby when I should have been headed into the house. Maybe Trent went in ahead of me to keep Alejandro from being offended by my lateness. Whichever one it was, I would never know Trent’s reason, but I knew one thing: I would forever feel responsible for his death. He had gone in there as my employee, and I had failed him. If it was the last thing I ever did, I would make sure that Alejandro paid for my cousin’s life.

  The cab pulled up to the gate in front of our house, and the guard practically fell out of his booth when he saw me sitting in the backseat.

  “Man, I thought you were dead,” he said.

  “I know, man. It’s been one hell of a week,” I answered.

  He opened the gate and waved us through. As we approached the house, I saw Pari
s pushing a stroller in the circular driveway by the front door. Obviously she wasn’t expecting anyone, because she tensed up at the sound of the approaching car, whirling around with her game face on. That expression changed in a hurry when I stepped out of the cab and we locked eyes. Paris let out a scream and ran toward me, practically knocking me over as she jumped into my arms. My little sister was stronger than she looked; she damn near crushed my ribs with her hug.

  “Hey, sis,” I laughed, happy to see my pain in the neck sister. We’d had our differences over the years, especially since I’d taken over the family business, but in that moment none of those things mattered. “It’s good to see you too.”

  She pulled back a little, just enough to get a good look at my face. “Boy, you’ve had us all going crazy over here,” she said. “If I didn’t think you were already dead, I swear I’d kill you myself.” She smacked me in the back of the head playfully.

  “What the hell is—Oh, shit! Orlando!” Harris was the first to come outside. He stopped in his tracks, his mouth falling open in shock.

  I loosened myself from Paris’s hugs and walked over to Harris. “Hey there, brother-in-law. What’s up? Aren’t you glad to see me?” I offered him my hand.

  He blinked as if to kick-start his confused brain and then took my hand. “Yeah, of course . . . but we thought you were dead.”

  “I thought I was dead too. But I’m here, flesh and blood,” I said just as I was once again tackled, this time by London, Junior, and Rio.

  “Holy shit, that’s O!” Junior shouted as he ran full speed toward me and scooped me up in a bear hug. London and Rio piled on happily.

  When my big brother let me go, he stood there staring at me wordlessly. I found myself speechless too. I’m pretty sure he was holding back tears, and I definitely was, because now that I was here with my siblings, it truly hit me how close I had come to never seeing them again.