Kill or be Killed (Mafia Kingpin Book 1)

by A. G. Khaliq

  As I started to make my way out of the warehouse, I stepped into the storage room, to quickly check my phone for any text messages. As I walked inside, I saw Abid standing there in the middle of the room. His arms were folded, and he narrowed his eyes at me. He looked like he was about to murder.

  I jolted backwards in shock. It felt like my heart had leapt out of my chest. I started shaking uncontrollably, not knowing what to fucking do. Abid said that he was going to town with Trex… so what the fuck was he doing back here so soon?!

  My heart thumped so hard, it felt like I was having a seizure and the walls were closing in around me. Like I was suffocating. I didn’t know how I was going to wriggle myself out of this one… There were no fucking excuses I could use to explain myself to him as to why I was at his Boss’s fucking warehouse, when I’d said I was going to the coffee shop.

  This was it. I could feel it… I could sense it.

  This would be the end of the road for me and Abid.

  “Going somewhere?” Abid asked bitterly.

  “I - erm…” I coughed, hard. It felt like somebody was holding a knife to my neck, and I couldn’t fucking speak anymore. I didn’t even know what to say.

  “You better have a good fucking explanation for this,” Abid said quietly. His quiet voice just made it even more terrifying. At this point… I had no fucking idea what was about to happen. I had no fucking idea about what was about to unfold. I didn’t know how he was going to deal with me… How he was going to react, or what he was going to say to me.

  The only way to explain myself…

  … Would be to tell the truth.

  And I was fucking dreading it.

  TREX

  I’d came back to the second half of the warehouse, to see Abid and ask him whether he’d found Steve yet. I heard voices coming from the storage room. It sounded like Abid was shouting at someone… A girl.

  I’d never seen a girl in the warehouse before. If she was trespassing… Maybe Abid was dealing with her? I didn’t fucking know.

  When I walked into the storage room, I saw a girl with her back turned wearing a tiny, skimpy outfit, and Abid was staring at her with his arms folded. His eyes were bloodshot. I’d never seen him like this before.

  Before I could get an idea of what they were talking about, they both left the room, making their way outside. The only way outside from the storage room would be to the alleyway out back, where the fucking bins were. That was the only place that they could have fucking gone to.

  As soon as they were out of earshot, I followed their lead. I needed to know what was going on. It might have been some personal business… but it became my business when this girl came into this warehouse, when I’d never seen her here before. She was behaving shadily, and Abid was so pissed off. We were like brothers, and we told each other everything. So why the fuck had he never told me about this random chick here?!

  ABID

  Aliyah followed me to the alleyway out back. My blood was boiling to the point it almost dried up. I’d been trying to remain calm and composed. I’d been trying not to kick up a scene in the warehouse. But my patience was wearing thin. I needed answers. I was so angry… So fucking angry. I felt so hurt and betrayed.

  As soon as we got to the alleyway, I punched the wall, screaming until my knuckles were red and bloody. It was her that I wanted to punch, her that I wanted to kick… But I never laid a finger on women, I wasn’t a fucking woman-beater like her ex-husband Asae was. I might have murdered a lot of fucking men in my life… but I could never lay hands on a woman. It’s just how my fucking mother raised me.

  Aliyah stared at me with a terrified expression on her face. I didn’t know why she was behaving so scared, like this wasn’t a normal thing for a criminal like me to fucking do. I was a monster… and she seemed to like criminals anyway. First Asae, then me, and now fucking Steve, the kingpin of the whole organization, even more of a monster than I was. She knew what she was signing up for, the minute she started fucking me.

  I turned around to face her, hardly able to look her in the eye. My knuckles were swollen, but I didn’t fucking care. I was fucking fuming, and I couldn’t hold back the rage inside me anymore.

  “Care to explain why I just saw Steve about to fucking ram his tongue down your throat?!” I roared. “You've been cheating on me with Steve this whole time?! You said you loved me! I can't believe you even lied about where you work. You were working for Steve right under my nose, there’s no other fucking reason that you’d be here!”

  “Abid I - I can explain!” she said, terrified. “I would never cheat on you, I love you!”

  I burst into laughter. Wow. The audacity of this bitch. Now she wanted to throw the I love you card at me… Even after I’d just caught her red-handed.

  “You don't know what love is!” I bellowed.

  “I love you, Abid!” she cried. “I wasn't cheating on you! I didn't do anything with Steve, I swear!”

  “Well it sure as hell looked like it!” I yelled.

  Aliyah broke into fresh sobs. “Look Abid, if you want the truth, you're not gonna like this…” She took a deep breath in, like she was hesitant to speak.

  “But I can't bear lying to you. If you want to leave me after I tell you the truth, then I wouldn't blame you. Just know I never wanted to harm you in any way, what we had was real.” She broke off her sentence, sniffing and wiping her eyes, her chest heaving upwards and downwards.

  “You're scaring me now,” I shouted angrily.

  What the fuck was she talking about, the truth?! Why was she talking like I was going to kill her for what she was about to tell me? I didn’t know what to think or feel anymore. My mind was in a state of shock. I was praying that this was just a fucking nightmare and that I’d wake up… But I knew it wasn’t.

  “What the fuck are you hiding, Aliyah?!” I screamed.

  “I'm a secret agent…” she whispered.

  As she said these words… My blood ran cold.

  It felt like my heart had stopped beating.

  It felt like the world stopped rotating around me.

  Like I was drifting in and out of unconsciousness.

  Like I was trapped in an endless spiral, and I couldn’t get out of it…

  “I took the job to clean Steve's money so that I could put him in jail,” she murmured. “My boss sent me here on a task to collect evidence. This could be my lucky break at work. I've worked for so many years trying to pin down Steve's cartel, and now I'm so close to nailing it.” She drew in a deep breath. I couldn’t get any words out. It felt like her face was blurring out in front of me. Like someone had torn my world apart.

  Everything that I was looking forward to.

  The future that I saw with this woman.

  It was all gone.

  Like it was being robbed from me.

  “I didn't know that you were a part of Steve's cartel until the day you saved me in the bar…” Aliyah went on, a timid expression on her face. “I didn't even know my husband was part of the Surenos. It was when you mentioned that Steve sent you that I started to investigate.” She broke into fresh sobs. “Abid, I promise, I never wanted to hurt you. I can get in big trouble just by telling you I'm a secret agent. I can go to jail myself.”

  She took a deep breath in… And now, I couldn’t stop my anger from boiling to the surface. I started screaming. I screamed and I screamed and I screamed… so loud, to the point my throat went dry. But she didn’t look afraid of me anymore… All she could do was sob.

  “THIS WHOLE TIME, I WAS DATING A FUCKING COPPER?!” I roared. “I can't believe I didn't realise sooner!

  “No wonder you were always being so damn secretive!

  “Why did you have to come into my life and get me attached?!

  “I fucking loved you, Aliyah, and you played me for a fucking fool!

  “It wasn't me that was bad for you, you were bad for me!”

  I screamed again, punching the wall so hard, I could hear one of my
bones snap.

  “Steve is my right-hand man!” I bellowed. “He's done so much for me! And you want me to betray him to be with you?!” I punched the wall again, repeatedly, screaming and screaming.

  “I ought to put a bullet in your skull right now for this bullshit!” I roared, and drew my gun out of my pocket, holding it against her head, my hand trembling.

  I was about to shoot the only woman that I’d ever loved.

  She screamed, her chest heaving upwards and downwards, as her life flashed before her eyes. “No, no, don't shoot me Abid, please!” she sobbed, terrified. “I kept your name out of it, if you turn in Steve, we can be together!”

  I screamed again, not knowing what to fucking do. I held the gun firmly against her head, still shaking. Even if she kept my name out of it… she’d betrayed me. She’d betrayed me in the worst fucking way possible, and I knew that I could never forgive her for this.

  I was damned if I do, damned if I don’t. If I shot her, I would spend my whole life living with the regret and torture, replaying it to myself in my head over and over again, and I would never be able to move on from her. The only woman I’d ever had romantic feelings for…

  But if I didn’t shoot her, she would walk free. She would probably turn in Steve’s criminal organization, and the man who taught me everything I knew, the man who taught me the game… He would be rotting behind bars. She’d move on with her life… But I’d never be able to move on with mine.

  “FUCKKKKK!” I screamed. “GET OUT OF MY SIGHT! FUCKKKKKK!”

  Aliyah broke into fresh sobs…

  And then suddenly, she stopped sobbing.

  She fell into my arms, clutching my face. Her t-shirt was drenched with blood, from the bullet in her chest where she’d just been shot.

  And as I slowly moved my eyes upwards to see who did it…

  I saw Trex standing there, with a gun in his hands, and a bitter expression written all over his face.

  “NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!”

  CHAPTER 7

  MEANS TO AN END

  LOUIS

  I walked into the living room, to see Mum standing there, with her arms folded, and a pissed off expression on her face. I scratched my arm awkwardly, not knowing why she looked so angry.

  “Mum, what's wrong?” I asked awkwardly.

  “Where have you been?!” Mum shouted. “The headteacher rang me and told me you'd bunked off AGAIN!”

  “Oh Mum...” I sighed. I was getting tired of her having a rant over everything. It was getting agitating, and I couldn’t be arsed with it.

  “Where have you fucking been?!” Mum demanded. “It's nine o'clock. You bunked off from school in the morning! Where did you go?”

  The truth was… I’d been to see Ellie. Mum couldn’t know that, though. I didn’t want her getting involved.

  “I went for a walk, to take my mind off things,” I muttered.

  “A walk?” Mum questioned, repulsed. “For ten hours?! I don't think so.” She took a deep breath in. “Louis, you were in a fight at school last week. Don't tell me you're in the hands of a street gang…”

  She broke off her sentence, a tear sliding down her cheek.

  “No!” I denied, even though I knew that was exactly what I was doing. “No Mum, I promise it's nothing like that. I'm really sorry about the fight, I just lost my temper. I promise it won't happen again.”

  “I do worry about you sometimes Louis, I really do...” Mum sighed.

  “Don't worry about me, Mum,” I reassured her, and a pang of guilt stabbed through my chest. I was lying to my mother’s face, when I knew that I’d been hitting robberies with Likkle T, Chase and Swoop.

  “Come on, I'll make us tea today,” said Mum, smiling at me.

  I took a deep breath in, feeling fucking awful. Eventually, I smiled back.

  It was time for another day of school.

  I walked into the playground, ready to make my way to my classroom. I couldn’t be arsed with school, with how shit I’d been feeling lately, but I knew that if I bunked off, the school would just ring home, and make Mum worry even more about me than she already did.

  As I walked past the football field, two girls started squaring up to me on either side of me.

  “Shame Keelan didn't break his fucking nose, little cunt deserved it,” one of them spat bitterly.

  “Keelan doesn't need idiots like Louis in his life,” said the other, and both of them burst out laughing, linking arms as they walked off together.

  I balled my hand into a fist, shaking with rage. I didn't even bother to respond. Was Keelan really going to get girls to fight his battles? What happened to putting our differences aside?

  Who did this son-of-a-bitch think he was? He got a few skets giving him attention, and suddenly thought that he was better than me. At least I didn't degrade myself or lose respect for myself for the sake of impressing girls.

  I rolled my eyes, pissed off, and continued to make my way to class.

  Keelan had left me incredibly pissed off for the rest of the day. I couldn't be bothered to pay attention in lesson, and then I had to face another lecture from the headteacher from bunking off and how I was lucky I wasn't excluded. I just didn't care anymore.

  As the bell for the end of school time finally went, I walked out of the school gates. I wondered whether to go home yet or not. I still felt that Steve owed me an explanation. I daren't go to his house again, though.

  I decided to just go to town, and treat myself with takeaway to help myself feel better. As I walked, a girl from my class approached me from behind. Her name was Hetty.

  “Hey Louis!” she exclaimed.

  I rolled my eyes. I really couldn't be arsed with another thirsty girl talking to me.

  “Hey,” I responded dryly, shrugging.

  “How are you doing after the fight you had with Keelan?” she asked, with her hands on her hips. “Is your nose alright?”

  “My nose is fine, thanks,” I retorted bitterly.

  “Good!” she exclaimed. “You totally showed Keelan who's boss.”

  “I guess I did,” I replied, wanting this conversation to be over, because I just wanted to be alone right now.

  She scratched her arm awkwardly, not saying anything. She seemed to be getting the hint that I didn't want to talk to her, through my blunt responses.

  “Well I'll see you at school, I guess,” she said awkwardly. “Was nice talking to you.”

  She walked away, looking disappointed, and I rolled my eyes again. “Finally,” I said to myself, sighing, and carried on walking.

  I continued to walk, until I heard the faint sound of a car playing a song by Mist, Ain't The Same. I couldn't help but to turn around - I loved this song. To my sheer shock, I saw that it was Steve’s car.

  I didn’t want to see him. I swiftly turned back around and walked faster, picking up my pace.

  “Louis!” Steve shouted. I ignored him and began to run.

  “LOUIS!” Steve repeated, speeding up the car to catch up with me. “I just want to talk.”

  I ignored him again, and he sighed, agitated. I ran away from him again, but he sped up and caught up with me again.

  “Louis, I just want to talk!” he sighed.

  It took me a while to realise that no matter how much I ran, he wasn't going to go away. I stopped to catch my breath.

  “Fine,” I said flatly. “What is it?”

  “Get in the car,” Steve ordered.

  “No,” I retorted. “If you want to say something to me say it out in the open.” I rolled my eyes.

  “Just get in the bloody car!” Steve shouted.

  “Fine!” I said, crossing my arms huffily. I got in and sat down, turning my face away from him.

  There was a long silence between us. I tapped my shoe against the seat impatiently.

  “I wanna make it up to you,” Steve said finally. “It wasn't fair how I hit you yesterday. It wasn't fair how I didn't give you an explanation. I'm your stepdad and I want the b
est for you.”

  I sighed, taking deep breaths in and out. How could I not give Steve a chance? I’d known him my entire life and I knew I wouldn't be able to live with myself if I didn't forgive him. What Steve did was unforgivable, but I was no better than him. I treated girls like shit, I’d robbed an old lady, and I’d robbed houses with those guys from school.

  But I’d grown up without a father. If I cut ties with Steve… my mother would be all I had left. And I needed a father figure in my life. A man who guided me, and told me what to do, and how to push through life as I grew older. As much as I hated Steve’s lifestyle… I had to try and forget about what I’d seen. He’d said so himself that I was too young, and he didn’t want me getting involved. So it wasn’t like I was becoming part of the Mafia, or selling drugs. I just wanted to fix things with my stepfather… Was that so wrong of me?

  I looked up and swallowed. “Okay,” I said finally.

  He smiled, ruffling my hair. “Thanks for giving me another chance. Where were you off to just now?

  “Oh, nothing important,” I shrugged. “I was just going to the chippy.”

  “How about we both go to the chippy,” he smiled. “My treat.”

  I grinned. “Thanks Steve.”

  Our moment was interrupted as my phone began to beep. I took it out of my pocket, holding it out in front of my face. Mum was texting me.

  “You better tell your mum where you are or she'll be going frantic,” said Steve, exhausted. “You know what she's like.”

  “I guess so,” I replied. I sent Mum a quick text, telling her that I was with Steve, so I’d be coming home late.

  “That's better,” Steve smiled. He reached for the aux cord and changed the song to MoStack's Let It Ring.

  “Absolute banger!” I shouted happily, bopping my head to the music. “So gassed!”

  Steve laughed as we both jammed to the music together, and he began driving to the chippy.