“Fuck man, do you know what time it is?”
I ignore King’s grumble and jump right into it. “Want to go with me to Fargo?”
“Why would anyone––” he breaks off, and I hear the rustling of him sitting up in bed. “You’re gonna go fuck that old guy up, aren’t you?”
I flip on my blinker. “Yep.”
“Well hot diggity damn, count me in.” He sounds wide awake now. “The usual hangar?”
“Yeah. Wheels up in forty.”
Ending the call, I pull onto the freeway and head to the small private airport in silence.
I already called Sloan to get the flight plan filed and the plane readied. He bitched about it the whole time, but he’ll do it, because it’s his job. And I don’t pay for him to live next to the airfield for nothing.
I hate leaving a trail of my comings and goings with flight plans, but I’d hate getting shot out of the sky more. And I don’t have the time to drive my ass across the nothing that exists between here and there. Plus, I have a warehouse in Fargo, so I have a ready excuse to be there. Which is precisely the reason why I have warehouses in every nearby state. Even if they’re empty, they’re my property, so I always have a valid reason for a flight.
The drive is uneventful, and I’m pulling up to the guard house at just before three in the morning.
This isn’t the first time I’ve left in the middle of the night, so the security guard waves me through with a nod of his head and nothing more. I’ve thought about replacing him with one of my own, but the need hasn’t arisen yet.
Driving slowly, I make my way to the back of my hangar and pull into one of the parking spots.
I hesitate for just a moment before deciding to leave my gun in the glove box. Based on the information King found, I’m certain he’ll be alone. Just like I’m certain I’ll be able to handle him with my bare hands.
The overhead door is already open when I walk around to the front of the building. Sloan is already inside, getting my Cessna ready for flight.
Private jets are overrated. They’re ostentatious. And they require too many people. My plane is perfect for flying under the radar, figuratively speaking.
Sloan nods at me through the windshield, and I nod back.
I’ll double check his work, but he’s been around planes longer than I’ve been alive and has yet to mess up.
Exactly forty minutes after we hung up, King climbs the steps and boards the plane.
I wait until we’re rolling onto the runway before I look over at him in the co-pilot seat. “You know we’re going there to kill a guy, right?”
He snorts, running a hand down the front of his perfectly cut suit. “Giving the man a good view before he dies seems like a kindness.”
I might also be in a suit, but this is the one I’ve been wearing all day. He woke up and chose to get dressed this way.
I shake my head. “You’re an idiot.”
King shifts in his seat, trying to get comfortable. “If you must know, mother, I have to go to brunch with Aspen and her husband after this. And I figured there’s a chance I won’t have time to go home between killing a guy and French Toast.”
“Hmm.” He has a point. “I thought you hated your sister’s husband?” I ask, pushing down the throttle.
“I do,” King grunts. “But my hatred for him is overshadowed by my fear of her. And she’ll make my life hell if I don’t show.”
“God, you’re such a pussy.”
“Fine, whatever. Now shut up and pay attention to what you’re doing.”
“You suddenly afraid of flying?” I taunt. “I’m a good pilot and you know it.”
“Uh-huh.” He tightens his seat belt. “I also know what grades you got in physics, so don’t get all fucking cocky.”
An honest laugh rolls out of me as I pull back the yoke, the aircraft smoothly rising off the ground.
The sky is still dark with night when we climb off the plane and onto the Fargo tarmac.
King makes a scene of stretching out his back when he unfolds from the plane, as he always does. Usually, it’s accompanied with a comment about how the aircraft is too small, or how I need to upgrade to a real plane. He knows I’m not in the mood for jokes right now though, as I use this time to prepare myself for what’s to come.
Reacting to aggression is one thing. But premeditated violence, that’s something else entirely.
I’m good at both.
King strides ahead to get a set of car keys from one of our local men. Sloan took care of everything we’d need on this end too.
I glance over, hearing snippets of their conversation, and notice the man standing in front of King keeps his eyes down. There’s a good chance that man has no idea who King is, but he’s smart enough to know that anyone traveling with me, in the middle of the night, is someone to be scared of.
King and I have separate lives, run separate careers, but in the underground, we rule together.
We are The Alliance.
To the public, King is just another rich-as-hell businessman, busy fucking his way through high society and making millions through clever investments.
I’m a little different. To the public, I’m basically a nobody. A rich nobody, just some guy who owns a security company, and moves in the right circles because of the money I have. But not someone to concern yourself with.
That same public has never heard of The Alliance. And if they do, if they hear the whispers, they figure it’s just a bunch of campfire stories. Something from Gotham City, but not here. The bad guys never live here.
And that’s exactly how we want it.
We don’t want everyday people knowing who we really are. That we’re the ones that go bump in the night.
I flex my fingers, breathing in the cold North Dakota air.
But The Alliance is real. And the people in our world know to be scared of us.
To fear me.
To them, the name Nero is synonymous with Hades.
I hear King say one last thing before dismissing the man and heading my way.
There are a couple of reasons we try to avoid being seen together. First, and most obvious, is that we never want to present ourselves as an easy target for our enemies. One well-placed bomb could rip the entire organization apart if it took both of us out.
But the second, more complicated reason, is that we don’t want King’s face associated with the organization. He’s an equal partner to me, although very few people know that, including those in the organization.
Unlike me, King comes from money. And he has family members. Which means collateral. Liabilities. And being associated with The Alliance means constantly looking over your shoulder. He didn’t want that for his sisters. So, he weighed the options and decided to distance himself from me––publicly.
But there are always two sides to a coin. Sure, as an unknown player, he doesn’t have every crime family breathing down his neck, trying to kill him at every turn. But on the flip side, since the men of The Alliance don’t know they work for him, like they work for me, King doesn’t readily have the protection of our army. He’ll only get it if I command it. And if I die before I can reveal our connection to our men, well, then he’s fucked.
Because that’s the thing about slaughtering dozens during a hostile takeover. Almost everybody who knew about King’s connection to the previous mafia families, and therefore me, is dead. And dead men don’t talk.
King stops at my side. “Just confirmed the woman is working. And someone drove by ten minutes ago saying the house looks quiet.”
I dip my chin.
Arthur still lives with Payton’s mother, but she works overnights at a gas station on the edge of town. I wouldn’t be opposed to wiping her off the face of the earth too, but it’s better that she’s out of the house and Arthur is alone.
“Alright.” I roll out my shoulders. “Let’s go.”
King nods at me before circling around to the driver’s side of the borrowed SUV.
Less than twenty minutes later, we’re pulling to a stop in front of a run down, piece of shit, two-story house.
The neighborhood is lower class, a little rough around the edges, but it doesn’t look dangerous. It’s quiet. A gunshot here would definitely get the cops called. Good thing we don’t need guns.
Climbing out of the vehicle, I take a second to look closely at the houses across the street, confirming that the folks around here aren’t spending their money on those fucking doorbells with cameras. Good.
Our footsteps eat up the sidewalk, and when we reach the house, I lift a hand, signaling King to wait.
The front porch looks half-rotted. It’ll be a miracle if it doesn’t collapse under my weight, so I’m sure as shit not walking next to King on those boards.
People always think the back door is better, but it’s not. Seeing someone standing at your neighbor’s door, even at night, is not that weird. Seeing someone jump the fence into your neighbor’s backyard is always suspicious.
The stairs creak as I climb them, but they hold.
A curtain is pulled shut across the front window, but the corner of it is caught on a lamp, showing a pie slice view of the room.
I reach into my pocket, going for my lock-picking tools, but pause.
I wonder…
Abandoning the tools, I close my hand around the door handle and… it clicks open.
“Hillbilly,” King mutters behind me.
I don’t disagree, but the small-town mentality of leaving your doors unlocked just saved us half a minute.
Moving with the door, I step into the house.
To my right, there’s a coat closet with the door missing, and on the left, there’s a half wall extending a few feet out into the room, separating the worn linoleum of the entryway from the matted gray carpet in the living room.
And in the center of the living room is Arthur. Asleep in a shit-brown recliner, facing an obnoxiously large TV playing an old football game just a few notches too loud.
It’s annoying, but I leave it on.
I take in the details of the room as I walk toward the man, flipping the corner of the curtain closed on my way.
Empty beer bottles. Empty whiskey bottles. Cigarettes piled on glass trays, the old tobacco smell thick and cloying.
It’s all too much like some of the houses I was passed between when I was without a real home.
My eyes pass over the small kitchen in the far corner of the space, with its empty fast-food wrappers on the counter and small dining table covered in junk.
The anger that’s been simmering inside my veins starts to bubble.
I look toward the stairs––the hard wooden stairs, with the dented banister––and I think of Payton. I think of my sweet girl growing up in this house. Being terrorized in this house.
A vision of her medical records flashes into my mind. The X-ray of her arm when she was 14. The accompanying statement by her parents, claiming she fell down the stairs.
Fell. I don’t think so.
I let my eyes close, settling into the darkness, allowing my true self to take over.
And when my eyes open, all I feel is rage.
My steps are measured when I circle around the front of the chair, brushing against Arthur’s extended feet.
Moving next to the recliner, I stop close enough to see the crumbs stuck in his scraggly beard.
He’s not as big as me, but he’s not a small man. A little soft with age and booze, but ten years ago… Ten years ago he would’ve been a formidable figure. No match at all for a teenage girl.
I bend down, inches from his face, and shout his name. “Arthur!”
And when his eyes fly open, I slam my fist into the center of his chest, hard enough to send the chair tipping backward.
Arthur lets out a grunt when the back of the chair hits the ground, his head bouncing against the padded headrest. The hit to his sternum seized his lungs. And he’s struggling to catch his breath when he should be struggling to get away.
He’s not scared enough.
Not yet.
Before he can roll out of his current splayed position, I step across to straddle him, then drop down—sitting heavily on his stomach, with my knees pinning his shoulders to the chair beneath him.
“What––” He finally chokes a word out.
And I slap him. Hard.
King snorts.
Arthur blinks against the sting in his cheek, then starts to struggle.
I easily bat his hands away. And when one of his knees thuds into my spine, I throw my elbow back into his thigh, causing him to cry out. Before he can try to nail me again, King grips Arthur’s ankles, jerking them away from me, forcing Arthur to look like he’s sitting properly in the chair. Only this chair is laying on its back, and I’m sitting on the occupant.
“Okay! Okay!” Arthur frantically pleads, assuming we’re here for something we’re not. “I just need a little more time!”
He shakily holds his hands up in surrender, and it almost makes me smile.
I don’t need his surrender. I’m here to take without permission.
I lean more of my weight onto my knees, feeling his shoulders grind beneath me.
“T-Tell him! I’ll have the money soon!”
I ignore Arthur’s words, distracted by a flash of gold on one of his wavering hands.
A pinky ring. Typical.
And when the lamp light reflects off it again, a memory pops into my head.
Payton on the couch. Crying in her sleep. Clawing at her neck. Fighting an invisible monster.
Giving me a name.
“Have you always worn that?” The sound of my voice makes Arthur stop struggling.
“What?” He tries to look down at his stained and holey t-shirt.
“The ring.” I gesture toward his hand. “Have you always worn it?”
He’s nodding as he closes his hand into a loose fist, allowing us to both see the top. As I expected, it’s a gaudy class ring. A wide gold band, covered in engravings that circle a large, obviously fake, red stone.
“I see.”
I can feel Arthur’s confusion as I stare at that fucking ring. Imagining the distress that would’ve covered a young Payton’s face, as she tried to push that hand away. Imagining the tears streaking down her face while that ring pressed into her flesh.
The viciousness that lives inside me slithers up my spine, and in my mind I smell the scent of roses.
Without another word, I dart my left hand out and grip his wrist.
My weight shifts further forward, until I’m looming over him, his hand trapped between us.
Arthur’s struggling now. His eyes are wide, his animal instincts kicking in.
She would’ve looked the same way.
With my right hand, I grab his pinky. The ring warm where it meets my skin.
Arthur really starts to fight now. And I hear King grunt behind me, as he puts more weight against Arthur’s legs.
Arthur tries to hit me with his free hand, so I widen my stance, my left knee jamming hard into his right bicep.
“Just take it!” Arthur’s shout is garbled. “Take the ring!”
My lips curl into a grin. “Okay.”
But instead of sliding the ring off, I tighten my grip around his pinky finger, squeezing it, as tight as I can.
I jerk my hands apart. A crackling sound fills the room.
And Arthur starts to scream.
The finger is broken, in a couple of places, but it’s still attached.
Huh.
I give the finger another sharp pull. This time the bone breaks through the skin, causing my grip to become slick with blood.
This is tougher than I thought.
A howl escapes Arthur, so I let go long enough to punch him once in the face.
He doesn’t even have the decency to take it like a man.
I need a better grip.
Spotting a hole at the collar of his shirt, I drop his hand completely and rip a strip of fabric off. Using the piece of Arthur’s own shirt––much to his dislike––I wrap his pinky in the rough cotton, giving me the friction I need.
Arthur’s howls of pain, never subsiding.
Exhaling, I channel my fury into my grip, and with one final yank, I rip Arthur’s finger off.
Finally.
Holding onto one end of the strip of cloth, I let it unwind. The loose finger dropping onto Arthur’s chest.
“Gross,” King mutters.
I let go of Arthur’s hand, shifting my knees back to his chest, and he immediately clutches his four-digit hand in his five-digit hand.
His sobs make his words incoherent. But it wouldn’t matter if I could understand him anyway. His fate was sealed the night I walked through Payton’s patio door.
I pick up the finger and slide the ring off the bloody end.
“This is mine now.” I wipe the ring clean on his shirt then slide it into my pocket.
Arthur finally catches his breath enough to form words. “Who are you?”
“Ah, finally the right question.” I lean down, invading his space. “I’m Payton’s wrath. And you’re about to die.”
When he opens his mouth to respond, I jam the balled-up piece of bloody cloth between his molars, keeping his mouth open, then I shove his newly unattached appendage into his mouth.
King makes a gagging noise behind me, but I don’t stop shoving until the finger is wedged into his throat.
Yanking the cloth free, I close my hand over his mouth. And use my other hand to pinch his nose shut.
Arthur’s eyes are bulging up at me.
Frantic.
Begging.
Terrified.
His hands are ineffectively scratching at my shirt, and when his eyes are on the verge of rolling back, I remove my hands, giving him the briefest glimpse of hope before I throw my fist into the front of his throat. Collapsing his trachea.
He blinks––soundlessly––up at me. His mind doesn’t seem to understand that he’s already dead.
