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“Good!” he said, all smiles again. “Now let me get this party started.”
Slightly shaken, but unwilling to show it, I moved off a little and watched as the body was hauled out of the back door of the barn. Landon looked over at me, and for a moment, I thought I saw relief in his eyes, but it was probably just the long halogen lights, hanging bare from the ceiling, playing tricks on my perception.
As I stood off to the side of Franks’ group, I checked out the final set of Chicago-based mafia cohorts—Rinaldo Moretti and his crew. There were several of them, including three bodyguards and a woman who must have been his daughter, Luisa. The guy with Rinaldo Moretti was an interesting one. Slim, wiry, and tall, he looked more like a schoolteacher than someone mixed up with organized crime. I was too far away to hear what they were talking about, but whatever it was, Moretti kept glaring at him. I didn’t pay much attention, though—my focus was on the other person standing with him.
Evan Arden.
I knew him both from the picture and from our brief encounter at the beach. He stood near Moretti at attention with his hands clasped behind his back. There was a shoulder holster over his arm, but it was empty. From the look of him, I was pretty sure he wouldn’t need a weapon if push came to shove. He wasn’t anywhere near my size, but he was a well-built guy—lean and muscular. I had the feeling that wherever he’d been hiding out, he’d kept up on his training.
Unlike I had.
I remembered Landon’s instructions about doing what I could to mess with Arden’s head. I thought about how he had looked on his knees with his hands bound behind his back as the guy next to him was shot in the head. He’d been a POW, and I wondered if bringing up the video might throw him off or if that was something he’d heard often enough already. I thought about what else I could say to him.
Not a fucking tongue-twister, that was for sure.
Franks called out to the room, and all six families gathered around the large table in the center of the barn. The three Chicago-based families, the reason we were all here, sat as far away from each other as possible. Gavino Greco and Rinaldo Moretti I knew from a multitude of tournaments, but the two Russian guys weren’t people I had seen before today. Igor Severinov and the other, Sergi Dytalov, had taken over when the Russian mob’s predecessors had retaliated against a stolen shipment of caviar by invading Moretti’s home. When the invasion turned into a bloodbath, people on all three sides had been killed, and the tension in the city had escalated to war.
I could feel the hatred between them anytime one of them made eye contact with another.
The six contestants, myself included, sat next to their bosses. I was between Franks and Landon. John Paul stood off to the side, watching intently, as Franks got the meeting started.
“This is going to be a little different, boys,” Franks said.
Maria Hill, the leader of the LA outfit, sat on the far side of the table and raised an eyebrow at him.
“And ladies,” he said with a smile.
“Oh, no,” she said sarcastically, “I’ll just sit over here and look pretty for you, how’s that? No, not too likely, huh?”
Franks ignored her and her tone.
“You’ll each be dropped with weapons in hand,” he said, “weapons chosen by your bosses and ones you’ve proven to be most effective when using.”
It was unusual to start a tournament armed, but not unheard of. There were many times when there were weapons to be found around the tournament grounds, but being dropped with them wasn’t usually part of the plan.
“Arden will have the firearms of his choosing,” Franks said as he looked over a list in front of him. “Dytalov, three Kunai throwing knives and a Busse Combat Team Gemini.”
He stopped and looked up at the dark-haired man near the Russian group.
“Whatever the fuck that is,” he added.
“You want me to go get it and show you?” Erik Dytalov volunteered.
“Shut your mouth,” Severinov said, “or I shut it for you.”
“Mister Hunter will be armed with a compound bow in addition to a handgun,” Franks said, “and Reaper will have her brass knuckles.”
He looked over to the woman sitting next to Chambers.
“Is that all?”
“I don’t need anything else,” she responded.
Hunter laughed.
“I got somethin’ else you need.”
“Bring it over here,” she challenged with a flash of her dark eyes, “I’ll show you just what I can do with it.”
