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“What do you want with me?” Brandon whimpers, whipping his head back to face us, his jaw already bruising.
There’s blood dribbling down his chin from a split lip, staining his very nice powder blue shirt. Unfortunately for him, he’s tied to the chair so he can’t wipe it off.
“You’ve become a person of interest to us, Mr Franklin,” Ash drawls out, in a bored tone, examining the back of his hand.
It’s the role that he plays. We all have one. Ash, the cold as ice questioner; Jax, the one that coaxes answers out of them with his fists, whilst Kai uses his tech expertise to hack into their digital lives, and destroy them. Me? I’m usually the good cop. With maybe a little crazy sprinkled in to unnerve them just enough. Like now as I hit play on my phone, andCradlesby Sub Urban starts to play, filling the basement with eerie sounds.
“What the fuck is going on?!” Brandon shouts, looking around at us all, his blue eyes wide, his lips and chin trembling.
“Well, in layman's terms,” Ash says, walking towards him, “you have something that we want.”
“What? What do you want, you little punk?” Brandon sneers back, clearly finding his backbone.Oh shit.
Ash nods, and Jax steps forward, pulling back his fist and punching Brandon again in the face. I wince slightly at the sound it makes. Damn, he definitely cracked something that time.
“What the fuck is wrong with you?!” Brandon shouts, tears streaming down his cheeks and spitting out a tooth that clinks on the tiles and skitters across them.
“It’s rude to call people names,” Ash deadpans, and I don’t bother to suppress a laugh.
“Now, now, boys,” I say, stepping forward and cutting off what Brandon clearly wanted to say back. “Brandon here is a smart man, aren’t you, Brands?” I ask the man in question, stepping up to him and crouching down, slinging my arm over his shoulders. He shrugs it off with a glare, but keeps his mouth shut, thank fuck. I want this to be done quickly so I can get back to Lilly.
“Good man. See? When you play nicely, no one needs to get hurt,” I tell him condescendingly.
“What do you want?” he asks again, looking back at Ash.
“One day in the near future, you’ll be receiving a phone call, detailing instructions on what you will do next. You just need to follow those instructions. Simple.”
Brandon barks out a laugh. “Why the fuck would I do that?”
“Because,” Kai interjects, turning the screen of his tablet around where we can see a picture of Brandon in flagrante with Summer, his current mistress, who also happens to be an employee of Black Knight Corporation. “If you don’t, then this will go out to the worldwide media, plus your wife on the same day.”
“So? Who cares who I fuck?” Brandon counters, obviously still not understanding that we hold all the cards in this situation.
“Did you know that Summer is only fifteen years old?” Ash informs him. There’s disgust in his face, but also a kind of glee at being the judge, jury, and executioner.
“W–what?” Brandon stutters, face going ashen.
“That’s right, you sick fuck,” Jax growls, fists clenched. He finds it difficult to switch the rage off once it’s started. It makes him a great punisher, but is hard for him to live with. “She’s underage.”
“And then there’s that pesky prenup you signed before getting married, the one with the adultery clause. It would mean you’ll be left destitute,” Ash says, cool as a fucking cucumber.
“H–how do you know about that?”
“There’s also the small matter of child porn on your computer,” Kai adds, pushing his glasses up the bridge of his nose, and ignoring Brandon’s question.
“What child porn?” Brandon’s sweating now, visibly shaking as he finally starts to realize that he’s backed into a corner.
“This is your work desktop screen, is it not?” Kai asks, turning the iPad around again and showing us a picture of an attractive middle aged woman with two young blue eyed, blonde children, with folder icons running down the side.
Brandon stays silent as Kai hits an icon, and a horrific image pops up. We all wince at this, bile rising in my throat at the picture. Kai quickly turns the screen back, but I don’t miss the haunted look in his eyes. He hates this aspect as much as the rest of us. Ironically, the song changes to Ruelle’s acoustic version ofMonsters.
“Th–that’s not…” Brandon starts, voice going quiet as he sees our stony stares. “Those are not my pictures. I swear.”
He’s telling the truth. We, well, Kai, put them there.
“That’s not our concern. But I’m sure the federal police would be interested to see them,” Ash replies, inspecting his nails, then looking back up into Brandon’s eyes.
There’s a look of resignation in them, and a twinge of guilt flashes in my gut. The small shred of humanity that’s been growing in size lately, feels unease at what we’re doing.
