AllFreeNovel
Share Us
The man opens his mouth and closes it. His lips tremble as he looks at the two associates on the screen. If they think they can escape, it’s too late.
“Names now,” I demand.
He lets out a piercing sound of dejection and gives us the names we already knew.
With a swift strike, Hayden jams the knife into the man’s scalp, breaking it in two and scattering his brain on the floor.
“Betrayal equals payment in blood.” Hayden tsks, looking straight at the two soon-to-be-dead associates.
“I would never,” Gabriel stammers, shooting up. He mutters “fuck” under his breath. It’s the desperation that gives him away.
“You know what this means,” I say, turning my gaze to each associate on the screen.
It’s the second associate who glares at me, fucking pride in Nathaniel’s eyes while he single-handedly brought death on him. I hope it was worth it for him. I will ask him when I meet him in hell.
The other associates realize who the traitors are and voice their support for our actions.
“This life reveals a man’s character better than any riches,” Augustus Bertarelli says. He’s the head of the Council of Twelve, a collection of old Italian families that went against us a few years ago. It still exists because they delivered the man responsible for the attack against us.
“Do what you have to do. You have my support,” Zara Monroe, the only woman in the group, says. She turned her father’s failing empire into the biggest gun transportation firm on the East Coast.
“War is successful for business,” Tristan Kinkaid says. He would know because he’s at war with his uncle over New York. If it weren’t, we’d be fighting over how to split the new territories.
“Call me when you find their replacement,” says Vian, the head of the Giancana, Chicago’s most powerful Italian-American crime family.
It never is that easy. Knowing him, he’s eager to claim more power just as well. It’s always a fine line we walk. And it’s good for now, but alliances are fickle in our world. Greed is the ultimate instance.
With that, he disconnects.
A new screen opens on the opposite wall, showing the two traitors sitting in their offices. With our snipers in position, I lift my finger, giving the order.
A clean shot to Gabriel’s head and the first associate turned traitor is dead.
I tilt my head back to the first screen, smirking. Nathaniel’s eyes fix on me. “You’ll die.”
Wouldn’t be the first time I heard that. One second later, he’s dead as well. But the fact is, these two couldn’t have planned the attack on all four of us at once. That would need more influence and skills than both of them have. So, someone else is still out there.
With the show over, we end the video conference.
We will find out who they were working with when we confiscate their computers and phones and go through them with a fine-toothed comb.
We bring a cleanup crew for our murders, which demands more work than anything else—leaving no trace of evidence behind and a solid story that no one will ever question our involvement. When it’s just the four of us with the shadows of the dead, I say, “I didn’t like the confidence. It’s as if they know this was a battle they lost, but they will win the war.”
Silence descends, each of us probably in our own head because I voiced something we all thought.
“See you tomorrow. I have a campaign to salvage.”
I go to our IT expert Rowan and say, “Find me everything on this Michael Bloom.”
I can’t wait to play dirty. How much fun will it be when I find out who’s playing the master puppeteer?
Going home, I take the stairs to my bedroom and turn the TV to a news program. Bloom’s face appears on the screen with the lackluster title, “The senator of the people for the people.”
Look at that. His emphatic speech for more social and tax reforms, better housing, and schools amuses me. He should know by now his utopian plan is impossible to implement. This idiot is the biggest demagogue.
I will decimate him.
In bed, I open my laptop and pull up the files Roman sent on Bloom. After he finished his master’s degree, he decided it was time for actual change. Why the sudden interest? According to the polls, I have nothing to worry about, but I want to win with a number that has him crawling back to the anonymity he was in before he thought he could take me down.
