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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 livehere.
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…
