27. Chapter 27 – Tamen
Chapter 27 – Tamen
“W hat exactly is your plan here?” Dane asked with a bored expression from the passenger seat.
“You don’t need to know, because you’re not coming in.” I repeated for the fifteenth time since he ambushed me outside of my hotel, getting in my car. If I had been in London, I would be on my bike and there would have been no room for him to tag along. Despite England’s reputation for unpredictable weather, Boston’s was even more erratic; the constant change made it impossible to ride, and I yearned for the open road on my bike.
“This is a revenge hit, isn’t it?” Dane pried, eyeing me. “Those hardly ever go well, brother.”
I hated when he called me that. We weren’t brothers, not anymore. The time for that was long past, which made his intrusion into my life even more annoying. “It’s not revenge. It’s simply finishing something I couldn’t last time.”
“So, who is it?” He moved forward like I hadn’t tried dismissing him at every turn.
“Don’t you have a wife you should be spending your time with this evening, instead of bothering me?”
He shrugged nonchalantly, “She’s busy with Liv and the kids. They’re having a whole evening at Hartington, complete with bounce houses, a chocolate fountain and endless martinis courtesy of Mrs. Straight’s impeccable ability to host a party. I think there was even a cotton candy machine.”
“So, you ran away from a happy house to sit in my dark car and annoy me?”
“No, I saw that I wasn’t needed there, so I left to find something else to do.”
“I don’t need you.” I snapped back, firmer than I should have. His answering sigh nearly gave him the entrance needed to slide into some brotherly role of wisdom and support that I wasn’t interested in. “It’s a simple in and out job, no assistance required.”
“Bummer.” An intrusive voice whispered from outside of the car as a dark bear leaned down into my open window. “I was promised fun.”
“Jesus fucking Christ!” I cried out, slapping my wheel and glaring at my brother and then over to Maddox where he squatted next to my car. “This isn’t a field trip for bored house husbands.”
“Good.” Maddox shrugged, “I’m not a husband.”
“Yet.” Dane smirked, and I rolled my eyes and slammed my head back into my seat.
“Leave.” I hissed, shoving my car door open and sending Maddox onto his ass as I got out. Dane followed suit and leaned his elbows on the roof of my car as I glared at him. “Both of you, leave. Now.”
“Oh, come on,” Maddox brushed his hands off on his jeans and smirked in the darkness that somehow always seemed to cling to his features. “We won’t take any of your fun away. We just want to watch. We won’t even touch anything.”
“Remember the last time you said that?” Dane chuckled and Maddox grinned as I threw my hands up in exasperation.
“I didn’t technically touch anything first.” Maddox pointed out, “That dude touched me.”
“You put an explosive up his ass and tied him to the top of a light post.” Dane deadpanned.
“Best Fourth of July to date, too.” Maddox stared off as if he was remembering fond times. “Pyrotechnics are such a lost art these days.”
“You guys are fucking nuts.” I shook my head, grabbing my bag from the trunk and walking away from their circus sideshow, headed into the woods towards my target. Did I think they’d stay in the car and leave me be? Not a fucking chance.
But if I had to stay to watch their middle-aged pathetic bored house-husband comedy show any longer, they were going to be in danger. And we all knew, even in my prime, they’d team up against me.
They always teamed up against me.
Walking through the woods with barely a snapped twig between the three of us, Maddox finally broke the silence, asking in a hushed tone. “So, who’s the target?”
They weren’t going to leave, that was obvious. And they weren’t going to shut the hell up either, unless I gave them something. “Max Halmer.”
“Max Halmer.” Maddox repeated questioningly, “Why does that name ring a bell?”
“Startup tech guy, Max Halmer?” Dane threw in.
“No,” I replied, stopping at a ridge and looking down at the impressive estate below. “Coke addicted, prostitute beating, slime ball Max Halmer.” I held my finger up to my brother before he could even start. “And no, this has nothing to do with Sloane.”
“Why would I automatically think that you targeting a man who’s notorious for trafficking and killing off sex workers across the East Coast would have any link at all to your girlfriend?” Dane scoffed, “So far-fetched.”
“Ridiculous, really.” Maddox shrugged, “You know, the only jobs I ever botched were the personal ones, come to think of it. But good thing this isn’t one of those.”
“It’s not!” I snapped. “He’s competition for someone I made a deal with. I was supposed to take him out weeks ago, and he got away. That’s it.”
“Was that before or after he shot you?” Dane crossed his arms and glared at me like only a disappointed male figure could.
Fuck him.
“I hate you both.” Walking away, I started my descent down the hill.
“That seems to be a trend for you.” Maddox chided as he followed. “I’ve heard you say that about Sloane a handful of times myself. So luckily for you, I know that means you really love us and couldn’t imagine your life without us in it.”
Twitchy.
I was so fucking twitchy again.
Max Halmer was probably one of the most pathetic men I’ve ever faced, and dying men were usually always pitiful, so that was saying something.
His security team lacked muscle and skill, relying solely on his high-tech system to alert.
But not to deter.
Security had to be a two-step process, and he forgot the second step.
“Come on, Maxi Pad.” Dane chided as the sniveling man tried to scurry away from his approach. The overdone tape job to the chair, courtesy of Maddox’s boredom, prevented any real movement though. It looked as though he wore a body suit of tape, he probably had a better chance at tipping over and getting a head injury than getting away. “You had to know we’d come for you.”
“I—” He stammered, slurring his words through his new dental work courtesy of my fist as he tried to run away at first, “I don’t even know you!”
“You shot me!” I scoffed, letting the theatrics of the night finally loosen me up to play along a bit. I was usually the one who loved a good mental warfare game before the execution, and watching Dane and Maddox have fun eliminating the security team had actually been fun. “In the back, nonetheless. Who does that?”
“I—” He choked on the blood pooling in his mouth and fell into a fit of incredibly embarrassing sobbing. “I’m sorry!”
The three of us paused, standing over the man, as his hysterics grew in volume. “Has anyone ever cried this hard before?” Maddox nudged me with his shoulder, “I mean you’ve hardly even touched him,” Max’s eyes opened a crack, before Maddox finished, “Yet.”
The sniveling simp fell back into more sobbing as I shook the cringe worthy feeling it gave me to watch a grown man cry. “I don’t know how much more of this I can take.” I opened my bag and stared down at the array of tools laid out inside.
Originally, I had planned to turn him into a piece of Swiss cheese with my knife, but the more he cried, the more dramatic I wanted to be about it.
“Well,” Dane interrupted, looking down at his phone a second before an alarm sounded from somewhere inside the house. “You’re going to have to wait a moment more, I’m afraid.” He looked up at me and pointed at the front door down the long hall to the foyer. “Because you are not going to want to miss this show.”
The three of us crowded together as the front door flew open, banging off the wall before a smoke grenade rolled in through the opening.
“Is that—?” Maddox hissed as we watched the smoke turn a bright orange color.
“A drop zone marker?” Dane tried but failed to hide his chuckle behind his hand. “Oh, but wait until you see the masterminds behind it.”
Seconds later, dark figures dressed in tight black outfits paraded in through the opening. And by paraded, I mean, one rolled in with some sloppy Catwoman move, one ran at the speed of a clumsy snail, and the other one crouch walked like a crab, making a beeline to the table against the wall to hide behind.
“Oh, my god.” I groaned, covering my face as I realized what kind of spectacle I was witnessing. “No, they didn’t.”
“Oh, they did.” Dane chuckled as Maddox bent forward, hands on his knees, laughing as the clumsy snail ran into the doorframe of the hallway and cursed in a very familiar voice.
The next noises were coughing. Lots and lots of coughing as the drop zone marker smoke filled the large foyer, coating the three stooges in iridescent orange dust.
“Damnit, Liv!” The clumsy running snail who I now recognized as Peyton gasped, “I thought you said this was fog.”
Wheezing, as she fought with her tight black facemask, the crouching crab pulled it off and revealed a tuft of crazy red hair as Liv gasped for breath, “I must have grabbed the wrong one.”
Meanwhile, my eyes found the roly-poly Catwoman fighting for her life as she tried to slink down the hallway toward us.
One. Somersault. At. A. Time.
Like a bad kindergarten level somersault—and that was being kind.
Halfway down the hall, she gave up, sitting on her ass in the middle of the floor as she removed her mask, letting her crazy rainbow curls free. “This all played out much cooler when we made the plans between drinks four and five.” Sloane said with a lopsided grin.
“Yeah,” Liv chuckled, walking next to Peyton toward us, where we still stood in utter shock. “But that was like six drinks ago.”
“Good God,” Dane laughed, “You three are menaces to your own life expectancies.”
Leaving our now silent and surprised victim of the night where he was, I stood over Sloane and held my hand out to her, helping me up and glancing down at her lush body in her outfit. “Is this latex?”
She giggled and shrugged, “My on-hand costume choices were limited, it was either this or sheer black lace.”
I wagged my eyebrows at her, “I don’t hate that option either.” Turning to join the group, surrounding my hit for the night, I watched Sloane’s face as she came face to face with the reality she so desperately fought to be a part of.
I expected her to be grossed out by the blood and gore on Max’s face, or even just somber to the fact of what I was here to do. But she wasn’t.
She simply looked at the man, crying again as we all stared down at him and asked. “This is the man who shot you?”
“It is.” I replied, looking over her head to Dane, who nodded approvingly as he held his wife to his chest.
Liv hunted with Maddox pretty regularly, in some weird middle aged date night adventure they did to keep their sanity amidst raising kids. Even Peyton went with Dane on some hits, but having Sloane with me at one, never crossed my mind.
Maybe it was the liquid courage that gave her the idea to tag along tonight, or something else, but I didn’t hate having her here. “And you’re going to kill him for it?” She asked, looking up at me.
“A hit was put on his head long before he shot me, for his own actions. He just bought himself some more time by trying to take me out.” I replied honestly.
“He traffics women.” Maddox added, “Prostitutes and drug addicts. And then he funnels the money through his tech company to wash the blood and tears off it.” Holding his hands up, he indicated the luxurious mansion we were all standing in.
“Jesus.” Sloane murmured, glancing back down at the man. “I thought shooting you made me mad enough to want him dead. But this—” she swallowed, “on top of that, makes it even worse.”
“You don’t have to watch this part.” I nodded to the bag I’d abandoned when they arrived with their fantastic entrance.
“I want to.” She took a deep breath and backed up, giving me space. “I feel like for the girls that don’t get to see their justice being served, I need to watch for them.”
Peyton took her hand in hers, squeezing it as they moved off to sit on the steps as Liv piped up, “If you’re not going to do it, can I?”
Maddox chuckled and pulled her back toward the stairs, “Let the man have his own trophy.”
“What?” She shrugged, “I’m just saying, he’s dragging his feet a bit.”
I turned back to my victim as Dane stood at my side and suddenly the need to draw it out and make it personal no longer consumed me. I just wanted to make it right . But I was also a maniac with a blood thirst that had gone unquenched for too long lately, so I settled on a quick slit of his throat.
He thrashed, and gurgled, and gasped, until he simply didn’t exist anymore. No longer able to hurt anyone or profit from their pain.
And my vendetta for the bullet Sloane had to dig out of my shoulder was settled.
“So,” Maddox asked after a while as we all walked back through the woods towards my car, “Wanna hit up IHOP?”
“Jesus, that sounds delicious.” Peyton moaned and Dane chuckled.
“You three stooges going to change first, or are you going there like that?” I asked, nodding down at their ridiculous outfits. I was pretty sure Liv had black tube socks on in place of actual shoes.
Sloane scoffed and smacked my chest, “We were aiming for Charlie’s Angels. And you’ll take us out, however we look, got it?”
I kissed her.
Easily.
Uncaring of the others staring.
Their opinions on it did not matter to me. I just wanted to kiss her.
“Got it.”