Chapter 2 #2
Five black lockers were affixed to the same wall.
I hung my black-and-crimson tiger mask on the door of my locker.
The tiger on my mask looked ferocious, its eyes narrowed as if its gaze was stuck on its prey, ready to launch, its jaws slightly open to reveal its canines.
It demanded respect and submission. It was a representation of what I truly felt from within when I hunted down predators.
Powerful. Deadly. Invincible.
Our masks not only hid our identities from the world, but they also gave strength to the women who came to us.
A lot of women and families who came to us for help didn’t have the heart to order an assassination. Most of them wanted justice without taking a life. Our job was to deliver.
We were the ones whom women hired when everything else had failed to bring them justice. Be it rape, domestic violence, abuse, attacks, or any form of violence committed against women, we were their vengeance. We were the monsters they hired to slay the real monsters in their lives.
We did whatever they wanted us to do. Find their attackers? Done. Make them suffer? Of course. Chop off their dicks? With pleasure. Make them disappear from their lives? On it. Kill them? No problem.
They named it, we did it.
Gladly.
Proudly.
Without. Any. Hesitation.
I’d just removed my holster and placed it in the locker when I was thrown off balance and pushed against my locker—courtesy of our team’s hyperactive rookie.
Shadow, Tara’s big black Doberman, jumped up onto my chest, almost licking my face. I was pretty sure it was the blood sprayed on my hands and chest that had him going crazy.
“Down, boy.” I giggled as I tried to get away from him. “ Auntie needs to wash herself before petting you. C’mon, go back to Tara. Go back to your mama.”
I glared at Tara, who was busy laughing at Shadow as he tried to get a taste of the disgusting blood on my skin.
“Shadow baby, come to Tara. Come here. Here’s a treat, boy,” she cooed. The moment the word treat came out of her mouth, Shadow jumped off me and ran to her.
Even though he was Tara’s, Shadow was all of our baby. He went wherever Tara did. She was our hacker, our stalker, our very own Shadow Panther.
Once Shadow was busy chomping down his treat, Tara turned her gaze to me. “Samaira, you need to chop the penis at the end of your torture session. Fuck, girl. Naomi was pissed.”
I snorted and started to remove my tac gear. “The fucker deserved it.”
She sat at her massive desk, her three computers open in front of her, the light from them illuminating her face, the left half of which she covered with a black mask. Tara sighed, rolling her eyes at me. “Bitch, they all deserve it. But you must admit, you were a little extra today.”
Grunting, I dropped the box of dicks beside her computer. “Here’s the package. Give it to Sloane. She’ll want to make it pretty. And ask Mary if she wants to keep them alive or not.”
Tara made a disgusting face and placed the box on the top shelf along the wall to keep it out of Shadow’s reach. She visibly shuddered. “Only she thinks decorating the box in glitter and shit might cheer up the girls.”
I snorted, untying my braid. “And you call me crazy.”
I made my way to the washroom but turned around at the last minute and asked, “Where are Sloane and Lena?”
Tara popped her gum and, without moving her eyes from her screen, answered, “Upstairs. The bar’s packed. A bit of a rowdy crowd today.”
“I’ll freshen up and join them. ”
After a scalding shower to wash away the blood, piss, and tears of those fuckers, I changed into my usual black tank top and cargo pants.
I put on my choker and two gold necklaces, the longest one resting between my breasts.
I put in all my usual earrings—my daith, orbital, industrial, forward helix, helix, and the hoops on my lobes.
I fucking loved seeing my ears all blingy and pretty.
I blow-dried my hair quickly since it was getting a bit too long to air-dry properly. Once I felt ready enough, I put on my black combat boots, went to the kitchen of our den, and opened the fridge.
I grabbed my berry milkshake jar that I always kept stocked in bulk. Beating and torturing men made me hungry and hot, and nothing cooled me down and pulled my mind out of the crimson rage it got lost in better than my cold berry milkshake.
When I noticed one was missing, the wave of crimson rage surged back to the surface. Immediately, I clicked the picture of the empty space on the shelf and posted it in our group chat.
Me: Who the fuck stole my milkshake jar? You know I need them to cool off.
Me: Tell me now.
Me: You know I’ll find you.
Sloane: Here we go again.
Me: Was it you, bitch?
Sloane: Pssh. I’m not crazy.
Me: Sloane, you absolutely are batshit crazy.
Me: Tara? Was it you?
Immediately, she shouted from across the room, “Hell no.”
Me: Whoever stole my milkshake, I’m coming for you.
Lena: Samaira, if you’re done with the hissy fit, come upstairs. NOW. It’s rush hour on Saturday.
A growl escaped my lips at having to let it go—for now.
They knew I needed my milkshakes, and I did not share them.
I would find whoever did this after my shift upstairs.
Lena wouldn’t use all caps in her text if she didn’t genuinely need me upstairs, especially after my torture session.
I either needed to fuck or sit in a warm bathtub for an hour with a dildo and my ice-cold milkshake—possibly both—to burn off the adrenaline still pumping through my system.
Me: Yes, Boss
I quickly gulped down my milkshake and was just about to head upstairs when Tara called out to me.
“What’s up?” I asked, pausing at the foot of the hidden staircase that led up from our Den to the basement level. Our Den was located directly under the basement and could only be accessed via a secret floorboard known only to the five of us. All our client meetings were held in the basement.
We handled most of our dirty work either down under the Den or from our safe house farther outside the city. We definitely did not kill people here. That was strictly reserved for our safe house.
She popped her gum and rearranged the items on the screen. “I just sent Mary an update. She’s coming to collect the box tomorrow. She asked for a night to think over what she wants to do with the boys.”
“Cool.”
The moment I stepped onto the main floor of the Thunder Claw, one of Brooklyn’s happening bars and restaurants, a cacophony of deafening noises engulfed me.
Lena, the leader of Wildcats, owned Thunder Claw, which acted as a front for our other…
uh…activities. The rest of us worked here as employees, handling day-to-day operations alongside our regular staff.
For obvious reasons, I was an excellent bouncer.
As I walked from the back of the bar toward the entrance, several pairs of eyes followed me.
In my black sleeveless tank top, my arms—showing a stunning tiger tattoo sleeve on my right one—looked massive and strong and intimidating.
I had muscles on top of muscles, and I flaunted them with abandon.
Women usually stared at me with a sense of awe, whereas men looked at me with a mix of challenge and surprise.
“Yo, Big Sam!” a dude yelled, raising his glass at me. Most regulars knew me as Big Sam, for obvious reasons. Not exactly the most original name for a bouncer.
“Yo, Doug!” I waved back. “Have a fun night.”
I waved at Sloane, who was operating the bar with our hired bartender, Zoey, and was in her signature bold makeup and the cutest short skirt and tank top. She single-handedly brought in more tips than all the other bartenders and servers combined.
Lena came up right beside me as I stood near the entrance, where I got an uninterrupted view of the entire bar. “Tough crowd?”
She rolled her eyes. “A typical Saturday.”
She leaned closer to me and muttered, “Next time, you chop the dick at the end. Naomi is going to chop your hair off in your sleep one of these days.”
I snorted. “I’d like to see her try.”
She playfully rolled her eyes and bumped my shoulder. “Nice work today, though. I’ll let you out early.”
I grunted. As satisfying as the work felt, it sucked that it was actually necessary.
The system was so rigged that we women had to take basic human rights, like our safety, into our own hands.
As if fighting for our rights day-to-day wasn’t enough, as if constantly worrying about our safety wasn't enough, we were often denied even the basic decency of justice.
When the entire world seemed designed to stomp down on women, it really left us no choice except to rise up and roar back.
To snatch back the justice we deserved. To tear apart the egomaniacs and assholes who thought it was okay to abuse women and then get away with it. Not under my fucking watch.
“By the way,” Lena continued, pulling me out of the hazy fog of anger. “There seems to be some chatter about an increasing number of missing women.”
“Chatter where?”
“More missing persons reports have been filed on women in the past six months than in the past four years before that. Also, I’ve heard some talk around the bar.”
The abundance of access to “chatter” and news of underhanded activities in the area was one of the few genius reasons for opening a bar as a front.
“Are we gonna do something about it?” I asked.
Lena shrugged. “Not yet. We don’t have much to go on. If something big happens, I’m sure it will land in our lap.”
We had our methods to allow people who needed us to find us.
And find, they always did.