Chapter 74 Ronan
RONAN
Dezmond Archer Junior would die tonight. Preferably with my bare hands, but if I had to use a weapon, I’d consider that a solid kill too. There was no way around it, the fates had pulled his cards and they’d announced his end. My brothers had called it, and I had agreed.
There was a part of me that still felt the aching pain of killing someone I considered my own family.
Maybe I owed him the decency of a fair fight because of our shared history.
Because he was once my brother too. But the stupid fucker’s ambition was the very reason we had to bury some of our best men this year.
There was no going back anymore.
The Crows were done but vengeance went further than just a name. We were reaping because he had sowed.
We’d hounded Susana enough to get a few names from her.
We paid off some girls she knew to help us get some intel, so we could figure out exactly where we could find Dezmond tonight.
It wasn’t hard. Just like she said, the fucker was there at Vosk, sitting in a VIP booth with some paid escorts pretending to enjoy his company while drinking some top shelf alcohol that was likely being put on Sokolov’s tab.
“Hey sweetheart, go ask your friends to clear the booth out.” I slipped some cash into the hand of a nearby girl and nodded over to Dezmond’s booth.
She squeezed into the booth and whispered into the closest girl’s ear. A game of telephone passed around and soon every girl was looking at each other with wide eyes and scurrying from the table.
Dezmond was too drunk to notice.
Santos shuffled into the booth next to him and Fletcher came in from the other side.
I squeezed in, sitting across from the bastard who dared break bread with me while he was plotting to take me down.
I pulled my gun out and placed the Glock directly in front of me, the barrel pointed his way but the piece itself was still laying on its side on the table.
He could have reached for it.
I wasn’t afraid of him.
“S-shit,” he stuttered out, his eyes blinking in an uncoordinated way that let me know he was shitcanned.
“That’s the problem about thinking you’ve got friends in high places isn’t it brother? They can’t seem to see you from where they’re perched.”
His fear was savorable, but this place was too full. We needed to get him out of here and we needed to do it without making a scene.
“Zerkos, let's talk this out like men,” he slurred, trying to make peace far too late in the game.
“Where’s Hughes?” I asked him, wondering if we needed to be on the lookout.
A few of our men were lurking in the corners trying to prevent some sort of surprise or sneak attack.
“Waiting for me to give the signal to report the Diablos Locos compound for some serious illegal activity to the FBI. The raid would go down within the next twenty-four hours, maybe just enough time for you all to scatter the fuck out of here and leave Cove City to the people who really own it.” He sneered and I couldn’t contain my laughter.
“You think you fucking own Cove City?” I asked, my amusement irritating him further.
“You think you do?” he asked, a bitter tone to his voice.
“No, Cove City is a goddess. She can’t be tamed by men like us. The sooner you learn that, the better off you’ll be, rat.”
“I thought you came here to kill me,” he snarled.
“They would love that.” I nodded to my brothers who didn’t hide the bloodthirsty look from their faces. “So give me a fucking reason you dirty fucking traitor.” I picked the gun up and slid it under the table, switching the safety off.
His eyes widened further than I thought possible.
“Zerkos, you don’t wanna do this. We’re in public. They’ll put you in prison for life.” He raised his hands up defensively, his face glistened with sweat as he tried to reason with me by tossing out some legal bullshit that definitely didn’t apply to me.
You either lived within the boundaries of the law or you didn’t.
I didn’t.
He’d somehow forgotten that.
“Then make it easy on me, brother.” My nostrils flared. “Get the fuck up.” I moved the gun under the table, pressing the barrel to his thigh as Santos slid out of the booth.
In a dark alley behind the club we each took turns letting our fists pay back all the pain he’d brought the Crows.
Blow after blow of our hands and feet, crunching his bones felt better than I had expected.
He didn’t fight it, he knew he was a prisoner to the game.
He thrashed and fought back even as we stuffed him into the trunk.
Then we drove back to the Diablos Locos compound.
There was a special entrance we were supposed to use so that the lower tiered members didn’t see us dragging someone off to their untimely death.
Best not to have witnesses we couldn’t fully trust.
“Zerkos I’m telling you, if there’s a single drop of blood stained on my nice oak floors when I get home you’re gonna be paying for the remodel from your own pocket.
Not my sister’s pocket…yours,” César declared from the phone as I tried to get instructions on how to get inside his goddamn torture cellar.
This motorcycle compound was a labyrinth and apparently the guy was set on putting up a few more buildings like some sort of fucking commune.
“This seems like a lot of fucking work just to get a prisoner locked up, you need a better system, Villalobos.” I’m pretty sure he growled into the phone but then turned to someone near him to bark out an order before returning to the line.
“Why is Ladrón not helping you with this shit?” he asked.
“He’s indisposed.” I cleared my throat, not mentioning the Bratva heir shacking up with one of his officers.
César sighed like he knew his men well enough to not need an explanation.
“I’m gonna need you to leave my wine cellar as you found it, got it?”
“Yeah, yeah.” I answered before hanging up the phone and tucking it back into my pockets.
I wasn’t dressed for this.
But were you ever dressed for slow and painful murder?
The image of my girl, dirty and covered in blood in that leather dress climbing out of that basement flashed through my mind.
She was always dressed for murder. I wanted to give her my protection but the reality was, my girl looked good dripping in the blood of her enemies, she looked even better when she was the one bleeding them out.
I got the code right on the third try and the room opened up, bright fluorescent lights shone down a concrete wall covered with chains and just next to it was a table full of torture devices.
I yanked Dez’s ankle dragging him into the room behind me, he groaned, still delirious from the beating he received outside the nightclub from us.
I stretched my fingers out, feeling the burn on the torn skin of my knuckles and smiling and recollecting the satisfying crunching sound of his cheek against my fist.
“Get him hooked up to the wall,” I commanded Santos and Fletcher before doubling back with the realization I wasn’t anyone’s leader anymore.
“Never mind, I got it.”
“It’s all good boss,” Fletcher said, shaking his head like he understood.
The two of them worked quickly, getting Dezmond chained to the wall while he was still wavering back and forth out of consciousness from the multiple head injuries he was now suffering.
“Where’s Ethan?” I asked.
“He went with Isaac and Smith to debrief the rest of our men, draw the line in the sand, and figure out who’s going where,” Fletcher explained.
“I didn't want it to come to this.” I scratched the back of my head with a sigh.
“It’s a good thing, you’ll see that,” Santos said, turning towards me. “Our people were already divided, if it was this easy to split off.”
“They’re split because… they weren’t yours to begin with,” Dezmond slurred, his head lifting up as he fought his way back to lucidity.
I swung my fist against his face, and it smacked against the concrete wall before ricocheting back down.
“Lights out!” Fletcher whooped.
Santos pulled the smelling salts from his pocket and stuck them in front of his face to wake him back up. Blood was pouring out of his nose violently and there was barely any light left in his eyes.
It wasn’t fun when they’d already mentally checked out.
“What’s the matter Dez? Is this not how Daddy’s plan was supposed to go?” I tilted my chin and hardened my eyes at him waiting for the light of recognition to hit his face.
It didn’t.
He was too out of it.
“My father knew you were all unraveling over the Mexican whore—” He didn’t get a chance to finish.
I threw my fist again. The impact from the collision of his head against the concrete wall behind him made a deafening sound. Santos rolled his eyes at me and pulled out the smelling salts again to wake the bastard up.
“Good thing we don’t need intel from him. You’ve practically beat him stupid.”
I gave him a fraction of a smile. He nodded, and it tore through my heart. I missed our friendship. I spent a lot of time wondering how we’d ever get back to how things were, and it made me wonder if he did too.
She was right, she wasn’t supposed to choose. Choosing would have been something she did to us, and this right here, this was the product of my own issues, my insecurities. She loved all three of us… and my problem was that he had loved her back the entire time?
Fuck. Was I the asshole here?
Was it up to me to repair the damage?
We bonded best through violence, maybe this was the closest thing to an olive branch we could get between us.
Dezmond woke up again, moaning a pained sound.
“I’m sorry, you were saying something?” I chuckled, cracking my neck on both sides.
Our captive spit a bloody wad onto the ground.
“He drew up the blueprint for the Crows, they were his men first. This should have all been his. It should have been mine,” Dezmond yelled, the true source of his rage showing its ugly head and letting us know jealousy was her name.