Chapter 33 Cord #2
Time to wake things up. I stand back and shove my booted foot hard against the door, splitting the wood and causing general chaos within.
Cosgrove staggers up from the bed with a gun in his hand, though he’s wild-eyed and shaky. Probably hasn’t slept since he started holing up in here.
I don’t give him a chance to get his bearings. I advance on him and slap the gun out of his hand then grab him around the neck and pull him to his feet.
“What the fuck?” he croaks. “Who are you?”
“I’ll give you a hint. Dante sent me.”
“Dante?” He visibly relaxes, like he’s in the clear. “Look, I’m just taking a few days off. I haven’t been feeling well.”
Stupid human excuse. I squeeze his throat. “So you weren’t ducking out to say, hook up with another crew?”
“Another crew? No, I…that is, I would never. I’m loyal.”
“Loyal, huh?” I jerk him closer and reach into my pocket with my other hand to pull out a set of charmed zip tie cuffs. “Let’s talk about loyalty, shall we?” I spin him around and cuff him in one practiced move.
“What’s happening here? Why am I being cuffed?”
“Don’t insult me, Cosgrove. I’d like nothing more than to beat your worthless ass to a pulp right now, but Dante wants you in one piece.”
He takes that as an invitation to struggle, so I pull him up and flash him my most unsettling smile. “The ‘in one piece’ part was just a suggestion, so don’t tempt me.” I shove him toward the door. “Look at the bright side. At least you won’t die at your bookie’s hand tonight.”
He starts fighting me as soon as we leave the room, forcing me to punch him so hard across the jaw he bites his tongue. Blood seeps out of his mouth, but at least the hit makes him more compliant.
We exit the lobby to the street and head down the block toward my car, half dragging Cosgrove by his arm. The kid looks up as we approach and grins. He’s not even fazed by the bloodied cuffed man in my custody.
“No one touched your car.”
I pull out another twenty and hand it to him. “Good man.”
The bookie’s two flunkies must’ve spotted us, because they come running at me, looking for a fight. “Where the hell are you taking him?” the bigger of them demands.
I shove Cosgrove into the passenger seat and slam the door then turn around to face them. “Sorry boys, guess your boss forgot to call you. I bought his debt. He’s mine now.”
“You got some proof of that?”
I pull the pink slip out of my pocket and shove it in his face. “Satisfied?”
He looks at it then backs off with a snort. “You’re welcome to him.”
Not that I need your blessing.
The trip back to the warehouse takes about fifteen minutes, during which time Cosgrove doesn’t stop begging.
He tries everything to convince me to let him go, all of which I block out.
He even resorts to offering to hook me up with “someone” who could pay me more money for my services. Guess we know who that is.
When I get to the warehouse, I call Dante before getting out of the car. “Where do you want him?”
“Take him to the basement and wait for me.”
Great. The basement again.
Like I haven’t seen enough of that the past few days.
I drag the idiot through the door and down the stairs. Things have been cleaned up since I was last here; no sign of the three vamps I tortured and killed.
There’s a metal chair bolted to the floor in one corner of the room and I shove Cosgrove into it and lean against the wall behind him to wait.
“Can you at least take the zip cuffs off?” he whines.
“You’re lucky I don’t tie you to the chair, though that’s still on the table.”
Dante enters the room, followed by Gio and Roland.
The big guard has a gleam in his eye, like he’s going to get rewarded for something.
He stands back while Dante advances on Cosgrove, his hands clasped behind his back, his own eyes darkening to pitch black.
The look doesn’t bode well for the prisoner.
“Why?” Dante asks, raising his foot to rest on the chair between Cosgrove’s legs.
Cosgrove’s eyes flicker around the room, probably looking for an ally. He won’t find one here.
“It’s not what you think,” he insists.
Dante steps back and turns to Roland, whose ham-sized fists are flexing at his side. It’s like he’s moving in slow motion when he takes a step and slams one of them into Cosgrove’s face.
The chair creaks like it’s going to pull loose from the floor. Cosgrove almost falls out of it, his nose a mess of bloody pulp.
“Let’s try this again,” Dante says. “Why did you betray me?”
“I swear, Dante, I’m loyal.”
“I need him to be able to talk,” Dante tells his guard.
Roland nods his understanding. The next punch catches Cosgrove in the side of his head, sparing his jaw. Blood oozes from his ear, and I’m betting he’s not hearing so good right now.
“Here’s how it’s going to go,” Dante says, pacing around the chair. “I’m going to ask you a question and every time you lie to me, Roland is going to decorate your face.” He stops in front of him and leans in. “If that doesn’t convince you, I’m going to let Cord go to work on your body.”
I offer him my most deranged grin.
“Now, nod if you understand.”
Cosgrove looks around him warily and nods.
“Great,” Dante replies. “Now, one more time. Why did you betray me?”
Cosgrove opens his mouth to answer then eyes Roland’s clenching fists and thinks better of whatever he was going to say. “I needed the money.”
At Dante’s nod, Roland punches Cosgrove in the nose again. “What?” he cries. “I was telling the truth.”
“I know,” Dante consoles him. “I just figured you needed a little punishment for BEING SO STUPID.”
He starts to pace again. “I’d ask you why, but we all know the answer to that. Gambling is a weakness, and you’re a weak little man.”
Cosgrove starts to sob. “I know. I can’t help myself.”
Dante leans over him and grabs his jaw, shaking his head. “Shut the fuck up, you spineless worm. How the fuck did you even get on my crew?”
“I can do better, I promise. Just give me another chance.”
I roll my eyes; we’re at the bargaining phase now.
“Here’s what you’re going to do,” Dante says. “You’re going to tell me everything you know about the Python’s operation. How many men, where they meet, what they’re into. All of it.”
Cosgrove stops crying and stares at Dante wide-eyed. “I-I can’t.”
“Why not?”
His voice is barely audible when he answers. “They don’t trust me.”
Dante smiles at him. “And you think I do?”
He nods at me and I pull out my switchblade and step closer, clicking to open it right next to Cosgrove’s ear. He jumps at the sound, then cowers away from me when I lean over, my voice a sibilant whisper. “I like cutting things.”
To prove my point, I press the knife under his chin and slowly drag it down his neck, leaving a trail of blood in its wake. I walk around to face him and make a show of bringing the blade to my lips and lapping the blood off it. I love letting my monster come out to play.
“Care to see how much blood you can lose before descending into madness?”
Cosgrove swallows and shakes his head.
“Here’s what I don’t understand, Alvin,” I tell him. “You betrayed your Guild for more money, so why were you holed up in a seedy motel like a little bitch?”
“I told you, they don’t trust me. They said they’d k-kill me.”
Dante laughs. “So you managed to piss off me, a bookie, and the Python? I’m surprised you’re still alive, though for how much longer remains to be seen.”
“W-what do you want to know?” Cosgrove asks him.
“Let’s start small. How did you meet them?”
Over the next hour, Cosgrove tells Dante everything he knows about the Python’s operation.
Granted, like the others I tortured, he’s never seen the leader himself, nor the one they call R7.
The guy who recruited him was called B64.
There were nine of them in his group, all Clan.
All Crimson Guild. He was the only one who worked directly for Dante.
He told them everything he knew about our operation.
For that fact alone I know he’s earned his death when this is over.
I only had to coax him once, jamming my blade into his thigh when he refused to tell Dante where they met.
When we’ve gotten everything out of him he can give, Dante nods to me and leads the others out of the room.
“Looks like it’s just you and me now, lover,” I coo.
“W-what are you going to do?”
A good question. At my request, Uno stocked the cabinet down here with loaded bolts of his poison, so I have a quick way to dispatch subjects. And frankly, my heart isn’t in it with this one. He’s so pathetic it takes all the fun out of torture.
Besides, we’ve already gotten everything we wanted out of him.
“You’re lucky,” I say, crossing the room to pick up the crossbow and load it. “I’ve kind of satisfied my torture fix this week, so we’ll just make this quick.”
“Make what quick? I can go, right?”
I turn around and face him. “See, there’s a problem there. You betrayed Dante.”
“But I gave him all the information he asked for. I proved myself. Didn’t I?”
“Oh, you proved yourself all right, and now I’ll prove something to you. Dante doesn’t suffer traitors.”
And then I shoot him.
When I get upstairs, Dante is already gathering his men to raid the addresses Cosgrove gave us. “You did your part,” he tells me. “I’ll call you when I need you.”
Looks like I got the day to myself after all.