2. Chapter 2
T he young man looked up at me with those big eyes that were as blue as a summer sky, pressing his face into the softness of the stuffed animal.
He was shorter than my six-foot frame by about four inches, but with thin muscles and wearing tiny underwear briefs made for little boys covered in some superhero I didn’t recognize.
The strangeness grew even more when I took in the soft powder blue leather collar around his throat covered in silver rings.
Did the bastard I was about to kill own this boy? Was he some sort of… sex slave? That could’ve explained why he wasn’t on the list to kill. He wasn’t human. He was property. But there was no way to know that for sure.
I couldn’t linger any longer. I needed to make a decision. Kill him or leave him to finish my job.
“Answer me. Who are you?”
When he didn’t, I aimed the gun at his forehead again, but something held me back.
Something told me deep within the recesses of my mind where the darkness couldn’t reach to not kill him.
That little bit of light left over from when I was a child.
The only goodness left inside me. The remnants of my mother.
I was ordered to kill everyone in the house, but there were supposed to be only twenty-one men. This boy made twenty-two.
I dropped my gun hand, and turned around to finish my job, leaving the boy behind. No more time for doubts.
When I stepped in front of the double doors to the main bedroom, I kicked them open and dropped to the floor, and rolled out of the way as a barrage of bullets fired, with one nicking my shoulder.
I ignored the burn and blood while on my stomach and took out the last two guards in quick succession, leaving only Randall Payne.
I stood, keeping my gun trained on him as he raised a gun at me. We were at a standoff. I could have easily killed him, but something in me wanted to know about the boy. Something that would make killing him a pleasure rather than simply a job.
Payne was a man in his mid-fifties and taller than me, but with a large gut. His balding head glistened with nervous sweat. “Who sent you? Who hired you? I’ll pay you double.”
“You can’t afford me.”
He scoffed. “Everyone can be bought.”
“I don’t go back on my contracts. It’s bad for business. Who’s that boy?”
“He’s mine.”
So, it was true. He owned the young man. Human traffickers of children were worse than scum. I nodded and put a bullet between his eyes with a smile on my face before he could say anything else.
It was done.
It’s not fucking done. You have a witness.
I walked over to Payne’s body and put two more rounds into his head to be sure, then I holstered my gun and took a picture with my phone for evidence to turn in to the client.
When I turned around, the boy stood there, still holding that fucking rabbit like his life depended on it.
His big eyes gazed down at the ground toward the man I had just killed, then they met my eyes again.
Suddenly, he ran to the body and dug into the man’s pocket, pulling something out and shoving it into the front pocket of his rabbit’s overalls.
I didn’t give a fuck what it was. It had nothing to do with me. My job was done. Nearly.
I pulled out my gun again as everything in my brain told me to kill him.
He was not only supposed to die, but he saw my face.
And my job wouldn’t be complete until I did.
But I fucking couldn’t. His innocent face was beautiful despite the bruises.
His plump lips were red, and when he bit his bottom lip, his cheeks formed little dimples.
He was like a skinny cherub. And he would be the death of me if I didn’t take him out.
I couldn’t leave witnesses or evidence behind.
My breathing suddenly picked up, and I slid my eyes closed for a moment. Then, with a long exhale, I holstered my gun. Fuck it. I brushed past the boy and headed out of the house. As soon as I stepped outside, I texted the image to my boss, Sid Virgil, on my burner phone and to Layla.
Me: It’s done.
Sid: Good. Any problems?
I hesitated for a moment, thinking about the boy, who was a massive problem that I seemed not to want to deal with.
Me: No.
Sid: Report tomorrow for details and
to receive the rest of your payment.
I turned off the phone, dropped it to the ground, and stomped on it with the heel of my boot.
When I picked up the little SIM card, I broke it and shoved it into my pants pocket.
Before I headed out to my car a few blocks away, something had me turning toward the house, only to come face-to-face with the boy.
My heart leaped out of my chest. Rarely was I startled like that.
He was so silent that I hadn’t heard him.
Then again, he was small and barefooted.
I didn’t doubt that Payne trained the boy to be as unobtrusive as possible.
“Go,” I said, shooing him with my hands like he was some fucking bird. “You’re free now.”
His thin arms wrapped tighter around the rabbit, and his eyes never wavered from mine.
I stepped up to him and yanked the damn animal from his hands, taking a closer look at it.
He didn’t fight for it or try to take it back, watching me with curious eyes.
What was his obsession with the damn thing?
Perhaps he tried to find comfort where he could.
I inspected the thing, turning it to and fro.
It was tawny brown with white inside the ears and a pink nose.
It looked worn and well-loved. The eyes were made of plastic and were large and black.
The damn thing wore green corduroy overalls with an embroidered carrot on the front.
Maybe this toy was all the boy owned. I handed it back to him, and he took it from me, pressing it close to his narrow chest again.
Looking closer at the boy, it was clear he was a young man. He had a dusting of fine, stubbly blond hairs along his jawline and a little over his lip.
“Do you have a name?”
“How old are you?” I asked when he didn’t answer.
“How long have you been here?”
It was unnerving how he just looked and looked at me, saying absolutely nothing.
“Can you not talk?”
Not even a shake of the head.
“I don’t have fucking time for this,” I muttered and walked away through the expansive yard.
When I heard the crunching of leaves underfoot behind me, I turned to see him following.
“You’re free. Go live your life.”
He was out of my hands now. He was not my responsibility.
Then all the possible scenarios crashed into my mind about what would happen to him.
He had no money, food, or clothes other than what was at the house.
And I was sure, now that I had cleared it out, the client would come in and clean it of dead bodies, blood, and anything of value.
If they caught the boy, he would surely die.
Then I would get in trouble for not taking him out.
I sighed, trying to shove out thoughts that I needed to kill him or leave him just to have him die, anyway. Even if he left the property, he had nothing and nowhere to go. Surely, someone would stumble upon him and take him in.
Or he could get raped, being half-naked and dressed like a little boy. The humane thing would be to put him down like a suffering, dying animal.
Fuck!
No! I wasn’t responsible for him. Maybe if I fucking repeated that enough, it would finally sink into my thick skull.
I kept walking until I reached my black Audi Spyder, opening the trunk.
I pulled off my guns, making sure the safeties were on, and unloaded them.
Once they were clear, I tossed them in a case in the trunk.
Then I took off my holsters and stripped out of everything that wasn’t my T-shirt, cargo pants, and combat boots.
I breathed in the coolness on my sweaty skin now that I was out of the hot gear.
My hair was wet from the beanie, and I combed back the strands from my face with my fingers.
And I needed to fix my damn nose. It was now or never, so I took a deep breath, held it, and readjusted.
There was a sickening crunch and a surge of pain I bit back, but it was back in place.
I’d have someone look at it later. Grabbing a box of tissues in the back, I wiped up the blood on my face and then shoved tissues up my nose, so I could drive and not worry about bleeding all over my face.
Next, I grabbed the red first aid kit, pulled down the neck of my T-shirt over my shoulder, cleaned up the wound from the bullet, and put a thick bandage on it.
It was nothing and would heal soon enough. One scar among many.
When I finished, I closed the trunk and turned around right into the fucking boy.
A surge of anger and frustration hit me. Growling, I yanked at his collar rings none too gently, pulling him close, and bent down face-to-face. “I’m not responsible for you,” I hissed nasally, then shoved him back. “Go! Get the fuck out of here!”
He didn’t even react. No flicker of fear. How long had he been a captive? Was he so traumatized he couldn’t talk or react? My cool control was slipping with this kid.
Shit! Since when had I ever been plagued with a sense of morality or concern for others? I looked up at the starry night and sighed, resigned to the inevitable. Fuck, I was weak.
“Fine! You have one day. I’ll get you some clothes, food, and cash. Then you’re on your own. I cannot take care of you.”
I growled again when I opened the passenger door for him. He quickly climbed in with no complaint or hesitation and buckled his seat belt around him and the rabbit. I shook my head, got in the driver’s side, and started the car.
“What the fuck am I doing?”
As I drove back to my place, I pulled out a pack of cigarettes and a lighter from the glove box and pulled one out. I put it in my mouth and lit it, then rolled down the window. I’d been trying to quit, but it had only been half-assed, since I’d probably die of a bullet before cancer, anyway.
“What’s it going to take for you to talk?” I asked, shoving the hair out of my face to glance at him, who watched my every movement.
I’d seen a lot of shit in my twenty-nine years, but this was one of the strangest. This little trafficked young man was a slave for who knew how long.
Did he require certain orders to talk? Was he that well-trained?
If so, then why did he help me? There must have been some motivation.
To get out of there, obviously, but now that he was out, why didn’t he talk? Maybe he physically couldn’t.
I stared out at the road ahead of me and took another drag from my cigarette while filled with frustratingly unanswered questions until I reached George Washington Parkway, a wooded road that wound around along the Potomac River, taking us toward Washington, D.C.
My home was before the city, sitting on some wooded land away from others on the other side of McLean, closer to Arlington.
Before I pulled onto the road, taking me to the long driveway that led to my home, I tossed my cigarette out the window and rolled it up.
As we drove up the long drive toward my unassuming house, I pressed the button on the roof of my car to open the security gates.
Once they were open, we moved along the wooded drive and parked in front of a small brick house sitting on five acres of land.
I had homes surrounding me, but the woods were too thick to see anything, and I boasted a state-of-the-art security system.
I would spend my money on a nice car and motorcycle and a security system, but I couldn’t be bothered with decorating a house or landscaping. I wasn’t some fucking homemaker.
As soon as I had the car turned off, my next line of security came out through the large dog door.
Cleopatra, or Cleo as I called her, was my Cane Corso.
She rippled with muscle and was as dark as night except for the white patches on her chest. I had trained her to guard my property and my person since she was a pup.
A few hand gestures had her sitting. Once I knew she was calm, I introduced her to the boy.
She sniffed his hand and did something I did not expect.
Cleo stood and leaned her body into him, almost knocking him over with her one-hundred-pound body.
Shit, he probably didn’t weigh much more than her. A stiff wind could knock him over.
She clearly knew something more about him than I did. Dogs were intuitive like that.
“This is Cleo,” I said.
When he looked up at me, I told him he could pet her. He raised his hand and gently petted her under her chin, her favorite spot, next to her tummy and chest when she was relaxed and off duty.
Whatever. They couldn’t get attached. They wouldn’t have a chance to.
“You’re here for one night only. Then you’re on your own.”