11. Eleven
Eleven
Francis
Fucking Jack Walker. The man was a spineless cunt.
One mention of my father and he was practically pissing in his slacks.
The only time he’d shown a backbone was when I’d demanded that Antoinette come with me on this mission, and he refused.
We ended up having to call Father from his office.
I still couldn’t believe he sided with Jack, claiming that it would raise too many questions if Antoinette was absent, too.
I gritted my teeth, restrained myself from pulling my pistol from my belt and whipping the shit out of Jack with it.
But just barely, because Father’s orders were absolute.
And to disobey him would be much worse than leaving Antoinette.
I might not like it, but my sister couldn’t exactly run, after all.
She had no car, and other than Agonde, there was nowhere she could run to that I wouldn’t find her.
Besides, she’d proven that she’d do what I said if it meant keeping these pathetic kids and her useless friends safe.
I had eyes in place to make sure that stayed true.
So, here I was, finally headed back to West Barrett after two weeks in the middle of nowhere.
I would be meeting my father at the Port, the industrial hub of West Barrett.
A whole city block of warehouses that bordered the water, and home to Barrett Holdings’ primary facilities.
Not our head office, that was downtown, of course, but we were a holding company, so obviously our biggest business was in importing and exporting goods, followed by construction.
Everyone in town knew that. After all, those were the things they wrote about in features in the business section.
Those were the things they asked about during press conferences and interviews with Father.
But I learned a long time ago that wasn’t quite true.
It took fucking forever to get back to civilization, or at least within range of a cell phone signal.
Once I could get online, the drive didn’t seem quite so slow.
After weeks away from Barrett Hills, texts came flooding in, mostly from the small crew Father had assigned to me, all asking about tonight’s job.
A few were from other contacts, guys I’d met at East Barrett High, the public high school I’d been forced to attend during those pathetic years we lived like dogs in the slums of my hometown.
A fact I now knew was entirely due to my sister’s inability to show fucking gratitude for our father’s love and care.
Instead, she’d forced us both to rot away under the name Hillis.
Father had reminded me what it truly meant to be a Barrett, a king, a leader.
Then, he’d given me the chance to prove myself.
Thankfully, the connections I needed to make that happen were exactly the kind I’d forged at that shitty school and on the run-down block.
On every street corner, behind every busted-up convenience store, and in the toilet of every shitty bar in the whole neighbourhood there were men and women all too willing to offer up the only things they had left to sell me. Their own flesh and blood.
A year ago, around this time, I’d stepped out of the black limo in the parking lot of the Barrett Arms pub.
This part of the job was new, but the end goal hadn’t changed since I was eight years old.
Leaving Mikhael behind the wheel, I’d gone straight inside ignoring the stinking face from old man Granger behind the bar.
Instead, I’d sought out a table at the back where a greasy, balding man and his old lady–old being the key word there–could reliably be found.
One lowball offer and an exchanged address later, I got what I came for and then some.
Later that night, in one of the very same warehouses we were about to approach, I’d handed three unwashed little kids, all dressed in hand-me-downs and other rags, over to our men. My father had smiled at me and applauded.
“Bravo, son.” He clapped me on the shoulder, and together we climbed back into the limo, “I’m glad to see you haven’t forgotten my lessons.”
I hadn’t. We’d driven away from the Port that night, and I knew exactly what would happen to the three kids I’d left behind. I didn’t even bother to learn their names on the ride over, because learning their names was always a mistake.
While my beautiful, soft sister was off slutting it up in the woods every summer, I had been busy learning our family’s business at my father’s side. The real business. The purchase and sale of product. And that product was people. Women and children primarily, but the odd man, too.
I’d grown up blissfully unaware of any of it.
Until the summer I turned eight. I stood in our driveway long after our mother had gone to drop Toni at the bus stop, where she would be whisked away north for two whole months.
Then, our father clapped me on the shoulder and explained that I’d be having an adventure, too, a secret one, for just he and I.
One that would help us secure our family’s future forever.
He’d brought me to the headquarters downtown and proudly shown me his office along with the whole building.
Then, Mikhael, our father’s right hand, even back then, had driven us down to the Port.
That was the first time I saw the boats, the shipping containers, and then, the warehouse.
A vast empty space with concrete floors and sound-proofed steel walls.
And rows upon rows of cages. All varying sizes from big and shockingly small.
At first, I wondered if Father was shipping animals.
It wasn’t until his men brought the first people inside, bags over their heads and hands zip tied behind their backs that I realized what the cages were really for.
The women were first, put into the taller cages.
Then came the kids, shrinking in size, some I knew were way younger than my own eight years.
Many were crying. Some were screaming. And some were so quiet, it was like they were barely there.
But as they were paraded past me, every single one of them watched me with empty stares.
Standing at his side, Father explained to me, ‘These children, they are your responsibility, Francis. Our men will handle the others, but it’s your job to make sure they stay quiet. Otherwise, our whole family, you, your mother, your sister, we will all be in danger.’
I remember a lump of fear rising in my throat, worry that I wasn’t up to the task.
“Can I count on you to do that, son?”
I’d nodded furiously.
“Good,” he said before signaling to one of the men, “Rafael, here, will show you what I expect from you.”
The man, Rafael, jogged toward one of mid-sized cages that held a boy nearly the same height as me.
One who hadn’t stopped screaming, though whatever he was saying was in some language I didn’t recognize.
Rafael flung the door open, grabbed the kid by his thin t-shirt and dragged him from the cage on limp feet until they were both clear of the bars.
Then, I watched that man beat the ever-loving-shit out of that kid.
He punched and kicked him over and over until the kids screams stopped. Because he had passed out.
My whole body was stiff. Shaking at the idea of having to do that. Or of not being able to and letting my father down as a result. Even now, I’m not sure which. My father must have recognized my fear.
“I know it’s seems harsh, son. And maybe you are scared. That’s alright.” Then he gripped both my shoulders and kneeled so we were eye to eye, “But just remember, you will be protecting our family.”
“Yes, Father.” I whispered back. He stood, then nodded silently to Rafael who returned the sagging body to its empty cage. Around us, the other cages had grown quiet, too. Women and children alike, watching, terrified that they would be next.
“You’re going to stay with Rafael. He’s going to train you.”
I cried out then, realizing my own father was about to leave me behind with a man I had just watched nearly beat someone to death.
“But, Father—"
“No,” he said sternly, “No crying. Either you can do this for us, Francis, or you can’t?”
It was a question. I could have easily said no, but I could read the disappointment in his eyes. He didn’t believe I could do it. He didn’t believe I could help. So I shook tears from my eyes and stood up as straight as I could.
“I can.”
“I’m proud of you, son,” he said, then turned to Rafael once more.
“Remember, never the faces.”
Those were his parting words as he left me behind.
It was weeks before I saw my father again.
Rafael and I barely left the warehouse. Every day he would teach me how to fight, or how to shoot a gun, or how to hit someone so it did the most damage while leaving only the faintest mark.
After two weeks, he made me hit the first kid.
Another little boy who wouldn’t stop crying.
I cried, too. Rafael broke my nose for it.
I guess he eventually reset it, too, but that wasn’t until after I’d bled for over an hour.
A month into my training, I realized that anytime I failed or showed any pain or weakness, I was met with a beating of my own.
Until I learned to do everything I was asked, just to avoid the punishment.
Until I learned to do it without being asked.
Until it became the thing that I needed to do.
It was the family business. Just one part it, I realized, as the women and children started to vanish from the warehouse. Sold–I would learn when my father eventually returned for me–one by one over that whole summer.
The next summer, too, and the summer after that. Each year, another batch of people, of children, were brought in at the start of July and began to vanish almost as quickly, with one notable exception.