Chapter 42
WHAT THE HELL DO YOU GAIN FROM ALL THIS?
J.D. Stevens
I ignored the gasps and curses echoing all around me.
Brother? I don’t have a brother.
“You’re fucking lying.” My fists clenched at my sides. “I would know if I had a fucking brother.”
He scowled at me, his eyes burning with intense animosity. “I wouldn’t expect Fergus to mention me.” He spat more blood from his mouth. “I only know about you because he would bring you to my house when we were younger whenever he wanted to fuck my mother. He wasn’t in my life, like he was yours.”
I heard the bitterness in his voice—his words dripped with resentment and envy. But I didn’t have the picture-perfect life he believed I had. Fergus was abusive, physically, and emotionally to me and my mother. Then when she disappeared all of his anger was aimed at me.
One day she was there, her presence filling the room, and then the next day she vanished without a trace. Fergus always insisted she ran off with her lover whenever I asked and would constantly tell me she didn’t love me. But I never believed she didn’t love me. And I couldn’t really blame her for leaving.
I closed my eyes and tried to remember if it was even possible that Revels was telling the truth but my memories after my mother left were hazy. I assumed because of what I suffered I couldn’t remember much other than the abuse. And once I was old enough to get away from him, I took my mother’s surname, left for the east coast, and never looked back.
As I wiped my hand down my face, my frustration and anger intensified. What does all of this have to do with my wife, damn it?
“I don’t give a fuck if you’re my brother. You killed my wife and my son!”
His eyes met mine, and a sly smirk appeared on his face. “All she had to do was what I told her. She refused. So, the plan changed.”
“What plan?” I asked.
“The plan to bring you to your knees,” he said. “I was so fucking close. When she died, we figured either you’d lose your mind and kill yourself, since she messed up the chance to do it legally. Shit just hadn’t worked out yet.”
“What the hell do you gain from all this?” Caesar asked.
Agent Revels eyed Caesar. “He suffers.”
“Nah, that ain’t it,” Caesar said. “There’s something else to this.”
He glared at Caesar, then smirked. I agreed with Caesar. Watching me suffer couldn’t be the reason for all of this, could it?
“You hate me this much?” I asked. ”You hate me so much, that’d you kill an innocent woman and her child. You’re fucking blood.”
I didn’t care he despised me. His hatred for me was irrelevant. I didn’t care if he was my brother. My reason for asking him the question wasn’t because of that. I wanted to know why do all this. What was his endgame?
He laughed. “She wasn’t all that innocent. And as for my blood, I don’t give a fuck about shit like that.”
“It’s never good to speak ill of the dead.” I punched him in the jaw causing him to groan. “What the hell do you gain from all this?”
He shrugged nonchalantly, like he didn’t know, or he didn’t care.
“You’re going to die anyway,” I said. “You might as well tell me what I want to know.”
“Like you said, I’m going to die anyway so what purpose does it do to tell you anything?”
“Wait. Wait,” Caesar said, taking a step closer to Agent Revels. “You said we.”
Confused, I looked at Caesar, trying to make sense of his words.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Revels said.
“You said we not I thought he’d lose his mind and kill himself,” Caesar said, smiling.
My head whipped back to Agent Revels, and it was the first time since I mentioned bringing his wife here that all his bravado was gone.
“Who are you working with?” I asked.
“I’m done talking. Do what you want to do to me, little brother. You won’t get one more word out of me.”
“I’m not you’re fucking brother!”
He laughed and shrugged. “Blood is blood, right?”
“This is your last chance, Revels,” I said. “Tell me who you’re working for.”
He glared at me but didn’t say another word. Fuck, I didn’t want to do this, but he left me no other choice. I nodded towards Schizo, and he jumped down off the pool table again and walked out of the den. Agent Revels zeroed in on me and it was my chance to gloat. He had the opportunity to save her even if he was going to die. However now she’d die along with him.
I hated to resort to this, but I wanted the answers he refused to give. He had the chance to do the right thing but chose not to.
Schizo escorted Mrs. Revels into the room with her hands bound with duct tape, gagged, and a brown sack covering her head. She had no idea who we were, and she had no idea where she was at.
“Motherfucker!” Revels screamed, as he tried to get out of his restraints and to his wife. “Let her go! I’m going to kill you!”
With all her strength, she fought against Schizo’s hold, her attempts to scream stifled by the gag. I grabbed another chair and sat it directly in front of Agent Revels only a few feet away. Schizo forced her to sit, then cut the tape on her hands before taping her to the chair, just like her husband.
“Let her go, Stevens. I’ll tell you what you want to know. Just please let her go.”
We could have avoided all this if he had just answered my fucking questions. He would die for what he did to my wife and son, and now she’d die because he wouldn’t tell me who was behind all this shit.
“Too late,” I said.
I yanked the bag off her head, and she gasped for breath as her eyes adjusted to the sudden brightness. When her eyes landed on her husband, her widened eyes filled with tears then slid down her cheeks. We’d done a number on him. He looked like he’d been in a car accident.
“Mrs. Revels.” Her eyes shot to me. “Apparently you are my sister-in-law. In a perfect world that would mean something to me but now it doesn’t mean shit, which means this will not end well for you.”
I walked behind her chair, and gripped her neck from behind, then leaned down towards her ear. “Because to your husband, blood... family doesn’t mean shit. So, I guess that should extend to you, too. Caesar, hand me your knife.”
While keeping my eyes fixed on Agent Revels, I extended my hand. When Caesar placed the blade in my palm, I placed it against his wife’s slender neck.
“Let her go!” Agent Revels yelled.
I laughed. “Let her go!” I mocked. “Tell her what you did to my wife and son, then I’ll think about it.”
He glared, his eyes narrowing in anger, but he kept his silence.
I dropped the blade from her neck, pulled my gun, then aimed for his leg, and pulled the trigger. She tried to scream but then it turned into sobs.
“Tell her, or she’s next.”
He groaned and looked at his wife. “His wife was pregnant, and she wouldn’t do what I wanted her to do, so I had her killed.”
With a look of disbelief, his wife began shaking her head, unable to comprehend that her husband would stoop so low.
“Oh yes, he did, Mrs. Revels. Apparently, my brother hates me so much that he killed my wife and his own fucking flesh and blood. Now he needs to tell me why and if he was working alone because I don’t think he was. So that’s why you’re here.”
With a swift motion, I freed her mouth from the duct tape, allowing her panicked cries to fill the room. “Please tell him what he wants to know Alan. Think about the kids.”
“Yes, Alan please think about the kids,” I said in a mocking tone.
As he stared at his wife, his eyes revealed a mix of remorse, guilt, and fear. He never believed she’d be in the middle of his shit. But here we were, and both would die because he just wouldn’t talk.
“Tell me who you’re working for?” I asked.
He took in a deep breath and released it. “It was Fergus.”
“My father?” I asked in disbelief although I shouldn’t be surprised.
“Our father.”
I closed my eyes, and suddenly all I heard were the sounds of my own breathing. I desperately hoped that he had absolutely no involvement in this situation. I hated him but I would have never believed he’d be behind some shit like this.
“Why?” I asked.
“That’s a question for him,” he said. “One I’m sure you’ll get the answer too.”
Damn right I would, and I would enjoy every fucking minute of it too.
“Say your goodbyes,” I said.
His eyes widened with fear. “She had nothing to do with this, Stevens. Please let her go.”
“And did my wife and son have anything to do with your hate for me? Did Rebel?” I asked.
He looked from me to his wife. “I’m so sorry, baby. I love you,” he said.
“I love you too,” she said through her sobs. “Please don’t...”
Before she could utter a word, I swiftly drew the knife across her throat, witnessing the horror in his eyes as his wife’s lifeblood suffocated her. Her body convulsed violently, and then she went completely still, her chest no longer rising and falling with breath. His face contorted with devastation, but I couldn’t find it in me to feel sorry for his loss. He killed my wife and child. He’d get no empathy or mercy from me.
As I approached him, I could see the fear in his eyes as I pressed the cold steel of my gun against his forehead. After inhaling deeply and exhaling, he directed his gaze towards me. “See you in hell,” I said with a chilling grin, then squeezed the trigger.
“Get rid of the bodies,” I said to no one in particular and walked out of the den.