The Butcher (Love Like A Loaded Gun #2)

Chapter 1

Chapter One

Alexei

The man was still breathing when I walked in but barely, each breath rattling like it might be his last.

The room carried the thick scent of bleach and blood, the kind that clung to everything. It had already been used tonight, and the dark stain beneath the chair proved that. It spread slowly across the concrete and slipped toward the drain in the center of the floor.

The traitor sat tied to the chair, wrists secured behind his back, ankles fastened to the legs, and his head hanging forward like his body had already admitted defeat and was only waiting for death.

I closed the door behind me, the sound loud in the silence, and the two men inside straightened as soon as they saw me.

“Leave,” I ordered, my tone even, my voice low.

They obeyed immediately, boots scraping against concrete as they cleared out, and when the door shut again, silence settled in.

It was thick and suffocating and exactly how I preferred it.

No noise. No interference. Just a place for me to work.

I crossed the room without rushing, each step steady enough that he heard me before he fully lifted his head. It took effort for him to move, but he managed it, one eye forcing itself open through the swelling and blood to find me as I stopped in front of him.

I let him look, let him take me in. Recognition came first, then the fear followed. Good. That made me fucking smile.

I crouched in front of him, bringing us eye to eye, and when his head started to dip again, I reached out and took hold of his jaw, forcing him to keep his gaze on mine.

My grip wasn’t bruising or crushing. It didn’t need to be. Control never was. “Still with me,” I said evenly, more a statement than a question.

His lips parted, something like a laugh trying to push through the blood coating his mouth and teeth.

“You… Drakovich?” My name sounded thin coming from him, like it didn’t belong there.

“Alexei,” I corrected, holding his gaze. “Use it while you can.”

A rough cough tore through him, blood spilling past his lips before he swallowed it down, his throat working against it.

His eye stayed locked on mine, searching, measuring, maybe looking for something he could use against me.

“Do you know what they call me?”

He coughed again, shook his head, but we both knew he did.

“Say it.”

“The… Butcher.”

His focus flickered over my face, desperate now, searching for hesitation, for something human enough to bargain with. There wasn’t anything for him to find.

“Look at me,” I said quietly when he closed his good eye. I tightened my grip just enough to keep him from disobeying me again.

When his eye opened, the fear had settled deeper, no longer something he could push aside or pretend wasn’t there. It hung between us steady and impossible to ignore.

That’s what I wanted to see.

“You’ve already been asked questions,” I continued, my voice calm, unhurried. “You’ve had opportunities to answer them.”

“I told them—” he started, but I cut him off without raising my voice, my fingers pressing just enough into his jaw to stop the words.

“No. You talked but didn’t answer.” I released him slowly and stood, turning to drag the metal table closer. The scrape echoed through the room as I adjusted it into place.

The tools laid out across it were clean and organized, each one positioned with purpose. I picked up a knife, not the largest, not meant to intimidate, just sharp, balanced, and made for this kind of work.

When I turned back to him, I let him see it, let the understanding settle in without needing to explain what was going to happen.

“My associates went easy on you,” I said idly. “I won’t be so merciful. I’m going to ask you one more time.” I stepped closer, my voice steady and even.

“And this is the last time you’ll have the option of answering with your voice.”

His breathing changed then, turning shallow and uneven, his chest rising faster as the reality of that sank in. “You don’t understand,” he rasped.

I leaned in slightly, close enough that he didn’t have to strain to hear me. “I understand perfectly,” I said. Then, without shifting my tone, I asked again, “Who ordered the hit?”

His gaze dropped for the briefest moment before snapping back to me. “They’ll kill me,” he whispered, his voice breaking under the weight of it.

I studied him for a second then leaned down, my mouth right next to his ear and whispered, “I’m going to do worse.”

That was what broke him. Not all at once or in some dramatic collapse but enough that the resistance gave way and something real pushed through.

He knew what I was capable of, that I’d make the torture last for days before finally killing him.

“Rossi,” he choked out.

“It came from Rossi…”

The name settled heavily between us. I straightened slightly, adjusting my grip on the knife as I watched him. “Which one?”

“I don’t know,” he rushed out, panic taking over now. “I swear to you, I don’t know.”

I held his gaze, measuring the truth in it. He believed that, but it didn’t mean it was a good enough answer.

“I didn’t see. I only heard the orders—” A trail of blood-laced saliva trailed from the corner of his mouth down to his chin.

Rossi was involved, and it changed everything.

Then I finished him, sliding the blade along his neck from ear to ear.

He spasmed, his mouth gaping open, death sounds leaving his throat.

He jerked in his restraints, but there was only one end for him.

Blood never meant anything but an end result to me.

It was just part of the process. Part of what and who I was.

When I opened the door, my men were waiting outside. They straightened immediately, waiting for orders.

“Dispose of him,” I said.

“Da.” They both said in unison.

I stepped past them without another glance, already moving forward. If the Rossi family was in on this hit, then they’d crossed so many fucking lines that there was no going back.

And whatever came next wasn’t going to be civilized.

It was going to be war.