Chapter 17 #2
I’ve never had such a lucky day bestow itself upon me. Dad being in the car means he can get into any CCTV in the area, wipe it clean.
Maybe God does still have a soft spot for his old favourite angel.
Stalking down towards the door, I wait, and I wait. The moment I hear the fake cries, my boot connects with the door. A real cry follows it as I make my way through the hotel room.
The woman clambers off the bed, grabbing her scraps of material as if that’s going to protect her modesty. Patterson jumps from the bed, rounding it as he searches for his own.
“Get the fuck out of here. Do you know who I fucking am?!” he screeches.
Maybe his voice box should go first; I can’t fucking stand to hear that for longer than necessary. My gaze shifts to the redhead behind him. “Out.”
She doesn’t need to be told twice, heels in hand as she fights with the zipper on her dress. A scream picks up from behind the door, and it’s swiftly silenced as I hear one of my men tackle her.
“All in place, boss,” he confirms, closing the door with a struggled click as the hinges work against the cracked frame. My glare remains fixed on our quivering Chief of Police.
“I said—”
“I heard what you fucking said.”
His mouth clamps shut, and he backs further into the room as I take slow steps towards him.
“Craig Patterson. Male. Fifty-eight years old. Chief of Police for Kingstone. The story to his colleagues is that he had a wealthy grandparent, but the reality is, he’s in with the higher ups of the Omnia. They pay him handsomely to ensure their operation remains undisturbed.”
The remaining colour in his face vanishes like a gradient, limbs trembling, and I wait for the moment this guy pisses himself.
His large, wild eyes search my face, and I do him the honour of removing the cap and glasses, watching the realisation take his breath away when the lightbulb goes off in his head.
“You’re a dead man walking!” he tries to snarl at me, but it comes out more like an adolescent male on the brink of his voice breaking.
My head cocks to the side. “Dead men don’t walk.”
The gun he didn’t realise I reached for whips out in a blur of black carbon, a bullet going into each of his kneecaps.
His cry is euphoric, firing my blood to boiling level as he collapses to the floor in a naked heap. I really didn’t need to shoot him, but my trigger finger got a bit itchy. I can’t trust myself not to beat the bastard to death, so I stay a couple inches away.
He’ll live long enough with his kneecap blown out, just might not be able to use the left one in a one-legged race anytime soon; it’s pissing with blood.
Rolling my eyes, I head towards the dresser, switching on the TV as I turn the volume up to max. “Not a very good Chief if you didn’t anticipate me reaching for a weapon. Too much time spent behind a desk?” I throw over my shoulder.
His whimpers are drowned out by the reality TV show filling the room, and I add, “What’s the deal with your little group of sociopaths?”
“Fuck you,” he spits, saliva dripping down his chin as his face almost reaches the same shade as the liquid leaking over his hands where he grips his injury.
“Not my type.” I put another bullet through his hand clutching his already fucked knee. He doesn’t even manage a scream, the pain taking his breath away.
Someone needs to take this damn gun off me.
“I don’t ask twice,” I growl.
“The…The Montgomerys…Th-They control everything.”
“Old information. Tell me something useful.”
His trembling hand hovers above his knee, blood crawling down his arm like ropes as he stares at it. “My fucking hand!”
I heave a breath. “Answer the fucking question, and I’ll maybe let you keep the other intact.”
“Barry K-Kensington…and his wife. Me. W-We’re in it too.”
The mention of them raises my hackles. “So you’ll know his sister-in-law?”
“What-t?”
I don’t answer him, just keep my expression vacant.
He goes silent, breathing harshly as the adrenaline rushes through his body. It breaks the patience my father taught me, and I send another bullet into his remaining hand. “Fuuuuck!”
“As much as I’m enjoying our time together, I have somewhere to be.”
“Yes! I f-fucking know her.”
“And do you remember what you did? How you spoke to her?”
I crouch down in front of him, watching the blood seep all over his once white shirt crumpled beneath him. “You made her out to be a liar. Her and her friend. You knew all along they were telling the truth. Even covered up their other friend’s fake murder.”
The first tear slips from his cheek, the convulsions threatening to take over as he struggles for a breath. Watching his suffering, the way the blood paints almost every inch of him red, eases the tension in my shoulders.
Just a little bit.
“I had to,” he hisses through spit, his dark eyes glaring nothing but utter loathing at me.
“Why?”
I know why. I just want to see how much information I can get out of him. “That’s…how it works. It’s my o-oath to them.”
My snicker is nothing short of morbid. “I don’t recall the police academy having that in their sign-up brochure.”
Patterson loses his own patience with me, spit flying from his mouth as he barks through his words. “It’s my blood oath. I took it after g-graduation. It’s passed down from generations. Louisa’s s-sister would have joined if she…”
A cold chill runs down my spine. “If she what?”
If this motherfucker says anything about her becoming one of their captives, I’ll pull his spinal cord out with my bare hands.
He doesn’t answer—not with speech.
The bastard laughs.
He rolls onto his back as he fights the pain, knocking the bedside table, causing the amber light to rattle a shadow spread across the wall.
My hand reaches for his neck, shaking him violently. “Fucking tell me!” I stick the barrel of the silencer into his groin in warning, but all his eyes do is roll, his skin looking extremely pale.
Fuck, he’s not dying, is he?
My gaze travels over his mutilated hands and knees, then the volume of blood pooling around him.
Motherfucker, I’ve hit a damn artery with the angle.
Oh well, I can still put a bow on his corpse.
I blow out a breath. Guess that means Barry needs to fill in the gaps for me.
I rise to my feet as Rex enters the room, and, deciding it’s not worth finding out how long it’ll take this prick to die, I fire one in his head without looking as Rex walks towards me.
He doesn’t even take notice of the dead body before me; it’s nothing he’s not seen before. It’s a tame death compared to the states we’ve left some in.
His voice is low, and it sends the hairs on the back of my neck standing. “We need to leave. Now.”
“Why?”
I turn to face him fully. He tilts his head backwards, sighing to the sky as two more of my people enter the room, a gas canister being pulled out of a suitcase.
I’m about to tell them to wrap the Chief in the rug instead so I can take him back, when Rex’s words stop me.
“You’re not going to fucking like this.”
A roar fills my ears as I watch his lips moving.
I stopped hearing his voice after he mentioned Indie got a text.
My heart feels like it’s malfunctioning.
She ran straight into a trap.
Right where the Omnia wants her.