Page 85 of Princes of Carnage

I hear his words, and logically, they make sense. But it’s hard to process them in this moment as I stare down at the lifeless forms of three of my people. None of them were much older than me, and all of them trusted me to lead them. To keep them safe. Fuck, they were even doing what I asked them to do, burying the hatchet with a member of Carnage and putting old grudges aside.

And look where it got them.

“Whoever did it must’ve cornered them in this alley,” I say, barely recognizing my own voice. “Jeremiah probably called you when he realized they were about to be pinned down.”

Nico nods, crouching down next to the body of his crew member and picking up the gun that’s held loosely in the man’s grip. Then he makes a low noise in his throat.

“What the fuck?”

Something in his tone sets off alarm bells in my mind, and I crouch beside him. “What is it?”

“Look.”

He jerks his chin toward Jeremiah’s face, and now that I’m closer, I see it in the dim light. There’s a dark round hole directly in the middle of Jeremiah’s forehead—a bullet wound. But what’s below that is even worse. His mouth has been cut open on each side, giving him a twisted, macabre smile.

My skin prickles as I look more closely at the faces of my people, realizing that all three of them bear the same marks. A bullet hole dead center in their forehead, and gashes on either side of their mouths.

“What the hell is this?” I whisper. “Why?”

“I don’t know.” Nico shakes his head, his gaze darting around the alley again as Killian and Atlas stand protectively over us. “But none of this was an accident. I might’ve been wrong. They might not have even all been killed here. But they were left here for us to find.”

I swallow hard against the metallic taste rising in my throat. It’s a dangerous thing, being in a gang, and every one of them knew that. But this? This was senseless. This was a kill just for the sake of killing.

To spread fear.

To send a message.

And it fucking worked.

“We need to get the bodies out of here,” I say, licking my lips. The stench of the alley is mingling with the sharp scent of blood in the air, and it roils my stomach. “Before the cops show up. And we’ll need to have people sweep the area. Maybe the attacker left something behind this time.”

Even as I speak, though, I already know that it probably didn’t happen. We haven’t been lucky before, and there’s no reason to think this time will be any different.

My people are tough, and so are Nico’s. They’re scrappy as fuck, good fighters, and they don’t shy away from violence. But all of them learned to fight and handle a weapon on the streets, picking those skills up as necessity demanded. They don’t have formal training or anywhere near the kind of deadly expertise that whoever is after us seems to possess.

The precision of the bullet wounds and the gashes by their mouths are a whole different level.

It makes me feel like they were hunted—like we’re all being hunted—and that thought makes agitation crawl through my veins.

Atlas and Killian keep scoping out the area as they stand sentry, providing lookout for Nico and I as we call backup. Several Enigma members arrive less than ten minutes later, and a few Carnage men show up shortly after that.

I can hear the muffled responses of my people as they catch sight of the bodies. A death of one of their own would be shocking enough, but this is multiple bodies, efficiently killed and brutally marked, and I can tell it’s sending ripples of unease through them.

Keeping my voice as calm and steady as possible, I give instructions on what to do, telling them to gather the bodies so that we can deal with them privately.

Several people fan out, searching for any evidence left behind by the attacker or any sign of where he went, but as I predicted, they don’t find anything.

Everyone looks freaked out and frustrated by the time they gather around me again near the mouth of the alley. They’re looking to me for guidance, I know, but for a moment, I feel at a loss for words. What the fuck am I supposed to say that will make any of this better?

“From now on, no one goes anywhere alone,” I tell them. “I know that safety in numbers didn’t really work out tonight, but it’s better than anyone being caught on their own. Make sure every team that goes out is prepared and knows not to let their guard down.”

There’s a murmur of agreement from the people around me, and I can hear Nico giving similar orders to his crew, telling them to stick together and be safe.

Honestly, it all feels like empty words. This should have been safe. None of the men who died tonight were pushovers. They were all people I would have trusted to have my back in a fight. But it didn’t help save them.

That thought makes fury churn in my gut.

This is an escalation. There’s no fucking doubt about that. It wasn’t an attack on our business interests, not our enemy trying to steal money or weapons or anything like that. It was a straight up attack on us, and it’s starting to feel like someone is fucking with us. Toying with us.

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