Page 70 of Brando

Lucky had meant to shoot Frank in the head and put us all out of our misery, but at the last minute, he deviated and shot him in the leg instead. Common sense prevailed. Not that we don’t all want to tear into the man, but unfinished business is just that. With Frank gone, we’d get no answers as to Maxine’s whereabouts. With Frank’s untimely demise, we wouldn’t have the closure we need to move on with our lives. So Lucky’s bullet had ripped through Frank’s leg instead, disabling him enough for Lucky to tackle him to the ground and subdue him. He was now in shackles in an old, dilapidated store that’s slated for demolition next week, and I couldn’t be happier at the thought of him suffering before he meets his maker.

“You need to mourn your sister,” Brando says, as we arrive at the store.

The reminder that my sister Sophia was today lowered into the ground guts me. She was just a baby. She hadn’t yet experienced all that life had to offer. Once she’d fallen victim to the horrors that Frank bestowed upon her, she’d never stood a chance of survival.

“This is me mourning,” I tell him, as I kick the door open and walk in, my heels clacking against the concrete slab. Every luxury, every fixture that once called this mall home has been stripped away until there’s only bare bones left of the building. Well, that and the rats.

“Wakey, wakey,” I call out in a sing song voice as I enter Frank’s current residence. His hands and feet are tied to a chair, and his head lolls against his chest, his greasy hair a mess. It’s amazing what the withdrawal of a few creature comforts can do to a person’s self-esteem. The stench of human waste in the small, confined room is overwhelming, but it’s nothing I can’t handle compared to what I’ve already been through. Uncle Mason follows us into the room, wrinkling his nose at the smell. His movements are awkward as he recovers from the gunshot wound that almost claimed him. I’m over the moon that he lived and he’s still with us, but sometimes I wonder about how sensitive his senses are. I shoot him a look that tells him to leave if he’s going to start complaining about the horrid smell.

Frank doesn’t lift his head when I call his name. I walk over and pick up the bucket that I know serves as his toilet, the one emitting the stench that could very well act as an atomic bomb. He’s given three toilet breaks a day, which is more that he allowed for the poor stolen souls he was trafficking, judging by the conditions in which they were found.

I lift the bucket and toss the contents at him, and he wakes with a start, taking in a shocked breath. He clears his eyes of the waste that settles there, then fixes me with his stony glare, his lips pursed in disapproval. I don’t think he received the memo that he’s in no position to be angry at me when I’m absolutely murderous toward him.

“I thought that would get your attention.”

“Fuck off,” he spits.

“You must really like it here,” I tell him. “Free five-star accommodation for days. Tell me, is this the sort of service you offered my sisters?”

“Piss off, Mia.”

Cocky bastard is confident I can only go so far with him. He knows he holds the key to me finding Maxine. He really doesn’t think it can get any worse than me tasering his leg for hours on end, or waterboarding him with his own shit. He really doesn’t think I have it in me to truly hurt him.

“Hose him down,” I say, over my shoulder.

One of the guards hauls a hose into the room and turns the water full blast, aiming it at Frank. He squirms against the chair, pushing back and forth on the legs, his desperation much the same as Sophia’s when he showed me the video of her going up for auction.

Brando is standing in a corner of the room, arms folded casually, an unwilling witness to my madness. Because sometimes, that’s where I feel I’ve descended. To the depths of madness that Frank created for me. Instead, he accompanies me out of a necessity to keep me safe, because he still doesn’t trust Frank, even when he’s tied down to a chair.

He warned me against my vengeance, telling me it wouldn’t allow me to sleep well at night, but what I don’t tell him is that I’ve slept like a baby every single night I’ve come to see Frank. His torture is my cleansing. He can never touch me again. He can never hurt us again. And even though I don’t know where Maxine is, I take comfort in knowing that he can no longer hurt her.

When the water is finally switched off, Frank lifts his head and spits in my direction, an act meant to display his total and utter derision toward me. I scoff in response, safe in the knowledge that I’m now the one holding the power between us.

“Look at me, Frank.” I pace the length of the room, back and forth in front of him, at times my eyes flicking toward Brando, who watches me from beneath half lidded eyes. “You see this dress I’m wearing?” It’s a knee length black wrap dress cut in a low v. I wasn’t prepared for a funeral and had to borrow it from Allegra. “This is the dress I wore to my sister’s funeral today.”

There is no emotion on his face as he continues to watch me.

“And these.” I stop in front of him and look down at my feet. “These are the heels that dug into the earth as I walked away from said funeral.” I swallow past the lump of emotion that strangles my throat. “Today was one of the hardest days of my life, the most painful.”

I squeeze my eyes shut as the image of my sister’s dead body on the morgue table assails me. I’d had to know why she died. With no visible wounds, I had to know what caused her untimely death. It wasn’t something I could live with, the not knowing.

Drug overdose.

Of all the things that had crossed my mind, that was not the answer I was expecting. Lucky had blamed himself, thinking the shock of the bullet he put in Frank had caused her to have a heart attack. He’d been inconsolable. But it had nothing to do with him. It was all Frank. He’d pumped her with so many drugs, her body had already started to shut down. It was only a matter of time before it did, and that time came at the warehouse, right in front of my eyes, where Frank could deliver maximum damage.

“I’ve hated you for so long,” I hiss, opening my eyes again. “You took everything from me. You stole my childhood, and then you took my sisters. What makes you think you have more of a right to live than they did?”

“I’m still here,” he scoffs. Too cocky.

“Not for long,” I tell him. “You see, I’ve decided that today is the day you die.” It’s the first flicker of emotion I see on his face as my words settle in the room, as though the final fatehas been written. “The same way you made your decisions, I’ve made mine. My sister’s funeral made me sad. But your funeral…that will bring me nothing but joy. I’m in the mood to be happy.”

“Bullshit.”

“You don’t think I have it in me, do you? You really believe I’m going to keep you alive until you tell me where Maxine is? When I know that as long as you are alive, you’re going to hold that over my head like a bargaining chip. You’re going to torture me with it, because that’s the kind of despicable animal you are.”

“You wouldn’t,” he hisses.

“Wouldn’t I?” I leave the suggestion hanging in the air between us. I nod to the guard and tell him to leave us, then I whisper to Mason, asking him to give us some privacy. He nods, his lips pursed tight, before he looks at Brando on his way out, a silent agreement passing between them. Uncle Mason trusts that Brando will keep my crazy in line.

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