Page 6 of The Midnight Delivery

I looked at my uncle whose skin had become like ash. “Why? What’s he to you?”

“Nothing,” Tony answered with a shrug. “But to you? He’s a message.”

Time slowed as I watched Tony pull the trigger. The miniature explosion, the bullet screaming through the air, the blood splatter as it entered the chest of my uncle, and the force of the gunshot pushing him back and down to the ground. I watched it all at what appeared to be a quarter of the normal speed we humans travel through life at. I wanted to scream, I wanted to run out of the room, but mostly I wanted to rush over to Tony and rip his eyes right out of their sockets. I wanted to do anything other than stand as I was, frozen with my hands covering my mouth.

Tony walked over to the area where my uncle moaned behind the desk, as if he didn’t have a care in the world, and pointed the gun again.

“Ari...”

As Tony squeezed off another round into AJ’s body, I found myself wondering what kind of look was on Alejandro’s face, and what made him call to me as he faced his death? Was it a look of terror? Was he at peace? I didn’t know, because I couldn’t bring myself to follow. But the gurgle that came from him as his final sound chilled me to my very core and made me curse the day my name was first uttered in relation to me.

I knew I should be afraid of him, as Tony rotated his head around his shoulders and moved to a couple of inches in front of my face. Logic dictated that I should feel the intense fear of someone who’d just witnessed a man murder another in cold blood. But the coolness coursing through my veins from Alejandro’s last breath morphed into a raging inferno. Alejandro didn’t have a good relationship with us, and he was by no means a father figure, but he was family and we take care of our own. Tony and I were face to face and the words escaped my mouth before my brain could register what I’d said. “You’re going to pay for that.”

“No,” he said with a chuckle. “You’regoing to pay. You’re going to pay me, with that prize money.” He waved his weapon towards where my uncle lay, and at the blood splatter as it dripped from various points on the walls. “I get every dime of that million dollars, or you’re going towishfor me to finish you as quickly as I did your uncle here.”

I curled my fingers into tight curls and pressed my lips. Saying anything further would enflame this situation further, and I was in no position to respond.

Tony tilted his head to the side and raised an eyebrow before the corners of his mouth eased up in a creepy smile. “Defiant to the last, huh?” His tone was a taunting one. He stepped in closer and placed his mouth right beside my ear. “I can’t touch you now, per our agreement,” he snickered.

When he moved his head beside mine, I focused on a spot of blood on the opposite wall and stared over his shoulder. I didn’t move as the heat from the gun barrel traveled up my arm at an agonizing pace. He was fucking me in his mind, but I was determined not to give him the satisfaction of showing any response. The bloodstain on the wall was the only thing in my world at the moment.

“But,” he continued. “If you don’t pay me, and I meanright afteryour brother wins, I’m going to kill him, then I’m going to ass fuck you, Ariana. Over, and over again until I feel like I’ve got my money back.”

Tony stepped back and hardened his face. “Then, I’m going to killyou. Hell, you’re so beautiful, I might just fuck you again after I put a bullet in your motherfucking brain.”

He snorted, spun on his heels, waved his gun in the air, and walked to the door. “Right after, Ariana,” he repeated as he took his leave. “Or your ass is mine. Literally.”

ROUND THREE

I’d spent the entiretrip back to the hotel wringing my hands. They wouldn’t stop shaking, no matter how hard I rubbed them. My phone buzzed in my pocket, letting me know of notifications I should look at, but all I could think about was AJ falling over the chair and to the ground. The only sound in my ears was his death rattle as he gasped his last breath and called out my name. The only thing I could see was Tony as he walked out the room, waving his gun as if he already owned me and was able to inflict any manner of torture he wanted to. The sick fuck. If Dustin didn’t win this fight, I would be at the mercy of a horrible man with nowhere to run and no one to turn to for help.

I felt horrible for leaving AJ like that. Even though we weren’t close, no one deserves to go out of this world the way he did. A pawn in a deadly game of chess. I couldn’t call the police, as they would have questions I wasn’t ready to provide answers to. In the morning, someone would discover him and make arrangements. I had to settle my nerves, and find a way out of this mess.

I paid what I owed to the driver as he let me out in front of our hotel and walked to the room. He’d attempted to flirt with me when I entered his car, and any other time I might have engaged with him, but not now. I don’t remember how much money I gave him, as I was too occupied with the night’s events to get caught up in the minutiae of the things going on around me. I was so weighed down with everything that I didn’t hear the moans coming from behind the door before I entered the room. It wasn’t until I came face to face with the horrified look on some random bitch’s face as my brother was mounting her from the back that I snapped back to the present reality.

My blood boiled. “Are you serious?!”

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