Page 3 of Wicked Rivals

The situation would get messy, yes, and it would take a little more effort on my part to get what I wanted, but using the brass didn’t run the risk of hitting an artery or slipping between a few ribs if I got a little overzealous.

After all, this kind of work was for patient men. While I rarely had an issue with patience, that morning had made me question how much I could spare.

This specific set of shiny brass had been made for my dead older brother, the man born to lead this family. But at some point, I had grown into them, and now they fit me perfectly.

My mother would have gone on about it if she were still alive and could see me now, some bullshit about it being a sign I had grown into my fate.

She would say it proved that running the family business was the life I was meant to lead, that it was God’s plan all along for me to stay and fulfill my destiny as the head of the family.

Instead of leaving it all behind as I had planned.

I tried not to listen to her voice as it echoed through my head, because her words no longer mattered.

When I conducted interrogations and worked in the cellar, I lost my humanity, left it waiting for me at the top of the stairs.

Any thoughts about the life I had wanted, about the woman who left me, about the family taken from me—it all disappeared in the cellar.

Only the monster remained.

Rolling back my shoulders, I stepped in closer to Mark and his mess of a face.

“You sure there’s nothing you want to tell me?”

“Go to hell,” he repeated.

I bet he thought he was brave. He wasn’t. He was stupid.

I nodded. “I’ll see you there in due time.”

Then I threw an uppercut into his ribs, followed by a striking jab into the exact same spot. The chains rattled, his body sagged, and he coughed up more blood than the last time.

“What happens next is up to you,” I said, stepping back to collect my breath. “Just a few of the right words, Mark, and then your pain will end.”

“If I tell you anything,” he panted, “they’ll kill me.”

A stream of blood trickled from the corner of his mouth.

I let out a low, dark chuckle—a pale imitation of my father.

“I think you know you’re dead either way. We both know what happens after this, Mark, and it doesn’t include you walking out of here. If I were you, I would put more thought into how fucking painful you want your last minutes to be.

“And it will be painful if I don’t get what I want. Or you can accept what you can control and finish this with at least a little dignity. So what do you say, Mark?”

The man glared at me through his swollen lids.

“I say if I’m dead either way, why tell you a damn thing?”

I stepped in again, looming close enough to smell the hot stink of his breath, grabbed a fistful of his sweat-drenched hair and jerked his head back, giving him no choice but to look me in the eye.

“Because if you tell me what I want to know, I won’t hunt down your family and kill them too,” I said.

His eyes got wider.

“I… I don’t have a family.”

“Really? Because when I found out you were spying on me and lying to my men, I didn’t only have them drag you down here. You should know better than that.

“No, I had them follow you for a week. And now I know about your girl living in Queens. I know about her child, the one with your dark curls and your brown eyes.”

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