Page 5 of Ruthless Commander
And the ones who betrayed him in the end.
I strode back to the car, lifted him out of the back seat, carried him inside into the tiny room we'd shared as kids, and laid him down on the mattress. There were holes in the walls. Holes the size of a man’s fist, and I didn’t need an explanation to know whose they were.
I strode back out to the car, hauled my packs inside, and kicked the door closed behind me. The small amount of medical supplies I carried was more than the goddamn prison had had. I yanked my ration packs out, then carried my first aid kit into the bedroom and hit the lights.
The weak glow spilled across his body. Jesus, he looked even worse now than he did before. I bent beside him and lifted his shirt, then I froze. Hard breaths consumed me. He was a fucking mess. Crisscrossed knife wounds up his side…it looked like they took a whip to his back. I was betting it hadn’t been just the inmates, either…no…it wasn’t just them, not at first.
The moment the news of his arrest reached me, I'd sent word to the prison. But by then, it’d been too late, too late to stop my brother from talking. Some burn marks were still blistered, some already scarring in savage, angry welts. I lifted my gaze to his closed eyes and then eased his shirt from his body and set to work on the wounds.
The knife marks were the worst. One was deep…too deep. I winced, then cleaned what I could and prayed there was nothing internally severed, not that that doctor gave a shit. By the time I peeled free the filthy rags that covered his wounds and cleaned them all with peroxide, I eased down onto the floor.
My stomach howled with hunger, but the thought of eating made me sick…
Instead, I leaned against the bed, watching the slow and steady rise of little brother’s chest. “Why the fuck didn’t you listen to me, Edon? Why the fuck didn’t you take my goddamn side?”
If he had, he wouldn’t be here.
If he had, he wouldn’t be so close to goddamn death.
I clenched my fists, my arms resting on my knees, and thought of them.
Laughing…
Joking…
Thinking they'd gotten away with it all.
But they hadn’t. I slowly climbed to my feet and strode out of the room. My packs were open on the makeshift table. Metal gleamed from medals I’d never wear. I couldn’t care less about the goddamn pretense. I cared about two things…getting him out alive…then revenge.
I stepped closer, reached inside the pack, and drew out my gun. Slipping it into the waistband at the small of my back, I pulled out a clean black t-shirt and slipped it on. A glance over my shoulder at the light that spilled through the doorway of my room, and I turned back.
Edon was safe…for now.
But I knew the men he calledbrothers.
I knew that one day, when my brother was least expecting it, they’d come.
After all, he was a liability. Loose lips and all that.
I turned back to the bedroom and flipped off the light, and when I left the house…I left it in darkness.
They’d come alright.
But not if I came for them first.
3
Mateo
The car started with a splutter, but this time I didn’t reach for the lights. Instead, I backed out of my driveway and nosed the car toward town with only the soft spill of the moon to guide me. Davol and his posse had become famous, no longer the street kids who bullied and stole. They'd upgraded their reputations into guns for hire and drug runners that traveled across the country.
No one touched them.
Not while the Besnik Organization paid their bills. Those men controlled the money and the drugs and paid men like Davol handsomely.Mafia…that’s basically what it was. I knew who they were and what reach they held. But it didn’t matter, we’d be long gone before they figured out it was me.
I pulled the car down a darkened street and parked behind a set of dumpsters at the back of a row of houses. A nightjar let out a call as I climbed out of the car and quietly eased the door closed. A kid’s wooden baseball bat and glove sat beside the dumpster. I grabbed the bat's handle, taking it with me as I walked, heading to where thethud…thud…thud…of music echoed from a house further down the street.
Mafia.
