Page 118 of Bad Men

The room was lit by a solitary lamp on a massive desk across the room. I stood in a clearing between a small sitting area and a tree in an enormous pot. Rows of books lined one wall on neat rows. The other half was a bar with colorful bottles lining glass shelves. I’d never been to Eduardo’s private office, but I guessed this was it.

I shifted closer, moving towards the desk with its clutter of papers, an open laptop, and a soft, leather chair turned away as if the owner had vacated it quickly. But it was the crystal decanter of amber liquid and half full glass next to the laptop that caught my eye.

Why would Eduardo leave for the night after he’d just poured himself a drink?

The skin at the back of my neck prickled. My gut, the thing I trusted above all else urged me to leave, but my brain had me drawing closer as if trying to make sense of the situation.

It was only when I was practically touching the edge of the desk that I noticed the hand. It rested comfortably on the armrest of the chair, the gold Rolex at its wrist glinting in the dull light. For a full beat of a second, my heart nearly stopped. I would have yelped if I hadn’t been a coldblooded killer. Instead, I used the barrel of my gun to nudge the chair around.

Eduardo Bernardo swung to face me. His head bobbed listlessly to the right with the momentum. He wore his usual dress shirt and trousers. Both still crisp but rolled at the sleeves and unbuttoned at the throat. It was the most casual I’d seen the man who took great pride in his looks. Yet none of that explained the blank stare in his eyes, or the upended bottle of pills next to his untouched drink.

“What the fuck?” I whispered to myself.

At a glance, the picture was pretty self-explanatory, but everything about it was wrong. Right down to the note keyed out on the laptop. The whole setup screamed staged; I’d done a few myself to recognize a fake.

“Tragic, isn’t it?”

My gun was up and aimed before the words were even finished being spoken. The figure in the doorway shifted a step closer, allowing the glow from the lamp to wash over them.

“You did this.”

Alejandro raised an eyebrow. “He did this,” he corrected smoothly. “It’s in his letter.”

“Bullshit.”

He didn’t respond, but remained comfortably in place, watching me.

“Why?” I snapped.

“Why what?” he countered, stoking my fury.

“Why did you kill him?”

That single brow arched once more. “Why would I?”

He was fucking with me.

“I am not taking the fall for this,” I told him, calculating the possibility that I would need to kill him.

“Why would you?” With zero hesitation to the fact that I had a gun pointed directly at his skull, Alejandro drifted over to the desk and stood over his master’s rotting body. “It was clearly a horrible tragedy. I’ve already contacted the police. They should be here shortly.” He reached over with hands encased in soft, black leather and turned the laptop over for me to see the screen. “Did you read it?”

I stared at the man, debating whether or not to ask if he was insane.

“No.”

“You should read it.”

I wasn’t stupid. I wasn’t taking my eyes off the fucker.

“Why don’t you tell me what it says since you wrote it.”

He didn’t bother denying it when he flipped the screen around once more. “Seems as though our leader has been battling his demons for a long time. It pains him that he has to hurt his family and loved ones this way, but he would see them all again soon.” Alejandro straightened and met my gaze squarely. “It seems he’s made you his successor.”

I’d been in the game long enough to know that wasn’t how it worked. There was a chain of command, an order of process. The rules might have been bent to allow me a chair at the table, but that wasn’t something that simply happened normally. It took years of loyalty and a large amount of money. Under normal circumstances, the spot should have gone to Joaquin after Cortez was cut off. But this, there was no way Eduardo would ever simply give me his throne. It was as likely as the man offing himself.

“Why would he do that?”

“Can we sit?” Alejandro took a step back, not to get away from the barrel of my gun, but to shift around me in the direction of the sitting area. “We have much to discuss and very little time.”

---