The man writhing on the ground is an oddly blank canvas. No identifying tattoos, a white man with short, dark hair. Otherwise, unremarkable, and likely chosen for his ability to blend in.
“Do ya’ feel like a nice chat here or a very long, painful session back at one of our warehouses?” I ask pleasantly.
“There’s one five minutes from here,” Aria offers helpfully. “All concrete, you can hose the entire thing down if it gets messy.”
“Thank you, baby.” I kiss her as I step on the man’s bloody knee, ignoring his roar of pain. “Listen, lad, we’re on a bit of a schedule…” I shoot him in the right thigh, shattering his femur. “Let’s move this along, aye? Who sent ya’?”
“I’m not telling you shit,” he says between gritted teeth.
Crouching down next to him, I playfully tap him on the cheek with my pistol. Well, maybe not playfully because based on his groan, I shattered his cheekbone.
“You will tell me,” I promise, “how long it takes is up to you.”
“Three gun battles in two days?” Aria sighs. “This has to be some kind of a record.”
***
Cormac calls me that night as I’m heading back to the estate. I’m not liking their torture setup. I had to wash the blood off with a fecking hose because they dinna even have a shower there. No drains in the floor, no acid for dissolving the body…
Amateurs.
“Well, ya’ lazy bastard,” he greets me. “Are ya’ ever coming back home?”
I am home.
How do I explain that to my brother, much less my Chieftain?
Ariais home.
I’ll never leave Scotland for good, but she has to be here, at least for now.
“I hear you’ve had a hell of a week,” Cormac continues. “Three shootouts in two days are impressive, even for you.”
“It gets better,” I sigh, “I don’t think any of them are connected.”
The arsehole starts laughing. “You’ve managed to successfully piss off three crime groups this fast? You’re an overachiever, you are.” His tone changes. “I’m thinking I know one of them.”
“Petrov,” I say flatly.
“Aye, he was stompin’ and screamin’ up and down Europe all week before he returned to Moscow,” Cormac says, “tellin’ anyone who would listen that he’s gonna disembowel you and tie your wife up with your intestines before he rapes her. We’re gonna have to kill that fecker.”
“He touched my wife.” The fury that blinded me that night comes back and I can feel my temperature rise.
“Petrov is a problem because he’s not like your usual Pakhan,” he says, “he doesn’t care about his Bratva, he’s insane, but not in the usual, functional Russian way. He just wants to watch the world burn. He’s weakened his own organization enough that I was willing to sit back and watch him implode, but we must intervene. I’ve already called Maksim Morozov and the Turgenev Bratva. They’re willing to jump in.”
My gut twists as the pieces come together. “His group attacked the King estate; it all makes sense. His people got inside and went straight for the study where all the sensitive information is kept. They blew a feckin’ hole in the outside wall to get in.”
“If he did get into the King archives…” he hesitates, “how bad would it be?”
There’s no way to soften this. “The world would burn.”
“Let’s make a plan.” Cormac’s the strategist, the thinker. I’m more of a ‘jump in and see what happens’ sort. I need his skills now.
We discuss the options and speculate on the other two groups behind the attacks until I reach the King compound. I’ll always prefer our family’s place in Edinburgh, but this mansion, perched high on the cliff over the ocean is stunning. Even more so for the beautiful woman waiting inside for me.
Patch it - Scottish slang for stop whatever the hell you’re doing
Chapter Twenty-Seven
