“The Bonadonna Sicilian Mafia are every bit as monstrous as I said. But then, I am also likely as monstrous as you imagine.” I chuckled mirthlessly, leaning against the doorway to Fee’s bedroom. “I’ve killed dozens of men. Never without reason, though you might not consider some of them worthy of death. I’ve spilled enough blood to make a red carpet that would flow through Buckingham Palace.
“In this case, I was awaiting an arms shipment in Blackpool. Guns. Grenades. Explosives. A shipment from the Morozov Bratva in St. Petersburg. When my people unloaded the first shipping container, it was full of people, not guns. Women. Children. A few men. All of them half-starved and too weak to put up a fight. Not all of them were alive.”
Fee’s hand paused from throwing another sweater in her backpack.
“The ship had been hijacked by a group of Albanians, the Kastrati Syndicate, who took my guns and reutilized the four shipping containers to hold stolen human beings. These containers are steel, designed to hold thousands of crates, or heavy equipment. They’re massive… you can imagine how many people they could hold. The Kastratis were working with the Bonadonna Mafia, who intended to intercept the ship before we could reach it.
“Fortunately, my men are alert, and always early. They found the Sicilians lying in wait. The fuckers were planning to ambush my people and then take the… the cargo.”
I’d seen and done so many terrible things in my life, enough that it always stunned me that I could still be horrified at the actions of others. I swallowed against the gorge rising in my throat. Fee hadn’t moved, her arm lifted as she clutched the sweater.
“There is a certain smell when human beings are crowded together. A pungency of shit and sweat. Despair and decomposition. It hits you like a blast furnace and even the strongest men will vomit. You can scrub your skin for hours and you will still smell of it, as if it had sunk into your soul. Sometimes, the prisoners will wail in terror. Though often, they’re utterly silent as if praying the shadow of death will pass them over. There was a little boy, still clinging to the hand of his dead mother. I found out she’d given her own scraps of food and water to her little one, trying to keep him alive just a bit longer.”
Fee made a small noise, as if a moan was fighting its way from her throat.
“I called in resources from everyone I could trust; Alastair’s people, the Doyle Mafia. The Corporation Syndicate in London sent in two passenger planes to gather as many as they could fit. It took thirty cargo vans to carry these people to multiple safe houses, where they could be cared for and new futures found.”
I chuckled mirthlessly, not wanting to look at her, not wanting to see her disgust. “We killed the Sicilians, of course. All of them. I only wish I’d had more time to make themtrulyregret their actions. But there was a flood of police headed our way by the time we got the captives out. Interpol, MI6, the local constabulary.
"We threw their bodies in a truck and took them to the nearest disposal option. My building site. They were buried in theconcrete footings, never to be seen again. Though… I suspect based on Lee Ville’s ability to convince the Bonadonna Mafia to join forces, they have been found.”
Sucking in a deep breath, I finally met her gaze. “I am not a good man. I break laws with impunity. But even I have a code. I keep my word. I don’t involve civilians. I bribe or spare law enforcement. And I don’t fucking sell human beings.”
Running my hand over my face, I pushed away the images of those people. Their terror, the stink of death. “Talking about one’s demons is not always a good idea. I would leave them undisturbed if I could. But these demons are raging now and you’ve seen them.”
Fee carefully put her sweater down before walking over to me. She didn’t speak, just held out her hand, waiting for me to take it. Her hand was calloused, like mine and warm. Lacing our fingers together, she led me over to the bed and pulled me down to sit with her.
Tucking a bit of her dark, glossy hair behind one ear, she looked up at me, her gaze clear and firm. Covering our linked fingers with her other hand, she said, “What do you want to do next?”
The last person I would want to see was the first one to show up at my house, pounding on the front door.
“Where the feck are ya, Davies!”
Fee sighed. “Did I mention I called Grandad?”
“Is he here to engage me in a round of good old Irish fisticuffs, or shoot me with his antique rifle?” I said, pulling on my pants.
Fee and I had spent the weekend in bed, between phone calls and plotting the demise of Leevil and the Sicilians. An example had to be made for the rest of the crime world. A big, bloody fucking example that was so decisive in its thoroughness that no one would ever think of the Davies Mafiaagain without involuntarily making the sign of the cross.
That Fee and her family would be avoided with the same caution afforded to a nuclear bomb would be guaranteed.
“Grandad, what do you think you’re doing with that pitchfork?” Fee was racing down the grand staircase, throwing on one of my dress shirts and getting the barest minimum of buttons done up for decency. “Put that down. And no, Kyle, you can’t shoot my Grandad!”
Pulling on a shirt and making sure my pants were zipped, I made it to the main hallway seconds after Fee.
“Fintan. Always a pleasure. Could you leave the farm implements by the door, please?”
Even for a man as… Irish as Fintan, his show of fury was impressive. “Ya think ya deserve less than being run through with a rusty pitchfork for puttin’ yourgéarchúisí,your disgusting hands on my Fee?”
“He’s breaking out the Irish, heisin a state,” she sighed.
“What if I told you that I’m about to make an honest woman of her?” I asked.
It was the wrong thing to say. With a roar, Fintan lifted the pitchfork, heading at me as I stepped to the left - his bad side, vision-wise - and disarmed him swiftly. “She’s too honest for the likes of you!”
“Grandad, hold off!” Fee snapped. “Come have a pint and let’s talk. I know you like Alec’s fancy ales, even if you pretend you don’t.”
By his third pint and a torrent of information from Fee and myself, Fintan’s countenance changed from fury to grief to outrage and to fury again, with his face so red that I was worried we’d talked him into cardiac arrest.
