Shade walks in front of me, facing Rip, and says, “Let’s make that canary sing, pres.”
Icer, as usual, grunts but as he does, he sends each member of the club a defiant glare, daring them to step out of line.
Indiana rolls his eyes and scowls. “Enough of y’all acting like spoiled blockheads. Y’all got beef, voice that later… or not since it’ll lead to you all getting your asses whooped.” His words are a clear warning to those who plan on disrespecting our leader,the man in charge who puts us above himself no matter how it affects his personal life.
I notice as each of them look ashamed at whatever path their thoughts went down. Then, one by one, they nod their head and uncoil their bodies. Now that the tension has been broken, and we’re unified once again, we walk into the room that Mr. Stratton is chained in and each one of us takes up a stationary position that circles him in an arc since his back is strapped to the wall.
Rip walks over to the corner, grabs the one chair in the room, drags it to the center, turns it backward, and straddles it. “Found your live stream, Professor. Our techie disabled it, put a virus in it so whomever tries to open the link will kill their computer. All of your hard work was for nothing. You lose this game of chess you’ve started. We are the Kings and you’re nothing more than a jester. Check mate, motherfucker.”
A smile quirks on my lips as Riptide antagonizes the jackass who held my woman prisoner because his mind got contorted on some make-believe people. Characters in a book that came from my old lady’s imagination. They never had blood flowing through their veins, they never took a first or last breath because they don’t exist—they never did and they never will. I don’t pretend to understand the way the human mind works, but there are some people who just aren’t born right, something is missing inside of them, and those are the individuals who need to be put down for the betterment of mankind.
“You think you’ve won,” Mr. Stratton laughs. “There are bigger fish in the pond that are coming after you. And trust me, you can’t beat these people. They caught wind of my fixation and pounced. They offered me things that you could only dream of if I made her disappear. They wanted you scrambling, and Iaccomplished that, didn’t I? For a minute there, your focus was on finding her and not paying attention to other things going on around you.”
“This fucker looks awful proud of himself, pres. I think we need to wipe that smirk off his face,” Indiana suggests, popping his knuckles. “I’d be happy to do it.”
“I think he’s talking too much smack, I’d be glad to remove his tongue from his mouth,” Shade offers.
Stepping forward, I say, “He looks a little too steady on those legs of his, I’d be willing to break both of his kneecaps.”
“His teeth are a little too pearly white, they’re blinding and offensive, I think they should be plucked from his mouth, one at a time. I have my pliers with me if you’d like me to take care of that,” Rebel volunteers.
A grin spreads on my face from one cheek to the other when a wet stain appears dead center of his jeans. “Look at that, gentlemen, the professor pissed his pants.”
“I’ll tell you whatever you want to know as long as you don’t touch me,” Mr. Stratton pleads.
“That’s the thing, professor, we don’t need you to. I told you we have a man that can figure all of that out for us, and for the most part, he has. We know you're in knee deep with the senator, her son, Patrick, and his butt buddy, Jerome. We know that once upon a time, you were a member of his gang. We know you’re nothing more than a pony boy, a sacrificial lamb who they sent to the slaughter.”
A lot of what he’s saying is news to me, something Booker must’ve recently discovered and shared with Riptide. “That thetext you received that had us rolling out?” I actually thought it was due to the police presence, but now things are starting to click and I know we don’t have to keep this fucker alive because we know all we need to.
“That and the fact that the five-o was getting hot and heavy,” Riptide answers. “And we had some unresolved business that needed taking care of.”
“No. Please don’t,” the professor begs.
“Did my woman beg? Did she plead with you not to touch her, to let her go? Did she ask for freedom you weren’t willing to give her because you’re a selfish, neurotic bastard?” I step closer to him, and shout, “Did she?”
“Yes,” he spits out, slobber tracking down his chin. “But I couldn’t let her go even if I wanted to! It was just going to be for a little bit, all she had to do was rewrite their book! Make it better, give her to the right man!”
“Who, professor? You? Do you honestly think you’re better for her than I am?” I ask, anger radiating from my entire being.
“Yes! You’re dangerous,” he accuses.
My entire body vibrates as I get in his face, our noses nearly touching, jabbing my finger into his chest, I ask, “And you’re not? You’re affiliated with a gang, motherfucker. I’m part of a club, a brotherhood. We may not be law-abiding citizens, but we’re honorable, we’d never put an innocent person in the path of war. We’d never use a woman as a pawn unless she steps up to us like she’s a man.”
Booker comes sprinting into the room, his eyes wide and freaked out. “End him. End him now! One of you do it, or I will.”
Something’s put a bug up his ass, but he never demands anything, and the fact that he is now has questions bouncing around in my head, but I’m not sure now is the time to ask them. Riptide must have come to the same conclusion as me because he lifts his gun and fires off a shot, the bullet connecting with Mr. Stratton’s skull, a dead shot between his eyes, and he does that without standing from his seat.
“What the fuck, Booker?” Pres asks, fury plastered on his face.
“Why are deaths so quick these days?” Shade complains. “We haven’t been able to play with our enemies lately.”
Riptide sends him a ‘shut it’ look and turns his attention back to Booker, asking, “What was that about, Book?”
“He’s an original. He started the Devils that are now the Dragons. He’s a founding member, he implanted a tracker into himself. They know we have him, Rip.”
Rip turns to Icer and commands, “Burn him.” Icer unlocks his shackles and the two of them take him through the underground tunnels that lead to the incendiary. Once they make it through the doors, a few of the others grab our cleaning supplies, the water hose, and get to work sanitizing the room so no traces of the professor’s DNA is left behind.
“How much trouble are we in here, Booker?” I ask, my mind already gearing up for a battle.
