Conquered by the Mafia Boss

There’s a moment of stunned silence and then their voices rise into laughter. It grates against my ears. I see myself reaching for necks and ripping them open with my bare hands.

“He knocked up the MC’s daughter!”

“Hey, that makes two of us.” Johnny’s face cracks with a smile and he leans forward, grasping my shoulder. “Congratulations, Jack.”

Congratulations.

The word slides over me like water on oil.

“I’m glad you took my advice and made her yours.”

I didn’t do it because you told me to, asshole.

The rest of them pat my back, and Sal gives me a look of concern. Whatever. The baby is far from my mind now. I want to find that fucking tattoo.

“We have a big arms deal with the Devils MC today. It’s our first business deal since this alliance, so let’s not fuck this up.”

* * *

There’s nothing but the distant, screeching sound of cars crumpling in on themselves. Piles of flattened multicolored metal surround us, insulating the noise. It’s the same place I buried that piece of shit nurse, and I wonder what he looks like right now. If his bones were ground to dust.

I’m backup, merely standing in the background in case something gets fucked up. Johnny doubled the number of soldiers for this deal. I guess the two-timing prick doesn’t trust the MC.

Crash or Flash or whatever his stupid name is stands in front of Fran? ois, negotiating. His long brown beard twists around his head, flipping in the breeze whistling through the metal parts.

One of the men beside me rolls up his sleeves. The sun bakes the backs of our necks.

“Sounds good.”

I catch the tail end of Fran? ois’s conversation with the biker. Adrenaline jolts through my veins and I whip my head when I see a flash, but it’s just the sun reflecting off a car hood. Damn it. It’s distracting. Hard to concentrate.

A crack splits the air and my jacket rips open at the shoulder, spraying blood.

I’ve been shot.

I barely register it before I dive under a heap of scrap metal. The outraged screams of my crew echo in the junkyard as a barrage of bullets smash into metal.

“CEASE FIRE!”

I whip around with my arm outstretched, gun aimed at that Crash motherfucker, but he holds up his hands, imploring us to stop. If it wasn’t them, who the fuck was it? The gunshot came from their side.

There’s movement to my right. The glare from a biker’s gun. I barely see him, hidden in the heap of junk above me. He aims right at my face.

CRACK!

His head whips back as I fire a well-aimed shot, and I don’t look to see him fall.

“What the FUCK!”

More gunshots thud in the heap I’m hiding behind, connecting sharply and glancing off. I’m going to fucking die hiding behind this thing.

A sear of pain slices down my neck, and liquid warmth blossoms over my skin. Fuck. At least it’s shallow.

They’re all above me. I aim a shot at another guy trying to take me out from above. I get him in the leg and he screams, then I pay attention to Fran? ois, who blasts Crash’s chest open with his shotgun.

I dive out from the scrap metal and launch myself toward the car as deadly zips thud into the ground. The scrape of a shoe-I clutch my gun and aim around the car, a hair trigger away from firing. Brian points his gun at me.

“Jesus!”

He takes a few seconds longer than me to lower his gun. I don’t like the attitude on his face. We have no fucking time for it.

“What the fuck is going on?”

He ducks behind the car with me. “They set us up.”

I glance once around the car, and a hole the size of my head blasts through the frame. Jesus. Blood trickles down and I think of her hair, tickling my neck. Beatrice. She’s alone at the house. All the things I said. Why did I have to be such an asshole? Why didn’t I tell her that having her around saved my life?

My shoulder throbs and the wound on my throat bleeds freely. The windshield shatters and bullets pepper the interior as Brian hurls himself over the hood and fires.Nôvel(D)ra/ma.Org exclusive © material.

Fuck this. We’re going to die.

Brain is blasted off his feet and lands on his back, his mouth exploding with color. Fuck! I rush to his side as a dark hole made in his jacket slowly smokes. He coughs up bright-red blood and his eyes roll back.

Jesus fuck.

I take the knife strapped to my ankle and I cut away his jacket and shirt, immediately covering the dark hole in his chest with my palm.

“Come on, you fuck!”

Goddamn it, he got shot in his arm, too. I cut away the jacket completely and roll up his sleeve.

And that fucking cornicello stares at me, right where she said it would be. Shock slowly runs through my body as Brian wheezes for air next to me. His limp hand searches for me. He was one of them. My body burns with white-hot rage.

I dig my thumb into his bullet wound and he opens his red-stained mouth in a wordless, bubbly cry.

“You piece of shit.”

“J-Jack! I can’t breathe!”

His lungs make a horrible wheezing sound. Fuck, I couldn’t ask for a better setup.

“You killed him, didn’t you? Who gave the order?”

But he can’t talk. He just inhales, making that rattling sound. Then I just reach over and pinch his nostrils shut. Brian tries to breathe through his mouth, but there’s too much blood. He weakly grasps my hand and bloodshot eyes beg me for forgiveness as I choke off his air supply.

Drowning in your own blood must fucking suck.

Blood-filled bubbles expel from Brian’s mouth. He gasps, the blood gurgling in his throat. Blue tinges his lips and capillaries burst in his eyes.