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"What do you mean he got arrested?!"
The young man flinched.
"You're telling me that he got caught?!"
The young man flinched again. "Yes, sir. He couldn't get away. The police apprehended him this morning."
"And you saw this with your own eyes?"
The man nodded. "Yes, Mr. Collins. I was watching from a distance."
"You were hiding."
"Well, there was nothing I could do in the situation and..."
"Do not make excuses, give me the facts."
The young man swallowed. "Yes, I was hiding in the alleyway."
Coke Collins fell back onto his chair and sighed, rubbing his thumb along the scar over his left eye. "Five years... He kept outta jail for five years, and now..."
"Sir, since the Boss is now incarcerated, as his second-in-command, you are now the gang leader."
Coke glared at his subordinate. "Yes, I realize that, thank you."
The man looked at the floor. "Sorry."
"Well, sorry doesn't change the facts, now does it? Sorry doesn't get the Boss outta jail, now does it? Sorry doesn't keep me from turning you over to the Sabers right now, now does it?"
The man blanched. "N-no, sir."
Coke groaned. "Carlos!" he barked. A Hispanic man, maybe in his mid-twenties, poked his head into the room. "Carlos, get this moron out of my sight."
Carlos nodded and strode into the room. He put a hand on the quaking man's shoulder and dragged him through the doorway.
"It's so hard to get good help these days, Coke."
Coke smiled and held his hand out.
A young woman stepped out of the shadows. Her long red hair was pulled back into a form of chignon, exposing a dark tattoo on her neck. Coke had never been close enough to see what it said, and she normally kept it hidden.
"Nikita," he said, eyeing the assault rifle on her back. "You know the penalty for calling me by name."
"Please. You can't get rid of me at this point."
Coke shook his head. "Fine. You're an important asset. Were you successful?"
"Have I ever failed a mission?" she asked, cocking her hip to the side.
"Fair enough. Well, I guess you've done enough work for today. Feel free to stay, or you can go home. Whatever."
Nikita grinned. "Thank you," she curtsied, "Sir." And with that, she turned and marched confidently out of the room.
Shaking his head slowly, Coke rubbed his hand over the scar. It throbbed, like it always did when he was stressed.
He slumped down in his chair. Well, chair was a loose term; it was more like a throne, fabricated out of countless firearms, splaying fan-like behind his head.
"Diego!" Coke snarled, pounding his fist on the table. "Diego, send out the messengers. The Boss is in the slammer. Let the Sabers know who's in charge now."
"Who in the name of Lady Liberty are you?"
Cobalt's face flushed. "Sir, my name is Cobalt Grayson. I'm in the poisons department."
The man standing before him grunted. "Oh, yeah, I remember you. You were the kid who cut up Coke Collins. You got the prosthetic, don't you?"
"I prefer to keep that part quiet, sir. My own fiancee doesn't even know I have it."
"Fiancee, you say?" The middle-aged gang boss stroked his chin thoughtfully.
The blue-haired twenty-something-year-old nodded. "That's what I wanted to talk to you about, sir. Soon, I'd like to take a few days' leave, for the wedding and a short honeymoon."
"When you planning on getting hitched?"
"Azael and I still have many details to go over, so it will most likely be in about six months."
The crime boss waved his hand, dismissing the boy. "Yes, yes, fine." Cobalt turned to leave. "One other thing, boy. The Mott Haven crew?"
Cobalt's attention snapped back to the gang leader. "What about them?" he barked, blood rushing to his head, causing the room to tilt.
The Mott Haven Murderers were responsible for his mother's death, and the deaths of countless other innocent people.
"Their Boss, Julian West, was incarcerated last night. One of our boys met with one of their messengers last night."
"And?" Cobalt asked warily.
The man in front of him tossed a bloody object to the ground. Cobalt bent down to inspect it, bile rising in his throat as he worked out what it was.
A man's severed middle finger.
Cobalt knew that this was all that was left of the Burning Sabers man.
He glanced back up at his boss, realization spreading across his features.
"Coke says hi."
"Nikita, how was work today?"
The red-haired girl tossed her duffel bag onto the Egyptian cotton sheets that enveloped the hotel bed.
"Sawyer. I thought you'd gone home?"
"Mum and Da weren't too pleased to see me, so they put me on the first plane back over, and here I am!"
Nikita flopped into the gilt chair in the corner of the hotel room. She'd been living in the Ritz-Carlton ever since her boss had given her the assignment of a lifetime.
"Sawyer, you can't keep coming to me when your life goes south."
The black-haired, green-eyed, British boy flashed her a perfect smile. "I prefer to think that you keep my life from going south."
Nikita rolled her eyes. "Oh, please."
"Anyways, you never answered my question. How was work?"
Nikita glanced up through her lashes at the boy sprawled out on her bed. His long black hair was pulled into a ponytail, with his side bangs swept over his right eye.
Nikita raised her eyebrow. "The tattoo is new," she commented. Sawyer raised a hand to his cheek.
"Bangs don't cover it, do they?" he muttered. He pulled his hand away and threw himself off the bed, falling dramatically across the vanity. Observing himself in the mirror, he swiped his bangs behind his ear, gently touching the area around the tattoo. "Come on, Nikkie Love, it doesn't look that bad, does it?"
"It's a QR code."
"It's a trend!"
"Is the crop top a trend as well? Or is that just the crazy part of Sawyer talking?"
Sawyer glanced down at his exposed torso, wrapping his arms around his bare stomach.
"Look, Nikkie, now you've made me self-conscious."
Nikita burst out laughing. "Sawyer, you are an amazing specimen."
Sawyer smiled, eyes wandering across the room to the door. Nikita followed his gaze. A package sat on a plush stool, leaned up against the wall.
"What's that?"
Sawyer shrugged. "I dunno. Some bloke dropped it off while you were at work. Said it was urgent. I told him you were at work, and he kept bugging me until I shut the door in his face. I thought the man was going to break the door down, but hotel security took him away."
"Huh. Well, let's open it, shall we?"
She slid off the chair and strode over to the package. She lifted it and shook it gently. Something rattled inside. She reached into her duffel bag and pulled out a Bowie knife. Sawyer's eyes widened.
"Isn't that a bit overkill, Nikkie Love?"
Ignoring him, Nikita sliced open the tape that held the box closed. Unfolding the cardboard flaps, she reached in and pulled out several stacks of money, along with a note.
"'Nikita,'" she read aloud, "'I know that I gave you the rest of the day off, but, if it's not too much trouble, I'd like your help with something. A few years back, several members of the gang were killed by the Burning Sabers. It was a strike team that got us. They fled after a few of them were killed. One boy stayed back and fought the last-standing Murderer. He was shot in the leg, after he shot the Murderer in the arm, and cut up his face. He ran away soon after.
"'The Murderer he shot was me. The Saber who did it was Cobalt Grayson, and I want him dead. As you can see, you've already been compensated for your trouble.
"'Yours, Coke Collins.'"
Nikita laid the letter down on the vanity. Sawyer scratched his chin. "Is that from the guy you're s'posed to be killing?"
Nikita nodded. "Yeah, but the boss gave me as much time as I needed for that guy. Cobalt's an instant payoff. I'll get him quick."
Sawyer shrugged. "Alright, but the sooner you get Coke, the sooner you're out of the Mafia, Nikkie Love."
"WHAT DO YOU MEAN, YOU GOT A DEATH THREAT?"
"Honey, it's fine-"
"No, Cobalt, it's not! Here we are, planning our wedding, and you get threatened by the Murderers!" The redhead wrung her hands in desperation. "This is not cool, Cobalt."
The blue-haired boy wrapped his hands around the girl. "Az, we're gonna be fine. The Boss put an APB out for Coke, and he promised us a safe place to stay, and even have the wedding if it comes down to that."
Azael buried her face in Cobalt's chest. "If you die before our wedding, I will kill you."
Cobalt kissed the top of her head. "Don't worry 'bout me, Azzy."
She smiled up at him, slowly pulling away. She glanced over his shoulder at a smear of black blurring against the gray of the warehouse walls. "Coby, there's someone here."
Cobalt spun around, spotting the fleeing figure just before it disappeared behind a stack of boxes. Azael dashed after the blur, leaving Cobalt standing in the empty center of the space.
"Hey, get back here!" Azael yelled. She cornered the stranger behind the latest shipment of AK-47s. The boy, obviously a boy now that she could see him, cowered behind his arms. She reached down and grabbed his collar.
"Please, don't hurt me!"
Azael rolled her eyes as Cobalt came up behind her.
"Who is it?" he asked.
"Just some street shrimp," she responded. "Can't be more than twelve."
"Recruit potential?"
"Depends," Azael huffed. "Kid, do you know how to shoot?"
The quivering boy nodded.
"You got a gun?"
He nodded again.
"Take it out, shoot out that light," she commanded.
The boy pulled out a 9mm. Ruger, almost certainly stolen from a gutter, or even a body. His lips trembled but his hands stayed steady as he aligned the industrial lighting fixture in his sights. He squeezed the trigger and a shower of sparks rained down on the trio's heads.
Azael clapped a hand on the young boy's back. "Welcome to the Sabers, kid."
280Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡXcTUe11pei
