Amber to Ashes (The Torn Heart #1) (48 page)

As the video begins, it takes me a second to recognize my own voice calling out, “
Cindy Lewis, Four eighty-
three Culvert Road, apartment B, Matoaka, West Virginia, two four seven three six
.”

I blink, confused as shit, as both Ryder and I come into focus. “
Repeat what he said
,” Ryder chimes in, clenching the whore’s hair.
“Now.”

“
Cin-Cindy Lewis
,” she cries, her body shaking, “
Fo
 . . .
four eighty-three Culvert Road, apartment B, Matoaka, West Virginia,
two four seven three six
.”

“
Very good, Cindy. You wanna live?
” Ryder questions.
“Wanna wake up to your kid tomorrow? See him grow up?”

Continuing to cry, the chick nods but doesn’t say a word.

“
Answer me!
” Ryder spits, his voice going hoarse as the back of his hand connects with her cheek. She stumbles into the wall, but Ryder catches her before she hits the ground, pulling her to his chest.
“Don’t just fucking nod!
This is serious! Do. You. Want. To. Live?”

“
Yes
!
” she sobs, her unclothed body falling against his.
“I want to live!”

This is a video from Dom’s warehouse. But how did the whore, who left before us, get it? More so, how the fuck is it even in her possession when Ryder
swore
he cleared everything from Dom’s office?

Before I can dwell on my unanswered questions, the video transitions to a darkened hallway, the claustrophobically narrow space strewn with boxes, clothing, books, and empty Chinese takeout containers, I’m convinced I’m watching the worst-ever episode of
Hoarders
. A deep, annoyed whisper breaks me from my reverie, my eyes landing on a hooded figure leading the cameraman through the less-than-stellar living conditions. The silence is deafening, my whole world reduced to what’s happening on the video as the pair makes it down the hall to their final destination, stopping in front of a partially closed door. Seconds decrease to milliseconds, my heartbeat lasts a lifetime as they slip into a dimly lit bedroom. Save for an aged dresser, the space is relatively empty—a twin mattress centered dead in the middle of the room, additional heaps of dirty laundry haphazardly tossed across a multistained brown carpet.

I direct my attention to the bed where the hooded figure is standing above it, a sleeping body blissfully unaware of the evil presence. Without a word, the hooded intruder lifts his hand, displaying for the
first time a pistol and—lacking even a second’s hesitation—fires three shots into the huddled mass on the bed. I shoot to standing, adrenaline causing my fists to clench of their own accord as my focus remains locked on the screen. Soon after the gunshots, a child’s scream reverberates in the near distance, his fear palpable. The gunman methodically moves toward the sound of the child’s crying, his ogre-like stature barely fitting through the doorway. As the monster disappears into the hallway, the cameraman pans in on the bloody, unmoving mass on the bed, revealing an all-too-familiar face: Cindy Lewis, 483 Culvert Road, Apartment B, Matoaka, West Virginia, 24736.

My jaw hits the floor as her kid’s cries increase, my need to stop what the psychopath’s inevitably about to do to him unleashing fury across my skin with every nerve catapulting to life in my body. Helpless to do a fucking thing, I yell out into space, swinging my fists at a phantom recipient, sweat spilling from my pores as the chatter of the universe eats away at my pleas. Silence, long and menacing, chills me down to my bones before one final shot splices through the air, the child’s tiny cries fading into nothing as the bloodcurdling sound of his last, mangled breath pierces me straight to the hollow of my soul. A ball of grief tightens my chest, its potency wiping out the strength from my muscles, as I watch, tears hindering my vision, the cameraman produce a small canister of gasoline. An entertained chuckle strums from his mouth as he drenches Cindy’s bed in the hazardous liquid, a calculated strike of a match following the premeditated movement. Flames scream through the room, the screen shaking in sync with the cameraman’s quickened footsteps as he and the hooded figure bolt out of the apartment.

The picture fades to black and I slump onto the couch, mentally disturbed beyond repair from what I’ve witnessed. From what I know will consume my every waking thought. I’ve seen the destruction man can do, experienced its brutality firsthand. But there’s no doubt in my mind that this heinous crime, this horrifying, inhumane act of cru
elty done to a mother and her child, trumps it all. Visions of Cindy’s unsuspecting face, the wretched sound of her innocent kid’s screams, will forever haunt the rest of my days spent on the gutless spine of this earth, the core of who I am stained by the vileness of humanity as a whole.

As the video restarts, my gaze widens on the mayhem unfolding before me. Hordes of families jumping from second-story windows, a father shielding his newborn daughter from a tidal wave of flames, and an array of household pets littering the streets blackens my line of sight. Limbs frozen, I watch a block of suburban row houses melt away into a skeleton of what they once were, the memories held within them spurring into the air in the form of ashes.

Shot taken from afar, the cameraman zooms in on the frenzied neighborhood below, laughter mixing with the howling screams from women and children. Blocking out stars for miles, flames lick the angry sky red, towers of smoke billowing into the frigid night air as though the devil’s fingers were reaching up from hell, painting the small town with his fury.

Helpless onlookers cry out as fire engines, cops, and EMTs descend upon the scene. Another cut to black and I’m left speechless as I bury my face between my hands in an attempt to keep myself from hurling. It’s no use as my stomach gives out. Knees hitting the carpet, I hunch over a wrought iron magazine rack and upchuck this morning’s breakfast onto a stack of
Playboy
s, my body continuing to shake as I compose myself.

After a few seconds of blank white screen, the video begins again, my heart lurching up my parched throat as I glimpse Derick, Dom’s older brother, sitting at his desk. Calmly smoking a cigarette, an emotionless stare pinned onto his half-skeletal-tattooed face, Derick looks into the video camera, his deadened eyes crinkling at the corners as he screws his mouth into a slow sneer. Transfixed on the devil before me, I barely notice a woman massaging his shoulders, only her slen
der hands visible as Derick lifts a snifter of pale brown liquid to his mouth.

“Goddamn, I fucking love this shit!” Derick slams the empty glass onto the desk, his expression contorted with equal parts disgust and delight as another pair of female hands appears, refilling his snifter with Jack Daniel’s. “But I’m not making this video to tell ya how much I love me some whiskey, Brock.” A sardonic smile spreads his lips as he nods his head toward the doorway, dismissing the woman behind him. She, along with the second chick, obeys his unspoken command, the door clicking closed with their departure as he chuckles. “Of course I’m not.” Sobering, his eyes darken as he leans forward, resting his elbows on the desk. “But I’m pretty damn sure you figured that much out by now. Even if you are a fucking murderer, a coldhearted pig like me, I’m sure your IQ is capable of registering what exactly the purpose of this home movie is.”

Without pulling his attention from the camera, Derick takes a long drag from his cigarette, followed by a quick swallow of his drink, his voice eerily calm as he relaxes back into his chair. “Though I have to give ya credit for one thing, Cunningham. You were right when ya said the whore should’ve been disposed of. After ya killed my brother you remembered the cardinal rule for when the shit hits the fan for us dealers. Never. Leave. A. Loose. End.”

Out of nowhere, he explodes, all calm forgotten as he jumps to his feet. “
Ever
, motherfucker! You never leave a witness alive! But you did and
I
had to clean up
your
mess, had to make sure the little cunt didn’t spill details about what’d happened
or
the empire I run! You should’ve shoved your gun up her diseased pussy and made her pay for being there!”

As though he didn’t trip the fuck out, he calmly reclaims his seat and takes a casual sip of his drink, his demeanor all business. “What Cindy did was just plain wrong, Brock. Wrong, wrong, wrong. I mean, she
knew
who killed my brother, yet she never said a
word
to me. I gave
her enough time to confess her sins against my brother, the man who saved her from her abusive father and dusthead whore of a mother. I kept waiting, patiently, which is
terribly
hard for me—though I already knew it was you—for her to reveal your name. But she gave me nothin’, kept her blow job–mastering mouth shut.” He stubs out his cigarette in an ashtray, and pushes off his chair to stretch, his eyes devoid of human emotion. “And her kid? Well, what can I say? Had
you
taken care of her the way you
initially
planned to, maybe, just fucking maybe, his three-year-old little ass would still be alive. Though I
probably
would’ve put a bullet in his skull anyway—I don’t need some cracked-out teenager seeking revenge on his mother’s killer fifteen or so years down the road—I’ll let his demise burn
your
conscience for a while.” He pauses, his grin returning. “But, man oh man, you sure as
fuck
missed one helluva show. There’s an epic difference between the complexities of how an adult’s skull explodes under the pressure of a bullet versus a kid’s. I won’t get into the details of it all, but it’s definitely something you’ll have to try out for yourself one day.”

Shotgun rattling in my nervous grip, I stare at the screen, visions of what the sick fuck did to that innocent child appearing unbidden as Derick stares back at me. I clench my jaw, refusing to take blame for his death. I can’t. Still, as Derick starts to pace the office, I have a feeling the kid’s short life will stay with me until the moment I take my final breath. Maybe even after.

Derick lurches at the camera, a wild look in his eyes as he shoves his face into the lens. “You fucked up, Cunningham! You should’ve
never
let that pussy friend of yours Ryder talk you into saving the dirty whore and her brat!” He scratches at the stubble lining his jaw, a broken-toothed smile curling his mouth as he backs away. “Shit happens, though. Everyone’s allowed a moment of weakness, right? But I digress.”

Taking his seat yet again and rocking back and forth in his chair, Derick produces a dagger out of the thick, smoke-filled air. Wooden handle intricately carved with what appears to be Chinese lettering,
the thing makes my forearm look like it belongs to a dwarf, its length a good twelve inches or so. Its surgical steel blade catches the domed lighting at a perfect angle, momentarily blinding me, my eyes squinting in response as he runs it along his shaved head. Continuing to stare at me intently, the dick smiles and drags the tip of the weapon down the side of his cheek, producing a trickle of blood. His smile spreads from ear to ear, his eyes tumbling into the back of his head as his tongue sneaks out, collecting his blood from the blade in one slow, calculated sweep.

The cocksucker’s a monster. The kind children imagine lurk in the shadows of their bedrooms but have never seen. The Boogeyman brought to life, he’s what haunts nightmares.

“Did ya know I couldn’t even give Dom a proper burial?” he announces, breaking the silence shrouding the airwaves between us. “My baby brother, my last goddamn living relative, is buried right here on our property. I turned his stupid-as-fuck sidekick friend into pig feed too, so there’s no chance in hell he’s ever gonna be found. His family thinks he took off to California with his mistress.” He lets out a condescending cackle, a smile lighting up his eyes as he finishes the last of his whiskey. “I always hated that dumb fuck, but Dom? Nah, Dom loved the dick like a brother.” He pauses, an icy emotion—one I can’t decipher, but if I had to guess, it’d be jealousy—coating his face, as he sparks up another cigarette. “Getting back to Dom: I couldn’t chance the DEA sniffing all over the warehouse here. I’m sure they wouldn’t have taken well to a drug lord calling in the murder of his brother. Well, maybe they would’ve, but that’s neither here nor there. Either way, I wasn’t about to hand them over my business or my life. Not
even
for my family.”

Before I can blink, he leaps from his chair yet again, his nose inches from the screen. “You killed my brother!” he growls, spittle flying from his mouth as he grabs hold of the camera, shaking it to near destruction. “Now I have nothing! Nothing, Brock! No family, just
hatred! I’m going to kill you, motherfucker, make no mistake about that! Before I’m finished with you, I’m gonna make ya wish your mother swallowed you instead!”

A certified Jekyll and Hyde, Derick dips back into his cool-cat character, not a beat missed between the eerie transition as he shoves his hands into his camo pockets. “You’re probably wondering how I found out about all of this. Am I right? Hell, if I were you, my head would be all over the fucking place.” Attention aimed at the ground, he leisurely strolls back and forth in front of a swastika hanging on the wall behind him. “It’s pretty simple, actually, but stay with me here if ya can. The video from our warehouse feeds back to a low-key apartment I keep a few miles from here.
Bamo!
Your buddy figured he had everything covered when he tore apart the camera system, but the asshole never thought about that one, did he? So much for his
supposed
genius status. Dumb fuck. Ya might wanna think about getting a different partner to head your operation.”

Laughter punches from his chest, his thumbs running up and down the slim black fibers of his wifebeater as he continues to pace. “Oh yeah, revisiting the loose ends we were discussing earlier. You’ve left a fuckload of them for me to handle. I’m not talking about you, your useless counterpart, Ryder, or Lee, but
so
very much more. Unlike what my brother said, this is
not
a game, nor is it an empty threat. There’s gonna be a reckoning, Brock. A reckoning of biblical proportions not seen since Moses destroyed the pharaoh.” He stops moving, a crooked grin hiking up the corner of his mouth as he faces the camera. “I’m gonna kill every single person you hold dear to your filthy heart, your two prick friends included. To make things even
more
excitin’, I’m making sure you’re the
last
bastard to die. Nothing personal, buddy, but I really gotta make sure ya suffer as much as, if not more than, I have. Just knowing I took everyone ya love, slowly, one by one, from your waste of a life, will make the day I cross through the gates of hell that much more . . . special, if you will.”