Run This Town 03 - (Watch Me) Unmask You (8 page)

He’d underestimated Lucky. That thought bounced all over Elias’s head for two days. He’d underestimated Lucky. He hadn’t expected the younger man to issue— what was it, a threat, an ultimatum? The point was, Lucky had issued something, and Elias had been walking around in a fucking fog ever since.

A family.

What the hell?

Lucky was twenty-four years old. And Elias was… too old. The last thing Lucky should be thinking about was that shit. A family, responsibilities. But he wasn’t like any other man Elias had ever met and he wanted Elias. Wanted to lock himself to Elias, build a future with him.

Except that would be built on a foundation of shifting sand.

Already Elias’s gut told him to run away. Get as far away as possible from the mess forming in front of his eyes. Get away from Lucky. But he couldn’t. Didn’t want to, which spoke volumes about his sanity. It also didn’t help that he hadn’t heard from Lucky in two days so Elias didn’t know if he’d dealt with his situation. The man he shared an apartment with.

Chad Jacobs. Elias had done a thorough work up on him. He knew everything about the man Lucky had spent the past six months fucking, down to what type of sugar he put in his coffee.

Artificial sweetener.

Ugh.

Hands shoved into his pockets, shoulders hunched against the biting wind, he walked down the Manhattan sidewalk. Habit had him looking this way and that, searching for any possible threat. With the man he was about to meet, he’d learned to expect the unexpected. Even though the temperature was colder than fuck, the cafés were still filled with people at five on a Friday evening.

At Rick’s Café, Elias found a table with two chairs and took one under a large red and white umbrella, facing the street. He waved away the waitress when she made a beeline for him. He wasn’t interested in anything to drink. He might not be able to keep that shit down when that bastard showed his face.

After escaping that orphanage, he’d been a whore, selling his body and stealing to feed himself until he robbed the wrong man. The choice he’d made to work for Haimon Konstantinou turned out to be the wrong one. He had no idea where the Konstantinous’s wealth came from, until it was too late. When he tried to get out, they framed him for murder right here in New York and had him sent to Rikers Island. A lesson they’d wanted him to learn.

He had. As difficult as it had been, he’d learned that lesson. He’d made friends, fought and killed for them inside that hell, and when given the opportunity to escape confinement, Elias refused to accept the Konstantinous’s terms unless they helped his friends, Israel Storm and Tek Ng as well. He’d bound himself to those bastards again for ten more years in exchange for that help. And he’d have gotten out, too.

Until he found Lucky in that fucking closet.

Then Elias went back to the bargaining table. This time giving them life. His life in exchange for Lucky’s.  

He’d intentionally put himself in this position, but he’d do it again. To protect Lucky, to keep him safe, Elias would do it again. Didn’t mean he had to like it, didn’t mean he had to embrace it.

A shadow fell over him and before he could tense, Stavros Konstantinou was in the seat opposite, face blank, but eyes mocking.

“Hello, Elias.”

Elias sat back, stretching his legs, one hand dropping down under the table. He was strapped, a piece in his waist, one in his ankle holster, plus the two silver bracelets that circled his wrists. Stavros wouldn’t come out to meet him in public without at least a backup system ten men deep, but that didn’t mean Elias wouldn’t go down drenched in their blood.

Stavros watched him closely, too closely. And when his mouth twitched Elias knew Stavros had an idea what was going through Elias’s mind. The Greek had taught him everything he knew after all.

“Nothing?” Stavros lifted an eyebrow. “I don’t even get a hello?”

“You called this meet.” Elias jerked his chin. “What do you want?”

“You haven’t checked in with me since you arrived.” Stavros’s tone was calm, too calm.

“I’m a grown man.”

“A grown man who works for me,” Stavros tossed back with a smile. “Or do you need a reminder of that?”

From all the years Elias had been working in close personal contact with Stavros, he knew that Stavros’s smile was the fucking harbinger of bad things. He eased his right foot backward until he could touch his ankle with the hand he had under the table. Not once did he look away from Stavros.

“Do you have a job for me?” he asked. “Because if not, I’m gonna get up and walk away. I’m not interested in being witness to your temper tantrums.”

Stavros licked his lips. “Temper tantrum, huh?” His teeth appeared. “You used to like that about me.”

Elias didn’t need reminding about his greatest lapse in judgment. “Do you have a job for me?” he asked again. “Because I’m busy.”

Something dark flashed in the depths of Stavros’s murky gaze. “Busy trying to get your conscience to give you yet another chance.”

Elias stiffened. He didn’t want Stavros even referring to Lucky. “He’s not now or will ever be your concern.”

“But he’s yours.” Stavros placed both palms flat on the table and leaned forward. “He’s your concern and your conscience, your guilt and your last ditch attempt at redemption.” All of that was true and when Elias didn’t speak, Stavros smiled again. “I thought I’d fucked a conscience out of you a long time ago, Elias.”

Around them conversation buzzed, dishes clinked and punctuated the din, but Elias found himself caught in Stavros’s gaze, trapped in the familiar shame of their shared past. “You thought wrong,” he finally said. Sharper than he’d intended and Stavros caught that weakness, too, grinning with a twinkle in his eye.

“No,” Stavros said softly. “I was right. Because it’s exceptionally cruel what you’re doing to that—” He waved a dismissive hand. “That boy. It’s the actions of a man without morals, without conscience. A man like me.”

“I’m nothing like you.” The fuck he was.

“I beg to differ.” Stavros’s lips curved. “That time in Grenada—”

Elias brought his gun up between his knees and dropped the safety. “Grenada is off limits to you,” he said in an even voice, when really he wanted to recoil in remembered horror. The very last thing he wanted to think about was the time they’d spent on the West Indian island of Grenada. The shit they’d done… The blood would never wash off his hands.

Hunger flashed over Stavros’s face, giving him a flushed red appearance. Elias used to like that look on him. He used to like a lot of things on Stavros and off him, too.

“You can never truly outrun who you are in here.” Stavros sat back and rubbed a hand in the center of his own chest. “It’s who you are.”

“Fuck you. It’s what you made me.”

Stavros regarded him steadily. “You’d think that, huh?” He shook his head with a disappointed sigh. “We can’t make you a killer, Elias. We can’t make you love the thrill of hunting your enemy and bringing him to his knees, any means necessary.” A half smile curved his mouth. Elias had enjoyed that fucking mouth more times than he cared to count. “We can’t make you drop your pants and offer up your ass two seconds after slicing a man’s throat from ear to ear.”

Elias’s fingers tightened around the handle of the gun. There’d always been a reason for what Elias did. Stavros hadn’t known it at the time, but he did now. Which was why they were here. Blood rushed in his ears. He didn’t speak, couldn’t deny Stavros’s charge, and the other man used that as permission to continue signing his death warrant.

“His blood was still warm, and your knees were all in it, your cum mixing with it as you begged for more, and harder.” Stavros bit his bottom lip. He did that when he was aroused, when he was about to come, too.

“I told you not to bring up Grenada.” Elias wanted nothing as badly as he wanted to empty his clip into Stavros’s chest right then.

“Why not?” Stavros cocked his head, a bewildered expression on his face. “You were in your element then. You were you. We didn’t make you that way, Elias.” He came forward again, voice dropping as if imparting a secret. “You came to me, to us, like that. Fucked up like that. We simply used it to our advantage. Truth be told, I loved you like that.”

“What do you know about love, Stavros? You’re not capable of it.”

Stavros smirked. “You don’t know the half of what I’m capable of, lover.”

“Maybe.” Elias nodded. “But I know it’s not love. Not even for Annika.”

An arctic blast was warmer than the look that washed over Stavros’s face. “Don’t say her name.”

Got ya.
“Oh, why not? Because Annika’s the one thing you want, but can never have? Because no matter how many men you kill, and how much blood you spill, she’ll never be yours?”

“No,” Stavros said evenly, nostrils flared. “Because if you say her name one more time, I’ll give Bruce the go-ahead to pull the trigger.” His face morphed into his true self, the man Elias despised. “You remember Bruce, Elias. You remember he never is far way from that high powered rifle of his. You remember there’s no target he can’t hit, no matter the distance.”

Elias did remember all that, and he glanced down at his chest, a quick search for the red dot that would show him as Bruce’s target. There was no red dot.

“Did I forget to mention Bruce is in New Jersey, on the rooftop of the building opposite something called—” He tapped a finger to his chin. “Cool Ink?”

Elias’s entire body seized. 
Lucky
.

“Yes, he has your boy in his sights.”

“You fucker.”

Stavros’s mouth twisted. “I’m not that selfish, as you well remember. I don’t only fuck, I got fucked.” He bit his bottom lip. “By you.”

“I really dislike you.” Which was Elias’s rather nice way of saying he wanted to tear Stavros’s head from his body with his bare hands.

“I remember when you loved me.”

Elias smiled. “I never loved you, Stav. You wanted my ass and I wanted out, so you fucked me and I fucked you over.” He leaned forward, keeping his tone low and mild. “Why do you think I came to 
you
 instead of the old man with that deal? Why do you think I chose you?”

A muscle in Stavros’s jaw ticked. “I highly doubt that was all it was.” His gaze went heavy lidded. “You’re a talented man, and here you are, about to do something even more reckless than any job I could have assigned you. If I didn’t know better I’d say you were suicidal, like my father fears.”

“What I do with my life is no longer Haimon’s concern.” As of their arrival at JFK airport, Elias was no longer Haimon’s bodyguard. He didn’t work for the elder Konstantinou anymore.

“No, it’s not. It’s mine, because you came back to me.” Stavros stroked his own chest. “You came begging, crawling back to me.”

Elias only crawled for one man and it wasn’t the bastard facing him. He allowed Stavros his delusions.

“You work for me, Elias. And I can send you to a hole in the desert, keep you there for years. Until that… kid forgets everything about you.”

“Try it.” Elias squared his shoulders. “Try me, Stav. It’s the last thing you will ever fucking do. The last order you’ll ever issue.”

Stavros threw back his head and laughed. “Threatening me, Elias? That’s so… Well, reckless is really the only word that comes to mind.”

Like Elias gave a fuck. “I will remain right where I am, Stav. I will give Lucky what he asked for and we will continue as we’ve been. I will never travel out of the country for you again, that you can believe. You want me to handle any business stateside, I’m your man. If you don’t like those terms, you can fight me. And I’ll fight back.” He held Stavros’s gaze when he said, “You won’t like how I fight.”

“I’ve always loved the way you fight. I’m sure that’s not going to change.”

Elias would have done anything for Stavros and his old man. Truth be told, before he learned the truth of who and what they were, he 
had
 done everything for Stavros and his father. Then he’d learned they killed indiscriminately. For money. Only for the money. That had spurred his desire to get the hell away from them and their long reaching clutches. But it had taken time, so much time, and while waiting for his chance to escape he’d had to do what he had to protect himself.

So he’d become like them, swearing all the while that no, 
not quite like them
. He’d just learn enough to defend himself should they come after him again. That turned out to be a crock of shit. All these years later he was just like them.

Killer.

Right back under that heavy thumb. Not fully entrenched in the action, but he didn’t fool himself into thinking that just taking orders from Stavros would be better.

It would be worse. Because just as he knew Stavros, just as Elias had studied Stavros, his former lover had studied him, trained him, molded him. They knew each other’s weaknesses, and that— that could bring a massive explosion decimating everyone and everything Elias held near and dear.

“What did he want?” Stavros broke their silence.

“What?”

“You said you would give your boy what he asked for. What did he ask for?”