Ruthless People (43 page)

We were both freshmen in college, and everyone just stayed away from her. It was like
she was the moon, and they gawked at her from afar. And just like the moon, she was
cold, distant, and downright scary. There was no reason for either of us to have spoken
if it hadn’t been for some school project. She never really talked to me when we worked,
and I was a rambler then, so it worked out fine.

That night I screamed for my parents and when they looked away, I screamed as loud
as I could into the phone that was left on my bed. They shoved me in the back of their
car and gave me a cocktail of drugs that took the fight right out of me.

The first night was the worst. They all took turns with the less pretty ones, I fell
into that category. I cried, I puked, I begged for death, and it was only the first
day. The girls who had been there longer were just wasting away in beds, so high they
couldn’t even pick themselves up.

I knew I wasn’t going to end up like them. I swore I wasn’t going to end up like them.
I planned on killing myself the moment I had a chance. When my next round of guests
came on the second day, they laughed at me as I struggled against the chains. They
liked fighters, they liked breaking them, and just as they dropped their pants, bullets
were flying everywhere.

They seemed like angels of death, shooting down the pigs who dared to call themselves
men. It happened so fast that I wasn’t even sure if I was still sane. I thought my
mind was just trying to protect me. That was until I saw her. She walked in, looked
around until she met my gaze, and I had never felt so disgusted with myself. I cried,
and she simply walked over to me and gave me her white jacket.

She told me, “As long as I live, this will never happen to you ever again.”

That was the start. She took me in and forced me into therapy while she personally
kicked my ass in training day in and day out for a year and a half. It felt like only
weeks then. When I was better, in the sense that I was no longer weeping during the
day and puking during the night, she told me I could go. But where could I go? I begged
her to let me stay. I promised to stay loyal to her as long as I lived. It was then
that she told me about who she was and what she did.

After a year and a half of seeing bloody walls, drugs, and guns everywhere, it wasn’t
too hard to figure out. She told me the only way I could stay was to prove myself.
I wasn’t sure how, but I would do anything.

So she drove me back to my old house on the corner of 54th and Adam Street, gave me
a gun, and told me to get my justice. My heart was beating so fast I could hear it
my ears, and I didn’t want to let her down. I didn’t want to let myself down. I wanted
to kill them for what they did to me. Parents like that shouldn’t get to live. So
I rang the doorbell, and when my father opened the door, he nearly pissed himself.

“Hi, Daddy.” It was the last thing I remembered saying before I lost myself. When
it was over, I walked into the kitchen to find Mel eating the dinner my mother would
never get to eat. She looked me over before sliding me a glass of wine.

“From this day forward, Adriana, I’m your Boss,” she said to me. “You will treat me
with respect. I will treat you with a lesser form of that respect. But if you ever
betray me, I will kill you, and I like you. But I will still kill you.”

“Yes, ma’am,” I said, sucking down the wine.

“Do you need anything?” she asked once she stood up.

“There is nothing for me here, ma’am.”

“Then burn it to the ground,” she said, before walking out the door.

Any part of the old Adriana died in that fire. From those ashes, I came out a Phoenix.
Mel had always reminded me that we all had the capacity to be ruthless, that all we
needed was the right push.

“Whoa.” Antonio smirked from my doorway at the transformed woman staring back at me.
Kissing my neck, he met my gaze in the mirror. “Sexy, but this isn’t my Phoenix. Where
are you going?”

“The Boss,” I said, and he didn’t ask any more questions, he knew not to. He kissed
my neck before walking to the door.

“Be safe, baby,” he said as the door shut.

Antonio and I . . . well it was new, complicated, and fun. I hadn’t dated since joining
Mel, however, Antonio and I always found ourselves in these situations with our clothes
off. I had to tell Mel, and when I did, she said that as long as our loyalty to her
outranked our lust for each other, she didn’t give a fuck who we screwed.

Grabbing my stuff, I walked out of the house basically unnoticed, and it was only
when I was about to board my flight, I sent a text to Liam. Mel would be right behind
me. She wanted blood. She would get her revenge.

THIRTY-TWO

“There was a murdered corpse,
in secret land and violent death
in thousand shapes displayed.”

~ Geoffrey Chaucer

LIAM

I couldn’t help but watch her as I drank my brandy. The way she cleaned her gun over
and over again had to be one of the sexiest things I had ever seen her do. She was
mesmerizing, from her long ponytail, to her sleek tank top and camo pants, everything
about her was memorizing.

“I feel you staring at my breasts,” she said not bothering to look at me. But her
voice alone was enough to give me a hard-on.

“If it bothers you, love, stand up and let me stare at your ass instead.” I grinned,
finishing the rest of my drink before standing up.

“Liam, we need to focus,” she hissed as I ran my fingers against her neck.

Kissing the base of her throat, I grabbed her breasts. “I am focusing.”

“Liam stop,” she said, pushing me away.

Backing away from her, I pinched the bridge of my nose, trying to calm myself down.
What the fuck was wrong with me? She had just started to speak less than twelve hours
ago, and I was trying not to jump her. Being in the plane with her so close didn’t
help. Never had I been happier to take her bitching.

“Mel . . .”

“Liam . . .”

We both stopped when there was a knock on the door. Sighing, Mel stood up and opened
the lodge door, allowing both Neal and Declan to walk in. Declan immediately gave
me a look as if he knew what had just happened. However, with the thin walls I wouldn’t
be that surprised.

Vance was right in coming to Tanzania. Neither Mel nor I had ever been here before,
but luckily the American dollar was as good as gold. It only cost us five hundred
dollars to buy this wooden lodge in the middle of the fucking jungle. It wasn’t the
Ritz, but it would do for now.

“Can we come in?” Neal asked.

“She opened the fucking door didn’t she?” I stated, pouring myself more brandy.
Thank God that
Nelson kid kept the plane well stocked.

Walking over to me, Mel capped the brandy bottle, glaring at me before looking back
at them. “What do you have?”

Declan pulled out a map and opened it over the table. “So were in Seronera, here.”
He pointed. “From what we’ve gathered speaking to some of the locals, a group of men
with
V
s on their arms came through here two weeks ago.”

“We think they are hiding out in Lobo, about forty-five miles from here. If we leave
now, we can make it before daybreak. I’ve already bought a helicopter from one of
the townsfolk, Jinx is fixing it up the best he can now,” Neal added, pulling on the
strap of his sniper rifle.

“You, Antonio, and Jinx along with the rest of the snipers will stay back ten miles.
I’m guessing the helicopter you bought isn’t going to hold all twelve of us, so look
for another one and have Adriana fly it,” Mel stated looking over the map. “Declan,
you and Monte, along with the rest of the men, will back the twenty-five mile mark.”

We stared at her as though she had just lost her fucking mind.

“So you and I are supposed to raid their hideout by ourselves?” I asked her slowly.
Maybe she wasn’t quite ready to come back yet.

“Ma’am, Adriana didn’t even come with us.” Declan eyed her carefully before shooting
me a look. This was too important to fuck up, and we only had a small window.

“Maybe you should rest,” Neal started, but was cut off by Mel cocking her gun.

“Please finish that sentence, motherfucker. I’m begging you to finish that sentence,
so when I tell Olivia why her husband came home with a bullet, I can say he forgot
who the fuck I am . . . a deadly mistake. Especially since I haven’t liked your bitch-ass
from the get-go. So go ahead and tell me I need some rest.”

Neal made the wisest choice of his life and kept silent, Declan on the other hand . . .

“Ma’am . . .”

“And you,” Mel snapped, turning her gun on him. “You keep your mouth shut or I will
be forced to tell Liam all the naughty things you’ve been dreaming of doing to me.”

“What the fuck!” Before he could even blink, I had a gun to his skull. I never thought
I would have to shoot my best friend, but I’d been wrong on many occasions lately.

“Drop your gun, Liam.”

I just glared at the bitch-ass motherfucking cunt that dared to call himself my right-hand
man. “Fuck no. I’d rather kill him slowly. Maybe set him on fire.”

Pushing Declan back, Mel stepped in front of my gun. “I wasn’t asking. Put the gun
down now.”

“We will have words later, cousin.” I glared over at him before doing as she asked.
I would deal with her later as well.

“Now that all your blood is pumping to the right places,” she hissed at me. “Adriana,
come in.”

And sure enough, a blond-haired woman with green eyes stepped in. She was sexy, in
a whorish type of way, and could definitely not be ugly duckling, Adriana. However,
she walked over to Mel with her head held high and pulled a cell phone out of her
bra.

“Is there anything else you needed, ma’am?”

Holy mother of fuck.
Sure enough, that voice belonged to Adriana.

Nodding, Mel placed the phone in her back pocket. “Thank you, Adriana, feel free to
change. I hope that wasn’t too much for you.”

“Never, ma’am,” Adriana replied, taking off the blond wig. “I placed the bombs throughout
the compound like you asked. They sweep the place every morning though, so tonight
is the only chance you have.”

“He didn’t touch you did he?” she asked with no emotion whatsoever. Anyone who knew
her was aware that emotionless Mel was as ruthless as they come.

“No, ma’am. I was too European for him. He wanted to taste the native culture.” She
frowned, blinking rapidly as she pulled off her fake nose.

“Thank you, Adriana.”

Adriana nodded before leaving, and I could feel my blood begin to boil over.

Why the fuck am I clueless right now?
I thought to myself as I cracked my jaw. Walking in front of her, I
leaned in on the other side of the table.

“Speak, now,” I said, afraid of losing my temper with her. One moment I wanted to
fuck her brains out, the next, I wanted to snap her neck. Why did she torture me so
much?

She leaned in and whispered, “I think I should rest.”

“Mel . . .”

“After Adriana let you know I was on the plane, I had her follow along on a commercial
flight. We’ve cut off most of Vance’s drug supply, but the money he makes from trafficking
is a lot higher—”

“You let Adriana get abducted?” That was the most reckless thing I had ever heard
from her. Trafficking wasn’t a joke. Adriana was most likely drugged within seconds
of being taken. They could’ve done God knows what during that time, and worst of all,
Adriana could have been blown . . .

“I see the wheels of hell turning in your eyes, and you need to breathe,” she snapped
at me. “Yes, I let Adriana get abducted, but she knew what she needed to do. After
all, it wasn’t the first time the Valero had taken her. This time she didn’t go in
as a victim, but as a motherfucking liberator. So as I was saying before you grew
a heart, Mr. Grinch, Adriana was taken from the airport. What she did, and how she
got out, I’m not aware of because it just fucking happened. All that matters is that
their hideout is laced with Cyanide bombs.”

“You want to smoke them out.” Declan smirked stepping closer, and the moment he did,
I stabbed the table right next to his hand. He looked up at me with eyes wide before
taking a step back.

“We smoke them out like rats, and we shoot them down one by one while they’re blinded.”
Neal grinned, circling the area around Valero’s hideout. “They will come running as
fast as possible, but they will be too fucked up to even pull the trigger.”

“You planned this all out in a few hours.” I didn’t even bother trying to hide how
impressed I was.

Turning to Neal and Declan, I signaled for them to leave. Declan was out the door
faster than I had ever seen him move.

She poured herself a glass of brandy, but neither of us spoke. We both were too hardheaded
for that. Knocking back the rest of my drink, I licked my lips.

“I missed you,” I whispered. She was the only one who could take all the fight right
out of me and put it back in at the same time. “I missed you, and us, and who we were
for that short moment in between hating each other and losing . . .”