Thirty-Eight
Garin
Two Hours Ago
“You piece of shit,” I spewed, spitting the words in Anthony’s face.
The boys had done a hell of a job torturing the ever-loving fuck out of him. Every toe but the big ones had been severed and tossed on the ground. He’d been forced to eat his own earlobes. Then, all his teeth were pulled out. The guys didn’t even have to tape his lips shut; Anthony had nothing to bite them with.
“Fuck you,” he gummed back at me.
“Fuck me?” I laughed. “Yeah, fuck me that I didn’t figure this out earlier, and I had to wait so long to kill you.”
As I rolled up my sleeves, the blood on my knuckles caught my attention. I fucking hated that a piece of him was on me. My hands had been inside his sister this morning. If I hadn’t had his blood all over me, I bet my fingers would have still smelled like her.
The only good part about all this was that it had brought Kyle back to me.
“Why did you do it?” I asked.
His eyelids were swollen, but he still looked at me. There was no life in his eyes. Just a dead stare, as if I’d already killed him. “Fuck you, Garin.”
I pulled so hard on a chunk of his hair that I felt his scalp tear. “Give me an answer. You’re going to die in this room anyway, so there’s no reason to keep it a secret.”
He didn’t scream like most of the men who had been brought in here over the years. He didn’t try to fight his way out of the ropes that bound his limbs to the chair. He didn’t cry. He didn’t even shit himself, which I’d seen happen before. He stayed still and looked at me with those dead eyes.
“I worked so fucking hard,” he finally said.
“So?”
“So, Paulie was going to give it all away, like you pieces of shit deserved some of it.”
“You mean, Paulie was going to tell the bosses?”
“Yeah, motherfucker.” When he spit, a clot of blood dripped down his lip. It ran across the front of his shirt and landed on his lap. “He was a pussy. Couldn’t handle doing business without you guys wiping his ass for him.” He spoke slow, and without teeth, it was hard to understand him. “When I found out he was gonna tell you guys, I killed him. I wasn’t sharing nothing with you. I did the work, took the risk. You weren’t gonna get a fucking cent of it.”
“And look where that got you.” I clenched my fists together and stepped back, so I could get a good look at him. “What about Billy?”
“What about that fucking junkie? He was asking all around town about Paulie’s murder. I got tired of hearing whispers about it. Then, I found out he was fucking one of my top girls. It had to stop, so I got rid of him.”
I gritted my teeth. “He was my best friend.”
“Yeah?” More blood dripped from his lip. “Some fucking friend you are. You left him in Jersey where you knew he was going to die.”
I wasn’t going to let this piece of scum make me feel bad for my decisions, and I sure as hell wasn’t going to justify my actions to him or anyone else. I’d done everything I could to help Billy. I didn’t care if Anthony knew that or not.
I walked toward his chair again, stopping inches from his legs. “I was with your sister this morning.”
“This morning? That’s impossible. I told her to stay the fuck away from you.”
It was only minutes before his death, and this asshole still wanted to control Kyle.
“It’s not impossible.” I pulled out my cell phone and clicked on my photos, bringing up a picture of Kyle and me.
I’d taken it when we got back from dinner last night. We were in the living room. She was sitting on my lap, my face kissing her neck. In the photo, I’d included plenty of the background, knowing I was going to show it to Anthony.
“Look familiar?” I watched the anger spread across his face. “I’ve been there, at your house, since I flew her home from the hospital.”
“She’d better not have given you nothing.”
I leaned in, getting really close to him. He smelled like death already.
“She gave me everything I wanted. I know all about the houses and cars and her business. And I saw your safe.” I laughed, wishing I had strangled this asshole when we were kids. Things would have worked out so differently. “You took her from me once. I promise you, that won’t happen again.”
He rocked in the chair, trying to head-butt me. “That’s my fucking money.”
Money made him buck. It made him moan. It made him show real emotion for the first time since I’d stepped in this room.
He was one greedy motherfucker who didn’t give a shit about anything else.
“The money will be of no use to you when you’re dead.”
Looking back at my phone, I found the button to record a voice message and pressed it. I couldn’t take a video; I didn’t want Kyle to see what we had done to him. I didn’t want her to have to see his face ever again. I held the phone out toward him, so it could catch everything that was about to be said.
“You ruined so many fucking lives, Anthony. But there’s one person who had to put up with your abuse the longest. You destroyed everything she wanted, and you owe her an apology.”
“Who? My whore of a sister?”
I nodded toward one of the guys standing on the far wall. He took the signal and walked over to Anthony, whipping the back of Anthony’s head with the butt of his gun. Anthony grunted, a clot of blood shooting out of his mouth.
“Let’s try this again,” I said. “Apologize. Now.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Mean it, asshole.”
He slowly looked up. “I’m fucking sorry, all right? I wasn’t a good brother to you, and I know that. But you finally got Garin. I hope he’s everything you wanted, you cunt.”
This motherfucker.
After everything he did to Kyle, and this was the best he had. I should have expected that from a guy who killed his own best friend.
I turned the recording off and slid the phone in my pocket. Then, I reached behind my back as one of the guys handed me a blade. It was nine inches, just long and sharp enough to do what I needed. I let Anthony watch as I folded my fingers around the base. I wanted him to know what was going to happen. I wanted him to see how much it was going to hurt.
“Do you have anything else you want to say?” I asked.
A string of drool hung from his lip, and he licked it away. He had no teeth to show me, but it didn’t stop him from trying to smile. “I should have killed you when I still had the chance, you worthless—”
Before he could say another word, I jerked my arm forward and stabbed the blade into the middle of his throat. A rush of blood squirted out from the wound. It filled his mouth and gurgled on his tongue as he tried to choke in air. His chest pumped, and his shoulders twitched until his head slumped forward. Then, all his movements stopped.
One of the guys went over and checked his pulse. “He’s dead, Garin.”
He reached for the blade, and I handed it to him. He would clean my prints off the weapon, and then he’d destroy it.
“Grind that fucker up and bring him to the beach,” I ordered to all the guys in the room. “I want to lie on his goddamn bones the next time I’m there.”
As I walked out, Mario joined me, and we went outside to his car.
“You did good, kid.” He patted me on the back. “I thought you were going to tell him how much you’ve been fucking his sister. You know, more salt on the wound.”
“I won’t talk about her like that, even to a dead man.”
“Oh, fuck,” he said, stopping several feet from his car. “This is more serious than I thought. Does that mean you’re not going to tell me anything about your trip to Florida?”
I laughed. “That’s exactly what it means.”
He pulled a cigar out of his pocket and lit it. “Are you going to tell her?”
“That I saved her life? Nah. She doesn’t need to know that.”
“You know that’s not what I’m talking about.”
I put my arm around his shoulders and shook his meaty muscles. “Let’s go get something to eat. I know you get hungry after you watch someone die.”
He took a puff and blew the smoke behind me. “That’s my boy.”