Ruin & Rule

I flicked a finger at a dent in the table. “And what does that have to do with me?”

Wallstreet grinned. “Everything, my dear boy.”

Something in his voice had my head snapping up. I glared. “Spill it. Your three minutes were up four minutes ago, and I’m five seconds away from throwing my fist in your face.”

He laughed. “Tell me, how often do you think in equations? Do you ever stop calculating?”

I shook my head. “I’ve been asked that a lot and my best reply is ‘fuck off.’ ”

His smile grew broader.

In reality, the answer to that question was that it was like I live in the fucking matrix with green code falling around me like rain, all day every day. I knew mathematical symbols better than I did the English alphabet. I could work out the hardest trig problem without a calculator. I could give answers to any problem within seconds.

Math—my ultimate love.

Apart from her, of course.

Wallstreet smiled, leaning in once again. “Perfect, I see the answer in your eyes. That’s the reply I wanted—what I needed to witness. Tell me, if you get out of here, how many people do you have to ruin?”

My breath caught in my chest. Ruin? Destroy, more like.

“Three. I have three.”

“And do you have a plan on how you’ll do it?”

I’ll walk up to them and put bullets in their brains, then watch as the life drains from their eyes.

I shook my head. Funny, that was the first time I truly let myself contemplate how I would end it. Strangely, it was… unsatisfying. Dreadfully fucking unsatisfying. They deserved to scream. They deserved to feel what I’d felt for the past year. Abandoned, deleted, lost.

I gritted my teeth, looking into Wallstreet’s blue eyes. “I want to make them suffer. Death will be the last thing they get from me.”

The old man nodded. “Another perfect answer. And if I told you I had the means to make that happen. Would you trust me? Trust a stranger who could make you wealthier than you could ever imagine and give you everything you needed to take whatever revenge you wanted?”

I stared at him. I stared hard. I searched for a lie—a trick.

There was nothing but passion in his gaze. Passion I recognized as his own revenge. He wanted to teach whoever hadn’t listened a lesson.

Something shifted inside. The traitorous bitch called hope stole once again into my psyche.

Slowly, a smile spread my lips. The suspicion in my veins dissolved and I relaxed. I saw myself in him. The burning. The cursing. The unbearable need to punish and set the status quo.

“I would.”

Wallstreet reached across the table, and pulled on my collar until he whispered in my ear. “I’m going to give it all to you, my boy. You obey me, you do everything I fucking tell you, and I’ll get you out of this place. I’ll give you the Corrupts, I’ll make you president, and I’ll teach you every damn thing I know about trading, skimming, and controlling not just your empire but the world.”

He let me go, holding out his hand. “In return, I ask you to be my ears, eyes, and legs on the outside. To run my business as I expect it to be run. You will be my heir.”

A year ago to the day, my life had ended. I would never have guessed I would get a second chance a full 8765.81 hours later.

My brain latched onto a question. “If you can get me out, why can’t you work the same magic for yourself?”

Wallstreet lowered his head, his fingers digging into the table. “Because I’ve been fucking stitched up and have no choice but to do my time. Thirteen more years—nine if I can get out on good behaviour. That’s too long to wait. It will all be destroyed by then and I can’t let that happen.”

I whispered, “What makes you think you can get me out? You heard what I did.”

The room seemed to quiet—the sounds of my fellow inmates hushing as I waited for his reply.

“Because, Killian, I know the truth. I know everything. And no one should have to live in a world where such traitors exist.”

For the first time in a year, gratefulness burned in my chest. He knew. He believed. My decision was easy.

I didn’t hesitate or think. This was my future. The only way I would get my revenge.

I held my hand out, locking eyes with the man who’d turned from disgraced god to savior.

Wallstreet clasped my grip with his.

I squeezed hard. “You have my word.”

He nodded. “I thought I would. I swear on my true name, Cyrus Connors, that I will do right by you. You will never be powerless again.”

I trembled, basking in his words. My muscles twitched as the foreign feeling of happiness returned to my rotten soul.

Wallstreet added, “From now on, your name isn’t Arthur Killian. It’s Kill. And you’re the acting president of the Corrupts.”

“Kill?”

He let me go, smirking. “You’ll be a killer on the stock market and a killer to those who wrong you. Best be honest about who you truly are, don’t you think?”

I reclined, smiling a genuine smile. “Yes, I do think. I do indeed.”

We grinned.

We nodded.

And that was how Kill was born.

The lessons began immediately.

Wallstreet somehow gained permission to remove me from laundry duty and stole me away for three hours a day in the so-called library. There, he waved away his entourage, set a notepad and pencil before me, and opened my eyes to the wonderful magic of trading.