Twenty-Six

Flynn

I walked down to the riverfront, pulling my jacket tighter around me. The cool, Missouri breeze could chill you right to the fuckin’ bone if you didn’t dress appropriately, but I was used to it. I knew what I was doing. After all, the Midwest was home. At least for now. Hopefully, we wouldn’t have to pack up and leave anytime soon—even though warmer climates did sound appealing in times like this.

It probably wasn’t the smartest choice in venues, but we met at an old abandoned factory in the middle of nowhere. When I walked up to the dilapidated building that looked like it was on the verge of falling down, I didn’t see anyone or anything. It appeared as if I was the first one to arrive. A knot formed in my gut as I walked around to the entrance of the building and saw the door had been propped open with a rock. Moving as quietly as I could, I stepped to the door and could hear people talking inside.

Voices. Two of them. I stopped and listened, ready to walk away if it happened to be a cop or a couple of kids causing trouble. I figured I could text Colin a new location, if needed. That wasn’t a problem. But one of the voices sounded familiar, and I relaxed a little.

It was the thick, Irish accent that had given my cousin away. I smiled, ready to walk inside when I recognized the second voice. I stopped dead in my tracks and strained to listen, trying to figure out who the second voice belonged to.

I stalled at the doorway of the building just long enough for Colin to look out and spot me.

“There you are, mate,” he said, motioning for me to come inside. “I was wondering when you’d finally get here.”

I hesitated and tried to peer through the shadow and gloom of the interior of the building. “Who’s with you?”

Colin glanced behind him, scratching his head before turning back to me. “Come inside, Flynn. It’d be easier if we talked inside, don’t ya think?”

He’d ignored my question and didn’t seem inclined to tell me who was in there with him. Why keep it a secret? Colin had broken the rules, he’d broken my trust, and that made me nervous. I reached to the small of my back and then cursed myself. I’d left my gun back at the hotel in case Ava needed to defend herself. I didn’t have any of my other weapons on me, and I was feeling more than a little exposed.

Leaving my gun behind had been a mistake. I knew that now, but I trusted Colin. With my life. So, why was he playing games with me now?

“Can’t ya tell me who’s with you? I heard voices,” I said.

Colin sighed, hanging his head low, as he stepped aside. That’s when I realized the second voice sounded familiar for a reason. It was Nicolei. One of Isaak’s most trusted allies.

“What’s going on here? I thought you and I were going to be alone, Colin?” I asked, narrowing my eyes and focusing my gaze on the taller, stoic man in front of me.

He looked so odd next to my goofy-looking cousin with his bright red hair and pale Irish skin. They were most definitely the odd couple, but they stood side-by-side like allies. Maybe even friends.

“Nicolei had a few questions for ya, Flynn, that’s all,” he said. “We wanted to talk about what went down with Isaak and the Russians. He told me some interesting things about ya that I didn’t know.”

“Oh did he? Like what?” I didn’t like where this was going. First of all, Colin should’ve come to me alone if he had any doubts about anything and secondly, I didn’t like the shit-eatin’ grin on Nicolei’s face.

“Like the fact you’re hooking up with a federal agent.”

I laughed. “A federal agent? Are you high, Colin? Or still just jealous I got with her and you didn’t.”

“So you admit it. You’ve been fuckin’ her,” Colin said, cracking his knuckles as he looked at me.

“We’re more than just fuckin’, lad, we’re together,” I said. “But she ain’t no fed. She’s a fucking secretary for Christ’s sake.”

“And you know this for a fact?” Colin asked. “You been to her office? Seen her filing and taking dictation and shit, lad?”

Nicolei didn’t say a word, he just stood there with his hands behind his back, watching us with that fucking smirk stretched across his face. Oh, I wanted to smack that look right off his face and then beat him bloody. But I had no weapon—nothing. Because I’d been stupid enough to trust Colin—the one man I thought I could trust with anything.

Apparently, I was wrong. Very, very wrong.

“What kind of stupid question is that? No, I haven’t been to her fuckin’ job. But she told me herself. And she ain’t a fuckin’ fed, she’s too—” I stopped myself from speaking further, biting down hard on my tongue.

The questions shot out of my head a million miles a second as I struggled to finish. She was what? Too pretty? Too fit? Too fuckin’ sexy? She was almost too fit for a job that required sitting all day, but I’d always assumed she worked out a lot. Took care of herself, ya know.

“See? Even you can’t be certain,” Colin said. “Which makes us think—maybe, there’s something to Isaak’s fears all along.”

Makes us think? He said, makes us think,—which told me there was a lot going on that I wasn’t privy to. And given that Colin seemed pretty well acquainted with Nicolei—I started to worry even more.

“You think I’m the snitch?” I snapped. “Really, Colin? Me?”

Colin shrugged. “I dunno what to think, lad. Not anymore. And I’m not alone. Once the brothers found out about you and the fed, they put it up to a vote.”

“Yeah? And what?” I called. “You’re gonna kill me, mate? Carry out the punishment? Do you even have the spine for that?”

Colin chuckled and rubbed his hand across the back of his neck, a nervous tell I was familiar with. “The Russians wanted penance—all the unnecessary heat from the law, the massacre that consequently cost their leader, Isaak, his life. Nicolei has permission from his brothers to do whatever is necessary to get the revenge they seek. And I can’t risk our alliance with the Russians by telling them no, can’t do it, mate. Surely, you understand and can appreciate that. After all, you worked your ass off to secure our alliance with the Russians. We can’t just turn around and piss it away because you’re fucking a cop and telling her all of our dirty little secrets.”

“I’m not fucking a cop,” I said between gritted teeth. “And I’m not the fucking snitch.”

“So you say. But the facts aren’t looking good for ya, Flynn,” he said. “There are a lot of questions about you right now, brother. It looks bad for you, mate. Really, really bad.”

Nicolei moved forward, gun in hand, with a smirk on his face. I didn’t flinch when he raised the weapon and held it to my head. He grinned wildly at me as if he were enjoying every second of it. And I was quite sure he was. Nicolei was a cold-blooded killer—and truth be told, we’d never really liked each other all that much.

With no weapon and a gun to my head, the only thing I could do was try to reason with them. Talk my way out of this mess—or at least stall them and keep them from killing me long enough that I could make a break for it and escape.

Colin was armed as well, and even if he was blood, I wasn’t so sure he wouldn’t try to kill me. After all, he’d set me up. He was the one to bring along the Russian to do his dirty work for him.

“I’m just trying to take care of the brotherhood, Flynn,” Colin said. “And make sure our relations with the Russians stay solid. Allowing a snitch to live because of loyalty is bad for business. And the last thing we’d want is to touch off another war with our new friends. Haven’t we had enough bloodshed and killin’, lad?”

“You’ve got the wrong man, Colin,” I shouted. “What good does killing me do if the snitch is still out there, huh? And he is. Believe me, he is. Yeah, I may be dead, but the snitch won’t be. And when he keeps rattin’ you out, what will your brothers think of you then? Think they’ll still want you in a leadership role? I assume that’s where this is going, after all—you take me down and then take my spot. Isn’t that the plan here, lad?” It had been a power play with Colin for some time now. I tried to remain patient, knowing he wasn’t as stable as he considered himself to be. And that was all this clusterfuck was—a power play.

But Colin didn’t get to answer. I flinched and ducked down when a shot rang out from somewhere behind me. The bullet barely missed the big Russian and hit the door behind his head. The shot made Nicolei turn and shoot back at the unseen assailant, giving me ample time to step up and drive my foot into his bollocks. I put everything I had into that kick and smiled in satisfaction when he grabbed his crotch and fell over in pain. He looked like he was going to throw up.

I took advantage of his condition by wrestling the gun from his hand. I had no idea who was shooting at us, but whoever it was had given me an out I intended to use.

He was still gasping and sputtering, so I drove my knee into his face, knocking him backward and to the ground. I pinned him to the ground by putting a heavy foot on his most sensitive—and probably swollen and aching—body part.

Now, it was my turn to smirk as the tables had turned, and I had the gun.

“Not so powerful now, are ya?” I sneered. “Not without your gun to protect you. In fact, without this gun here, you’re kind of a pussy, aren’t ya?”

Nicolei winced when I spat in his face and pulled the hammer on the pistol back, preparing to shoot him in the face. But I froze in my tracks when I heard a voice call from behind me.

“Don’t do it.”

My eyes widened in absolute horror. It was Ava’s voice.

Looking over my shoulder, just to be sure, I felt my heart sink into my shoes when I saw my beautiful girl standing there. She was armed with a gun she had pointed straight at Colin’s head. My cousin looked like he was ready to shit himself as he stared down the barrel of her gun, but she looked at me as she spoke.

“He doesn’t have to die, Flynn,” she said. “We can call the cops, have them take care of it from here.”

“And then I go to jail, too,” I grit out, my heart pounding. “Is that what you want?”

The look on her face softened, but only for the briefest of moments. She shook her head, a confused look on her face. She looked torn. As if she were struggling with some decision in her own mind.

“No,” she said. “Honestly, I don’t want that at all.”

“Then let me do what needs to be done. These two punks were here to kill me, so I need to take care of business. Go back to the hotel, Ava. Stay out of it,” I ordered. “Don’t worry about me, sweetheart. I can handle myself. I can handle this.”

“I can’t, Flynn,” she said. “I can’t let you do it. I can’t let you shoot that man in the face even though he very much deserves it.”

“I told you she’s a fucking fed, man. She’s goddamn FBI, brother,” Colin shouted, his voice a little shaken. “Even though she shoots like a goddamn girl.”

I stifled a chuckle when I looked over at him. He had his hands in the air and an enraged look on his face. His gun was on the ground, ten feet away from him.

“I missed on purpose, asshole,” Ava said. “I didn’t want to kill you. I just wanted to scare the shit out of you.”

“Mission accomplished,” I added. “I think he very well may have shite his pants.”

“If I wanted to, I could hit you from twice this distance with you running circles around all of us. If I wanted to.”

“See, man?” Colin said, shrugging. “She ain’t no fucking secretary.”

Between watching Nicolei and Colin, I couldn’t really look at Ava. I couldn’t see the look on her face. I wasn’t able to read her, to see if Colin was right and she was a fed. I had to admit that she did sound like a cop right then and there. She shot that goddamn gun like one, too. She wasn’t denying any of it. She just stood there, quiet, with a strange look on her face.

I wasn’t sure what to think, but if Colin was right and she was an FBI agent, there was no way I could go through with killing Nicolei. Not in front of Ava. Not in front of someone who might be a fed. Not if I wanted to keep my ass out of prison, anyway. With a sigh, I dropped the gun, but kept my foot in place, holding him to the ground. I stepped down hard for a moment, just for good measure.

“Thank you, Flynn,” Ava said.

With the gun not pointed at his face any longer, Nicolei grabbed my leg and twisted, taking me down to the ground with him. I hit my head hard against the concrete, and he lunged forward and punched me square in the face. A flash of bright light flared behind my eyes, and my head exploded in pain. Blood rushed from my nose and filled my mouth with the coppery taste of old pennies.

And even worse—he now had the upper hand.

A gunshot sounded, and for a brief second, I thought it was the gun we were wrestling over. But Nicolei looked down at me, no longer fighting, his face panicked and pained. The color leached from his face and his lips began to quiver.

His eyes widened and he slumped down to the ground beside me, screaming something unintelligible in Russian and crying out in pain.

I sat there looking at the Russian’s body and Ava, who had the gun still raised and leveled at him. She’d hit him in his side, so it wasn’t a death shot, but he was bleeding out on the ground beside me.

She rushed over to him, still keeping a wary eye on Colin. Unfortunately, he’d managed to pick up the gun while Ava had been busy dealing with Nicolei. Colin stepped toward us, his gun pointed straight at Ava. My heart lurched in my chest, and I watched as Ava froze for a moment, putting her hands up.

“Do you love her, Flynn?” Colin asked. “Even after she lied to you about who she is?”

My head was pounding, the thoughts coming at me in triple time, but I managed to push myself up off the ground.

“She lied, I lied. I think that makes us even, don’t you think, sweetheart?”

I grit my teeth as I spoke, unsure of what her actual response might be. It occurred to me that maybe this had all been a ruse. Something to get close to me and earn my confidence. Maybe she didn’t love me after all.

“Answer the goddamn question,” Colin snapped. “Do you love her?”

“Yes, I love her,” I said, looking over at Ava and feeling my heart break as she looked back at me.

“So if I kill her, it’ll hurt you?”

“Why the fuck do you want to hurt me, Colin? You’re my brother. I love you—”

“Love me? Shite. You feckin’ love having an errand boy, you mean. You love having someone to knock around because it makes you feel like a big man,” he sneered. “Don’t you remember the night you two met? I was the one talking to her until you swooped in and stole her away—just like you always do. Just like you steal everything else from me. Want to show me you love me? Kill the bitch who came between us and maybe I’ll believe you.”

His hand was shaking with unrestrained fury as he spoke, and he dropped the hand holding the gun to plead with me. The thought flashed through my mind in a heartbeat. I had a decision to make. Kill the man I thought of as a brother—or let him kill the woman I loved. Both had lied to me. Both deserved to die.

“I wouldn’t have hooked up with you anyway,” Ava said to him. “You’re not entitled to me. I don’t owe you shit, and I’m not some goddamn object to be won. And Flynn realized that—which is why he won, you asshole. He treated me like a real person, not some fucking prize.”

“No, he won because you’re an undercover cop and needed to get close to him, admit it,” Colin sneered.

Ava opened her mouth to speak but closed it quickly.

“Is that true, Ava?” I asked softly. “Are you a fed? Was it just your job to get close to me?”

“At first, yes,” she admitted, her eyes filling with tears. “But I fell in love with you, Flynn. I swear on everything I hold sacred that I did. Nothing about me telling you I love you is a lie.”

“Yet, she’s still going to turn your ass in,” Colin said. “Just watch.”

“I’m not. I can’t. Not after everything we’ve been through, Flynn,” she said, her voice cracking.

She looked away as the tears started to roll down her cheeks. I wanted to go to her, to comfort her and tell her it was going to be all right. Problem was, I didn’t know if that was true. I had no idea what she was going to do—or what I was going to do. She’d lied to me. She tried to use me to hurt the syndicate. I didn’t know what to do with that.

“I love you, Flynn.”

“I love you too, sweetheart. And I’m sorry. So fucking sorry for everything,” I said, knowing what I had to do.

Tears welled up in my own eyes as I pointed the gun and shot, closing them to avoid seeing someone I loved so much die in front of me.