11
Damien
To say it’s been a rough two weeks is a bit of an understatement. It’s been challenging indeed, and it just continues to get worse and worse as each day passes. Ezra and I are now married. She’s my wife, which means the agency can’t send someone to kill her. So, here I was sitting in James' office getting the third degree.
“Have you lost your goddamn mind, Damien?!” James shouts, pacing back and forth while I sit in the chair opposite his desk and watch him impassively. “How could you marry her?! What the hell were you thinking!” James stops at glares at me before he continues pacing again, shaking his head furiously. “This is not how we do things here, Damien. You had an order to terminate. Do you have any idea what you’ve gone and done? The client will not let you live. Either of you!” He barks, slamming his hands down on the desk. “And you killed Sebastian!”
“No, you did. You signed his death warrant the second you sent him after me. He attacked me in my home. Did you honestly think I would let him live?” James glares at me and pinches the bridge of his nose and goes back to his pacing. “If the client wants to sic his dogs on me, let him. And you can tell him this for free, he or anyone else that comes after Ezra. I won’t only kill him; I’ll pick off every family member one at a time until there’s nothing left.”
“How can you trust her? If she runs home to Hugo, we’ll have Mexico’s biggest cartel on our asses, Damien!” James barks irritably.
“I can control Ezra. She won’t say a word. If I suspect she will betray me, I will kill her myself.” I assure him, but he shakes his head, evidently unconvinced. He places his hand on his desk and looks at me closely.
“What the hell are you thinking? You should have told me your plan, Damien.”
“Why, so you can stop me?” I ask incredulously, and James looks at me steeply. “I don’t kill innocents, and you damn well know it. That wasn't anywhere in my contract, and I don’t like surprises.” I tell him seriously, and James shakes his head.
“This girl is trouble,” James states. “She’s going to change you. She will get you killed. Mark my words.” A hot surge of anger courses through me at his words. I pull out my knife and impale it into the desk between his splayed fingers, and glare at him hard.
“No one has the power to change me or control me. No one. Not you, not Ezra.” I tell him, ensuring he hears the gravity in my tone when I speak. “Get the word out. Ezra Quintero is married and not be touched. Are we clear?”
James stares down at the knife wedged between his fingers and lifts his gaze to meet mine. He nods in agreement and straightens before he picks up a file and tosses it at me. “Jasper sent this for you. It’s the names and location of the people that pulled the trigger on your parents.” I glare at the file in my hands and feel my heart jackhammering in my chest. Fucking finally. I open the file and scan through the information Jasper has gathered. I pick up the photos of both the men and stare at them.
“Mom, mommy, please get up. MOMMY!”
I shake off the memory of the moment I lost everything and stand up. I’ve been waiting for this moment for a very long time.
“Damien—” I get up swiftly and walk to the door.
“I’ll be in touch.” I walk out of his office and get in my Audi RS5. I sat there, looking down at the file in my hands. I need to prepare for the shit storm that’s about to come my way, but first, I’ve got some pressing unfinished business to attend to.
“Zane and Aaron. I truly hope you’re enjoying your last day on earth because you’re about to meet the devil himself, and I’m your one-way ticket straight to the deepest core of hell.” I slide my shades on and drive to the address listed on the paperwork.
* * *
“It won’t takeme long. I can see at least three street cameras.” I inform Jasper and hear him typing away on his side.
“I’m on it.”
“And you’re sure he lives alone?” I ask once more to be certain, and Jasper utters an ‘mhm’ while he works.
“Yes, the man is an alcoholic, and his wife left him a year ago. No children, no other family members that I could locate. The only person he seems to have a connection with is Zane.” I nod and eye the small house up ahead. I slid out the magazine to my handgun and checked the ammo before I slide it back and look at the house again. It was a small, beaten-down two-bedroom house with an unkempt front yard.
“All right, bro, you are good to go,” Jasper informs me, and I nod and drive down the street till I’m further away from the house. It was getting dark, so it wouldn’t be too difficult to sneak around the back without being seen. Usually, this would be a job I’d complete with a sniper gun, clean and tidy but not this time. No, I want him to know who I am. I want to see the light go out in his eyes when I pump his fucking skull with led. I quietly make my way through the backyard, press my back against the wall and look through the window and see the fucker in his lazy boy with a beer in his hand, watching tv.
I pull my black leather gloves on before I knock on the door and wait for him to get off his fat ass and open the door. I hear the door unlock, and he pulls the door open, and when he sees no one standing at the door, he pokes his head out. “What the…”
I grab his throat firmly, his eyes go wide with alarm, and I force him back into the house, kicking the door shut and press my gun to his temple. “Evening.” I greet and push him into the lazy-boy he was lounging in.
“Whoa, who the fuck are you? What do you want?” He sputters, his brown eyes wide and curious, while his gaze flickers from mine to the gun I was pointing at his head.
“Who am I?” I repeat and smirk darkly, taking off my shades and tucking them into the hem of my black t-shirt. “I’m the mother-fucking-devil and your worse fucking nightmare.”
“I don’t understand?” He utters in a flurry, holding his hands up when I cock my gun, glaring at him penetratingly.
“You will,” I state calmly and let my eyes roam around the house. “Sixteen years ago, you walked into an apartment on 83rd and shot two people in the head. Adrian Saunders and his wife Emilie. You remember that?”
Aaron blanches and shakes his head. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. I didn’t kill anyone.” He denies. I bite my bottom lip and swing my arm, punching him hard in the face; he flies back into his seat and groans.