SWNOVELS Fear The Reapers: Chapter 2
“To what do we owe the pleasure?” Atlas asked, leaning into the blue crushed velvet seat.
His dark eyes meticulously grazed the man standing before us as his thumb mindlessly twirled the ring on his middle finger. It was mental manipulation at its finest and At was doing a hell of a job of fucking with the man.
To the untrained eye, his casual posture came off relaxed, bored even. But simmering below the surface was an insurmountable amount of pressure. I could see it in the slight tick of his jaw and the tension radiating off his shoulders. He sat poised and ready to strike at the idiot requesting our audience.
“I… I have something to offer the four of you,” the dick mumbled, “as payment for my debt.”
“Interesting.” Cyrus noted, his eyes trained on the twitching junkie that stood before us. “We don’t know you. You don’t know us. So how is it you owe us something?”
How he emphasized the word “us” had the man nearly shitting himself. At this point they were toying with him, like children playing with their food. Everyone in this town knew that if you so much as spoke ill of The Reapers, you were as good as dead. This motherfucker had to have a death wish for showing up at our club unannounced.
“I, uh… know Johnny. Your dealer on the west side of town? I’ve come into a little debt with him and he… uh… one time when he was high off his ass, he told me where I could find you.”
Johnny was a dead man for two reasons. One, he sent this asshole to Hell’s Tavern to find us, and two, he sampled the product. Our club was our sanctuary, and we hired our employees under one condition; they stayed clean. Johnny fucked up, and by the murderous look in Ezra’s eyes, Johnnyboy’s hours were dwindling.
“And the canary finally sings.” Atlas mocked, standing up from his seat. The man eyed his every move and I could almost taste the fear that oozed out of him. Atlas’ hands moved to smooth the wrinkles in his jacket before reaching into his pocket and pulling out his phone.
“Ez,” he said, grabbing my older brother’s attention, “he’s all yours. The rest of us need to make a few arrangements.”
By arrangements, he meant tracking down Johnny’s ass. Drug distribution was just one of the many businesses our syndicate ran, and to put it bluntly, keeping track of a dealer was beneath our pay grade. But Johnny made himself our problem. If he was talking freely to this asshole, who knows who else he was talking to. We needed to send a message and nothing compared to the personalized ones we hand-delivered.
At the mention of his name, Ezra leaped to his feet and stalked towards his new prey, cracking his neck as a smile brimming with malice spread across his face.
“Ple… Please! Wait!” The man cried, waving his arms around frantically. “It’s an excellent offer, take it and I’ll leave town and never say a word of this to anyone.”
His pleas fell on deaf ears as Ezra’s movements didn’t falter. Ezra enjoyed the hunt almost as much as he enjoyed the kill, and this man looked like he’d be stupid enough to put up a fight. Poor fuck had no clue fighting back would only intensify Ez’s torture.
“I… man… please.” The man pleaded, his blown-out eyes frantically darting between the four of us.
Maybe it was the smell of desperation that wafted towards us the moment he entered the club. Maybe it was just my morbid curiosity. But I wanted to see what he offered.
Cuing them all in on my thoughts, I cleared my throat and nodded towards the man. I wasn’t one for words, especially around strangers, but my brothers understood. The subtle message was all they needed to figure out where my head was at. It was the dynamic we’d always had, even before the stutter.
The one thing you can rely on in life is family. It was the reason we kept our leadership small, with each of the four of us heading different aspects of the business. We had a chain of command for whatever remedial tasks we needed, but we only truly trusted each other. That small circle of trust was the key to sustaining our power over Caspian Hills for the last six years.
“It’s not every day that a meth-head comes looking for us.” Ezra hissed as he approached the man cowering beneath him. “This offer of yours better be worth your life. I was looking forward to watching your pathetic body bleed out.”
The man’s face inadvertently ticked when the word “meth-head” tumbled into his ears. The term clearly bothered him and I smirked to myself at the irony. He was high off his ass, not giving a fuck about jeopardizing his own life by being here, but still cared about what complete strangers thought of him. The fragility in his eyes was almost humanizing. Almost.
The world is full of sinners, some are just better at keeping their sins hidden from view. While men like Malcolm were desperate to conceal their flaws, my brothers and I took on a more unapologetic approach.
We were brutal business men and when the time called for it, lethal killers. Did we deny it? Of course not. We embraced our demons, bathed in the blood we spilled, and lived up to our fucking reputation. That’s how my brothers and I earned the name The Reapers. People knew that when we came for you, death was calling and your time was up.
Caspian Hills was ours, and no one was stupid enough to fuck with what was ours. The men who tried didn’t live long enough to gloat about it.
The man standing before us had willingly walked into a lion’s den. He was either incredibly brave or remarkably stupid. Based on the interaction so far, I was betting on the latter, with or without the meth that was probably coursing through his system.
“I have someone for you. A girl.” The man stammered, smiling eagerly.
I had no clue why this man thought offering a girl to us would change his fate. In our world, women were a dime a dozen. People either wanted to be us or they wanted to fuck us. We emanated power and even if they didn’t know who we were or what we did for a living, they could sense that shit from a mile away.
“We don’t deal in flesh.” Atlas glowered, giving the man a look of utter disgust. The sheer force of his words wiped the man’s stupid smirk off his face.
“She’s worth it.” He pleaded, his body trembling. “Blonde bombshell. She’ll do anything you tell her. She’ll earn her keep. Th..th-think of her as an investment that keeps on giving. I ran it by Johnny and he wanted her for himself, but I knew you were the ones with the actual power here.”
Fuck. We now had a dilemma on our hands. If we didn’t take what he offered, Johnny would run his stupid mouth, if he hadn’t already, and word would spread across town that The Reapers had gone soft. We didn’t want that kind of publicity. Not when The Diaz Cartel was hungry for ammo to use against us. Tired of slumming it in Caspian Valley, they were looking for any cracks in our foundation.
We could kill the bastard here and now. I could practically see Ez’s demon begging for the bloodshed, but then we’d have a bigger mess to clean up and frankly, the asshole wasn’t worth the hassle.
Taking the girl would send a message and help cement the fact that we always collected our debts. She’d stay with us until we grew bored with her and as long as she did nothing stupid to get herself killed, we’d let her go once the dust settled. We’d solidify our reputation and our men wouldn’t have another body to bury. No harm, no foul. Looking towards my brothers, I could see that they were all slowly drawing the same conclusion.
“Okay, asshole.” Atlas boomed, tossing a business card on to the coffee table. “Send the girl to this address at midnight tonight and disappear. If we see your face again, we will kill you. If you try to escape without fulfilling your end of the deal, we will kill you. Understand?”
The man nodded his head rapidly as he grabbed the card, stuffed it into his pocket, and scrambled for the exit.
“Not so fast.” Cyrus ordered, halting the man’s jerky movements.
“Ez, he’s all yours.” Atlas mumbled without sparing the man another glance.
“Wha- wait, I thought we had a deal?” The man cried, getting hysterical.
“Oh, we do and you better deliver.” Cyrus interjected, tilting his head slightly. “You didn’t honestly think you could come here uninvited and leave unharmed, did you? I know you’re a meth-head, but you can’t be that fucking stupid.”
The man’s eyes grew wide as terror raked through his entire body. Ez relished in his fear, flashing a wicked smile as he stalked towards the man. We all stood up and moved to get a closer look.
The unmistakable smell of piss filled the room as the trembling man backed himself up against a wall. I felt for whoever had to clean that shit up.
Blow after blow, Ezra pounded into the man’s clammy flesh until his own scarred knuckles bursted from the force. The man’s brow had split open and I could see the bruises already forming on his sickly pale skin. The man’s legs had given out on him and he crumpled to the floor in a heap of bones and bloodied flesh as he desperately tried to block Ez’s savage blows.
“Let this be a reminder, you piece of shit.” Ezra spat, wiping the sticky mixture of blood and sweat from his brow. “Never fuck with The Reapers.”
He gave him one last punishing kick to the gut before walking away with a little skip. Ezra looked elated as he made his way back towards us. It would’ve seemed shocking to those that didn’t know him, but there was nothing Ezra enjoyed more than pure, unfiltered violence.
“Hell,” Ezra quipped, looking at the blood splatter all over his black oxfords, “that’s my third ruined pair this month.”
“Maybe you need to switch up your finishing move?” Cyrus joked, nudging me with his elbow.
“Nah, you boys love a good splash show.” Ez said with a wink. “I can’t disappoint the fans.”
“You’re a s… sick fuck.” I mused, shaking my head.
Ez blew us a kiss as he headed back to the lounge, making me and Cyrus chuckle. The fucker was the craziest one out of all of us, and that was really saying something.
“Alright, dickheads.” Atlas spoke up, garnering all of our attention, “That’s enough action for the evening. Let’s get back to business, shall we?”
As security dragged the man’s unconscious body away, we all retook our seats in the back of our low lit VIP area as if nothing happened.
It was just after 5:00 PM and the club didn’t open for another few hours. That gave us plenty of time to get the floors cleaned and have the guards prepare our house for our newest asset.
Poor thing had no clue that her piece of shit pimp had just sold her freedom. No idea that her mind, body, and soul no longer belonged to her.
If we were better men, we’d let her go. Unfortunately for her, my brothers and I were never raised to be good men.