“And our newest member?”
“He went to watch Savage’s back.” Absinthe placed the wall Master and Player had built for him made up of wood with a multitude of small holes set at different heights across from the children. “Someone had to, and we had this gig. Savage knew he couldn’t get back in time.”
“I’ll just bet he went to watch Savage’s back. He’s probably just like Savage, needing to fight in the clubs and then go after the women.”
“There’s nothing wrong with Savage, Alena,” Absinthe said, keeping his voice low. “Any more than the rest of us. He thinks there isn’t any hope for him, but he’s saved my life more than once. I resented him for it too. I resented you.”
“I had to save you, Absinthe. You were starving yourself to death.” Her voice dripped with tears. She didn’t pretend to misunderstand him, although the confrontation had been so many years earlier. “None of us could let you go. You’re part of my soul. Part of all our souls.”
“I know that now. I just didn’t know that then.” He slung his arm around her neck and brushed her cheek with his lips. “Thank you for saving my life. I didn’t appreciate it then, but I do now. And just so you know, Savage is a good man regardless of what he thinks about himself. I see inside of him and I know what’s there. He might have to battle demons in his mind, but in his soul, where it counts, he’s golden.”
Alena glanced down at her hands. “I didn’t mean to imply I thought Savage was wrong for what he does. We all have our strange needs. They seem right to us, but weird to everyone else.” She shrugged. “He’s my brother. I guess, someday, Destroyer will fit with us too.” She didn’t sound as if she believed what she was saying.
“He didn’t grow up with us, Alena, so it’s bound to be much more difficult to accept him. That will come. Savage said Destroyer didn’t shirk at all. That he took his back and no matter what was required of him, he did it without flinching. Although, I think both of them were more scared of these kids than they were of fucking up six members of the Venomous club.”
Alena laughed and turned with him back to Emily and Jimmy. Absinthe sat down in front of the children and picked up one of the rocks, letting it slip through his fingers again and again to drop into his palm. “When we were kids, even younger than you, some very bad people murdered our parents and took us to an awful place so they could do bad things to us.”
They had agreed that in order for the children to identify with them, particularly Jimmy, they would have to allow the children to know the same things had happened to them. They didn’t know how to whitewash anything. They didn’t have social graces or know how to talk gently to children. No one read them bedtime stories. They were going to try to help these children, but they were doing it their way. Bluntly. Following their path. What had helped them.
“Everyone has to decide for themselves what they’re going to do when they find themselves in a situation where someone takes them from their home and family. We decided we needed to fight back. Czar taught us how. He was just a boy himself, but he figured things out using what we had right there. That’s why he’s president of Torpedo Ink and we all look up to him and listen to what he says.”
Emily nodded. “That’s why he’s our dad, right, Absinthe?”
“That’s right, baby. And that’s why you always listen to what Czar says. His word is law. You don’t keep things from him. You always tell him the truth. He can figure it out, even when you’re scared. He might look scary mean, but he always comes up with a solution.”
Emily nodded. “He kisses me good night. So does Mama Blythe.” She squeezed Jimmy’s hand. “They make things better.”
Absinthe nodded. “Like I said, we didn’t have much, we were just little kids, but we developed some wicked skills and I’m going to teach you those and the progression of each of the weapons you can make and how to use them if you need to.”
That got Jimmy’s entire attention. He suddenly turned his gaze fully on Absinthe. The kid was heartbreaking. He could see why Czar and Blythe were desperate enough to want Torpeko Ink to find a way to help them break through to the boy. He’d been taken by a man called “the Collector” and sold to a very wealthy pedophile who kept him for six years. Torpedo Ink had discovered him when Jimmy had been put up for auction online and they set out to find him and retrieve him.
The Collector found single parents, men or women without too many family members and very young children, babies even, took pictures of the toddlers and made up brochures. Those went out to exclusive websites, specifically those of very wealthy clients looking for children they could have without fear of interference. If they chose one of the Collector’s toddlers, he murdered the family, took the child and was paid a fortune. Jimmy came from the Collector. The boy was new to the family. He’d only been with them a few short months and was still very nervous and unbelieving that he was safe.
Alena sank into the grass beside Absinthe. “The cool thing about these weapons is no one can ever detect that you even have them on you. Not ever. We started this way, with just little rocks and acorns to practice with until we became so accurate, we never miss. Never. And you won’t either, if you practice the way we did.”
She picked up one of the rocks, still sitting, half turned and sent the rock flying so fast it hummed in the air and shot right through one of the holes.
Emily and Jimmy both gasped, eyes widening and then exchanged grins. Jimmy reached down and picked up one of the rocks, his fingers moving over the smooth surface.
“Czar would have penalized me for showing off. We were never supposed to make any noise. Not ever. You don’t give yourself away. You don’t want your prey to ever suspect you. You’re the child. The innocent. Even if you’re the only one in the room that could have done it, you have to perfect the look of innocence. Never be smug. Never have an ego. Never brag. Never show off. Never tell anyone that is not one of the brothers. That means Torpedo Ink. That’s who you are. Torpedo Ink. This is your family and it always will be. What we say here stays here with us.”
Emily nodded solemnly. “That’s what Daddy Czar tells us all the time, right, Jimmy?”
Jimmy nodded. He looked as if he might say something, but he didn’t make a sound.
“So, what we’re going to do now,” Absinthe said, “is start practicing. Emily has the red rocks because that’s her favorite color. Soleil painted them for you. She put all those pretty little flowers on them, Emily. You’ll be able to tell they’re yours. You have twelve of them. Jimmy, you like blue. You’ve met Soleil. She’s married to Ice. She painted the ocean on all of your rocks because Blythe told her you like the ocean. Each rock is varied, but all of them have various shades of blue and the ocean is acting different. You also have twelve.”
Alena and Absinthe moved back out of the way.
“You’re going to take turns throwing. You want to use a quick pitch, side arm. That’s the first throw you’re going to learn. At first your rock might not get to the wall and it can be frustrating. That’s okay,” Alena continued. “The point is to learn the arm movement. I’ll help you with that. You need that very slight movement, so no one notices. You can actually practice it without anything in your hand. It just helps to have the rock in your palm. Sometimes, hold it without letting anyone see it.” She demonstrated, concealing the rock in her fist and making the quick flick with her arm and wrist.
“Emily,” Absinthe said. “You try.”
Emily nodded solemnly and did her best. It was clear Jimmy couldn’t wait to make his try. For being so young, the two stuck at it far longer than Absinthe thought they would. By the time the hour was up, they were actually hitting the wall with their rocks.
“What you’re learning today, girls, is seemingly not a lesson in self-defense, but it really is. It’s important to know. I’m going to tell you straight up that if you’re caught using what we teach you for anything you shouldn’t, like shoplifting, or stealing for personal gain, we will be very disappointed
in you and the club will punish you in ways you don’t ever want to know about. Am I making myself clear?” Ink said.
Nicia and Siena, Max’s two girls, and Zoe, Czar’s daughter—all three stared at him with wide eyes and nodded their heads solemnly, looking like they might faint. Ice had to turn his head away to keep from smiling. His little Zoe was always so somber. Nicia and Siena were as well. Ink could look very scary with his tattoos and his frowns.
“You need to learn to pick pockets. There might be times when someone will take your identity, or you will have to know theirs but will want to return it without them knowing. You have to be so good that you won’t get caught. That means you have to be able to take a wallet or remove a weapon from anywhere on your enemy without them feeling you take it,” Ink continued. “That’s what you’ll be practicing today.”
Storm unveiled the three dummies they’d hung from several trees—two men and a woman. One was dressed in a business suit. One in jeans, T-shirt and vest. One in a dress with a purse. All of them had a multitude of bells hanging from various pockets and lapels.
“We have a list of items each of you will have to retrieve from each of the dummies without ringing the bells,” Ice said. “I’m going to show you how to do it and then, one by one, you’re going to try it. It can be frustrating, but the idea is to have fun with it. Don’t get upset when you’re not perfect first time out. Zoe, you always think you have to know what you’re doing immediately. This isn’t like that. It’s a skill, which means it takes practice. You have to do it over and over to be good at it. Absinthe said you’ll need to practice over the next two weeks before coming back to show us how good you are at it.”
The three girls followed Ice to the first dummy and watched while he retrieved each item Storm called out to him to take from the “businessman.”
“Each of you are wearing the jeans Lana sent you ahead of time,” Maestro said. “At least you’d better be, or you can leave class now.” He looked at the four kids sitting in the grass in front of him, waiting to see if any of them had disobeyed the dictates of the email that had been sent along with the delivery.
No one moved. Maestro nodded. “Good. We might as well just get to it. I know that Czar and Max have worked with you on shooting various guns. We’ll train with knives, but today we’re going to be working with garrotes. Lana sewed one into either seam along the sides of your jeans. The garrote is very thin and rarely can be detected.”
Benito, Max’s son, broke out into a huge smile, exchanging grins with Kenny, Czar’s son. “Cool,” Benito said. He felt along his jeans. Kenny did the same.
“It can’t be detected,” Maestro repeated, “otherwise it’s useless to you.”
“Is there a problem, girls?” Lana challenged as Darby and Lucia exchanged a look of concern. “If you would prefer to be excused, you can be. You don’t have to learn this. Blythe and Czar made it a point that these lessons aren’t mandatory.”
Darby shook her head. “I want to learn. It’s just that Blythe is so cautious with us all the time …” She trailed off. “I definitely want to learn.”
“Me too,” Lucia said.
“All of you, stand up,” Preacher said, not waiting for any more explanations. “This takes finesse, not a bulldozer, Benito. You have to have the fingers of a pickpocket. You have learned how to pickpocket?” He made that half a question, half a statement. “If not, you need to go to the class Ice, Storm and Ink are teaching. You have to have that light a hand. No one can suspect you because you use this only in dire circumstances or if you’re …”
Reaper cleared his throat and Preacher broke off abruptly. They weren’t going to talk about assassination. That had been discussed ahead of time.
“We’re going to teach the art of retrieval and then how to actually use a garrote. Of course, you won’t be working with an actual garrote,” Preacher continued. “We don’t want anyone to accidentally kill Benito—er, someone.”
Lucia laughed and nudged her brother with her hip. “Your reputation has preceded you, little brother.”
“Drop your hand casually down to your side so that just your fingertips rest on the top of the seam of your jeans. You have to do this by feel. There will be a couple of stitches open. You have to be able to feel that with the pads of your fingers. Just rub back and forth until you feel it. Once you feel it on one side, do the same on the other with your opposite hand. Switch back and forth between sides until you’re confident you can find those open stitches fast with either hand,” Preacher instructed.
The four teens spent some time going back and forth feeling for the stitches. It was much harder than it sounded. A swipe over the top of a seam with the pad of one’s finger didn’t always allow for distinguishing at a quick feel the absence of a thread. One had to be very sensitive. It took the teens longer than they expected and they really had to slow down, concentrate, feel and then learn to do the same on the side they weren’t as strong on.
“You have to build up both sides of your body. You can’t just rely on being right-handed or left-handed. You don’t know when you might be pinned down on your strong side. Or shot on that side. You always have to be prepared to use either hand,” Lana said. “Once you get a feel for the absence of the stitches, you have to very gently use two fingers to push in and stroke upward. The ring is very small, but it’s there and will slide through that hole. It has to twist as it comes through. You have to find the trick to move it with that pushing in and sliding upward and then twisting in one motion. You should feel the ring with the pads of your fingers.”
“Retrieving that ring is the most difficult part,” Reaper added. “It takes patience. No one does it the first time.”
“No one even feels it first time,” Maestro added. “The idea is you have to practice over the next two weeks until you get it. When you come back, we’ll expect that you can do it. You’ll also need to be able to rethread the garrote back into the seam.”
Benito let out a snort of derision. “Lucia can do that.”
Instantly Maestro spun around and took a menacing step toward him. “Why would Lucia do that for you? Are you incapable of doing it for yourself?”
“No.” Benito drew himself up. “She’s a girl.”
“So you’re telling us that threading a garrote into your clothing is beneath you? That women are somehow a lower status than men?” Maestro took another step toward him and he wasn’t alone. Preacher and Reaper formed a solid wall with Maestro.
“What makes you think you’re so damn much better than a woman? Because you have a fuckin’ penis hangin’ between your legs?” Reaper demanded. “We’re one family. Torpedo Ink. Not one of us is better than the next. We treat our women with respect. Alena or Lana can take out an enemy with the same skill as any one of the brothers.”
“You don’t get that, Benito, you’re not worth much to Torpedo Ink,” Maestro snapped. “We’re a family. We don’t put one member down. We don’t make them less. We never make them feel less. You need to be able to thread a garrote into your own fuckin’ jeans just like Lucia has to be able to load her own gun. Essentially, it’s the same thing. But don’t you ever make the mistake of thinking you’re more than a woman, because you aren’t.”
Benito nodded his head several times. “I’m sorry, Maestro. I tease my sister all time. I don’t mean it. I really don’t. I used to, but Max says the same as you, that we’re equal, and never to think that way, so I don’t.”
“Then stop teasing that way,” Maestro counseled. “If you tease that way, you might start thinking that way again.”
Benito nodded again. “I hear you.”
“Keep practicing, everyone,” Lana said. “We’ve only got a few more minutes so let’s get on to the actual way a garrote is used. It isn’t as easy as it looks in the movies. There’s a bit of a trick to it, especially if there’s a height difference. We’re going to use just some thin tubing so I can show you how it works, and you can practice with your partner. They’
ll sit in the grass in front of you.”
Lana demonstrated on Preacher and then each of the instructors sat in front of one of the students and directed them step by step.
“What in the world is going on here?” Blythe’s voice was a mixture of amusement, outrage and resignation.
“Please tell me you are not teaching these children to use a garrote,” Airiana, Benito’s adopted mother demanded. She shook her head and lifted her eyes to the sky. “That is the last thing that boy needs to know how to do.”
“Ice, Storm and Ink were teaching the girls to pick-pocket,” Blythe said.
“Naturally,” Absinthe said, coming up behind them. “They have to be able to take away a weapon, keys, anything that will help them escape. They have to feel empowered. That’s what turned us around. Especially Jimmy. He really responded to feeling as if he might be able to control something, anything. That’s what Czar did for us. That’s what we are doing for them.”
Absinthe deliberately moved back away from the teens so the two women would follow him. “We make certain to tell them never to use what they learn outside of defending themselves from predators. We tell them Czar is the boss. He’s the go-to man with the answers. We don’t go outside our families. But they have to feel empowered. These are children who have had their parents and brothers and sisters murdered. They were brutalized. Their innocence torn from them. They can’t get that back as much as you want them to. You couldn’t reach them your way. You asked us to help you. We’re trying to do that. Give us the chance.”
Blythe took a deep breath and looked across the field. Jimmy and Emily were throwing rocks at a wall with holes in it, showing Zoe and Airiana’s two girls what they could do. The girls immediately pleaded to try. Zoe managed to get one rock through a hole. Jimmy jumped up and down and smiled at her.
“He’s never smiled before. Never.” She bit her lip. “Okay. I’ll trust Czar’s judgment.”
Airiana sighed. “Benito is a little demon child already. I suppose Max will just have to watch over him. He’s going to laugh about this.” She shook her head and walked off the field, following Blythe.
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