Up in Smoke_A King Series Novel

by T. M. Frazier

  “I am?” Preppy’s eyes widen in shock.

  King lights a cigarette and continues. “It’s not just the girl either. You say you ain’t on no one’s side, yet you saved Preppy in the hospital. He wasn’t one of your jobs. He wasn’t your business.”

  I think about his words and reply with a half-truth. “No, but I had another job at that hospital. Didn’t need any shit going down while I was trying to move bodies from the morgue.”

  “Oh, shut the fuck up, Smokey,” Preppy says.

  I don’t have time to warn him about his upcoming death if he calls me Smokey again because the kid talks without taking a breath between sentences. Rapid fire. A tongue like a Gatling gun.

  “You didn’t have to do shit to help me, and you know it. You could have done your job without getting involved in our shit. You did it because you wanted to.”

  Fucker was right, I could have, but that didn’t mean I was going to admit it.

  “Trust me. This will go so much easier if you just admit it,” King says. “Also, it will get him to shut the fuck up faster.”

  “Admit what?” I ask, wondering exactly what this fucker is getting at.

  Preppy places his hand on my shoulder, and I glare at it like he’s just stabbed my grandma, but he ignores my unease.

  “That you loooove us,” he sings.

  “Can’t we just do this the old-fashioned way and stab each other? Or maybe a rousing game of Russian Roulette?” I ask. “That could be fun.” I down the glass of whiskey Bear hands me. “I thought you three were ruthless sons-of-bitches. Can’t we just have a shoot-out like the good old days?”

  King chuckles and shakes his head. He’s got a smile on his face that tells me he’s been there before, but there is still no way I’m admitting to anything. He adjusts the thick black studded belts he wears wrapped around his forearms. They aren’t for decoration. They’re weapons and I’ve seen a motherfucker or two meet their end with one of King’s belts wrapped around their fucking necks.

  “How about a compromise?” I ask, flicking Preppy’s hand off my shoulder.

  “What kind of compromise you thinking, darlin’?” Bear cocks his head, and much to my dismay, he seems amused rather than annoyed.

  “I’ll admit that…there are a lot of other people I’d rather kill than you three,” I offer. “It’s the best I’ve got.”

  “Sounds like Rage’s club pledge,” Preppy mutters. He straightens his bow tie and claps his hands together. He bows his head then glances back up with a huge smile on his face that seems off for someone whose been through all he has. “You dooooo love us!” he exclaims, bouncing on his heels. “I could just kiss you. Come here, you big, burly bitch.”

  Bear and King laugh as Preppy leaps into the air, heading straight for me. I sidestep, and he goes crashing onto the couch. Rebounding without missing a beat, he rolls onto his back. Smile still in place.

  “You’re way too happy for someone who’s been tortured the way you have,” I point out, taking a drag of my smoke. Bear pours out another whiskey and hands it to me. I down it in one burning gulp and hold it out for a refill which Bear obliges, this time filling it almost to the brim.

  “I know, sickening, isn’t it?” Preppy asks. He winks at me and sits up, lighting a joint. “Sometimes all you need is a smidge of torture to put shit in perspective.”

  What was really sickening was what had happened to him. Preppy should be dead. For a long time, everyone, including his friends, thought he was dead, but he survived and rejoined the land of the living. If Preppy is still smiling after all that happened to him, I should be able to smile, too. To let Frankie in. To make this shit with her more…permanent.

  “I recognize that look,” King says. I hadn’t realized I’d been staring into my whiskey.

  “What look might that be?” I ask, staring out the window into the courtyard below at the closed door of the room Frankie’s in.

  “The look that says she’s gotten to you,” Bear says, downing his own whiskey. His grin is of the shit-eating variety.

  “Some people say that a good woman can tame a man. Train him. Make him less violent,” King says. He chuckles. “It ain’t true. It makes you more violent. It makes you more everything.”

  “Ain’t that the fucking truth,” I say, taking a drag from my smoke. “Something I’ve recently learned.”

  “Says the man covered from head to toe in what I assume is someone else’s blood,” Preppy says.

  I look down. “Kind of forgot about that.”

  “Been there,” Bear says.

  “We all have,” King adds.

  “Ditto or trippilo, or some shit like that. Me, too, is what I’m trying to say,” Preppy chimes in.

  The three of them laugh, and as hard as I try not to, I can’t help the slow tremor growing in my chest and shoulders until I’m laughing right along with Bear, Preppy, and King.

  And damnit it feels good.

  Motherfuckers.

  When the laughter dies down Bear’s expression turns serious. “We’ll get this son of a bitch, Smoke. We’ll plan our attack on the compound. You’ll get your revenge, brother, and we’ll help you,” Bear says.

  I nod because I don’t know what else to say. Shit feels overwhelming. I cough into my hand.

  “We’re working on a way to get on the inside. Got our tech people examining the blueprints. We’ll burn that motherfucker down and everyone in it,” King pipes in.

  “Shit, haven’t killed anyone in a while,” Preppy purses his lips and shrugs then begins to stretch like he’s preparing to run a marathon, running in place. “Sounds like a fucking good time to me.”

  “We got you,” Bear says. “We all do.”

  The thought of finally getting my revenge and getting to keep Frankie makes me smile.

  I down another whiskey then Bear walks with me back down to the room where Frankie’s asleep. I push open the door and the smile on my face dies a quick death. My heart falls from my body.

  Frankie’s gone.

  Chapter Fifty-One

  “Okay, let’s do this,” Rage says, pulling out a long knife. She’s standing behind me in her room at the club. I’m sitting down, facing the mirror above the dresser. She turns the knife over, inspecting it. After a few seconds, she seems lost in the glint shining back at her as she rotates it again and again.

  I clear my throat, and she glances up at my reflection.

  “So how do we do this?” I ask. “Should we do a count to three? I think that’s the best waa—ouch!”

  “Or I can just do it now,” Rage sings, having already made the thin slice into my skin below my ear.

  “That works, too,” I mutter, trying not to wince in fear she’ll take the whole ear off for shits and giggles.

  Rage twists her lips while she works to shove the small device just below the skin under my ear. When she’s done, she covers the wound with a flesh colored patch that matches my skin. “That should do it.”

  “Any words of advice?” I ask, feeling terrified. I don’t want to think about the look on Smoke’s face when he realizes I’m gone. I don’t want think about anything other than the plan and what lies ahead.

  Think now.

  Feel later.

  Nothing else matters.

  Rage lifts her large blue duffle bag that says LEE COUNTY HIGH SCHOOL on the side and throws it over her shoulders. She shrugs. “Don’t die?”

  Rage opens the door, and I follow her out into the darkness of night. We reach the back gate, and she crouches down, tossing her bag through a hole in the fence before crawling through herself. “Don’t die,” I repeat to myself on a whisper. I get on my hands and knees and follow her through. “I’ll try to remember that one.”

  As we move through the dark, I focus on why we’re doing this.

  The entire reason for me leaving Smoke without telling him.

  The surveillance video image. More specifically, the corner of it I didn’t show Smoke. The part where you can see
that Griff didn’t leave Morgan’s house empty handed. He was holding a wrapped bundle of towels in his arms, but it isn’t the towels that’s fueled this mission, it’s what was peeking out from underneath them.

  A tiny pair of pink feet.

  Chapter Fifty-Two

  “You’re Rage?” Griff asks, adjusting his glasses as if it would make her morph from a girl to a guy. “I pictured someone different.”

  He’s wearing the hat. The one from the surveillance video. White with a black stripe above the brim. He’s much shorter than I imagined, but he’s got this look in his red-rimmed beady eyes. He’s unhinged. Disturbed.

  The dread moving up my stomach into my throat threatens to strangle me but I swallow it down.

  “Someone with a little more penis perhaps? I get that a lot,” Rage says, pursing her lips, giving the impression that she’s bored. She looks so unruffled. So composed. I wish I could feel that way or at least fake it better because I’m quaking from the inside out. My stomach is twisting as if it decided to take up gymnastics. But even with this level of fear coursing through me, I can’t help but notice that Rage and I make a good team.

  Griff looks amused. He sucks his top teeth and steeples his fingers. “That’s exactly what I was expecting.”

  “If a dick is what you want, I can cut one off one of your guys and give it to you. Would that make you feel better?” She pulls her blade from the sheath.

  Griff smiles. His overly tanned skin is in contrast with his too-white teeth.

  Rage, growing impatient, shoves me forward, and I fall onto the ground on my knees. My chin bounces off the concrete since my hands are bound behind my back.

  “What’s this? A gift? For me?” Griff asks, looking down at me like I’m a species of goat he’s never seen before. He places his fingers under my chin, and I jerk my head from his touch. This buys me a backhand to my cheek. I see stars.

  “Frankie Helburn,” Rage says. “Word is she stole from you. Consider her an offering to prevent the war and the deaths of my brothers that would happen if this bitch keeps hiding behind the walls of my club like a scared bird instead of taking her punishment like a woman. Now say ‘thank you’ like a good boy so I can get the fuck out of here. It’s cold and dark and dusty in this fucking place. You’re like Batman without the cool car.” She gives Griff a once over. “Or the good looks.”

  Griff ignores her insult and glances down to me. “You don’t care that I’m gonna kill her?” he asks, straightening his jacket as if it will make him better looking.

  Rage rolls her eyes and tightens her hair tie around her long blonde ponytail. “We all die, Griff. Don’t act like that’s a surprise to you. We’re all just biding our time until we meet the dirt again. I’m just buying us a little more time is all. One in exchange for many. I hear that’s how morals work. I’m giving it a shot. Do we have an agreement? The bitch for laying off my club?”

  Griff places his hand under his chin and pauses for a moment. “We have a deal.”

  Another man comes up and yanks me off the floor, roughly pushing me across the room and tethering me to a small metal chair.

  Rage doesn’t look in my direction when I yelp as he tightens the knot on my wrists, cutting off my circulation.

  “You don’t care that Smoke won’t be happy with this revelation?” Griff asks curiously. His voice is high-pitched for a man’s. He sounds like a grandmother from Queens.

  “I don’t know what you’ve heard, but there’s bad blood between me and Smoke,” Rage says. “I know people think I abandoned him. Just packed up and left, but he’s the one who broke up the team. He left me so he didn’t have to split the paycheck two ways anymore. So, you see? There’s no love lost between us. I’m looking forward to seeing his face when I tell him I’m the one who brought his bitch back to the kennel. But Smoke’s mine. To kill, to let live. He’s mine. That’s part of this deal.”

  “Search her,” Griff orders suddenly.

  I’m hoisted out of my chair and patted down. There are hands and fingers everywhere, and I mean everywhere. My eyes water from the painful intrusions.

  Rage still looks bored, buffing her nails on her pink t-shirt that reads WHITE GIRL WASTED until they toss me back down onto the chair with such force my tailbone stings.

  “We done here?” Rage smooths down her ponytail and taps her foot impatiently.

  “We’re done here,” Griff says after his men give him a nod that assures him I’ve got nothing hidden on my person. “It was a pleasure.”

  “It was creepy as fuck for me,” Rage turns, her blondness swaying back and forth as she makes her way out the same way she brought me in until I hear the roll of the heavy door.

  Griff kneels before me and runs a fat finger across my throat. My skin crawls, and bile rises in my throat as I flinch away, but he holds me still by grabbing my throat and squeezing until I can’t pull in air.

  “You and I are going to have so much fun,” he grinds out.

  My last thought is of Smoke on the porch of the house in the prison, puffing on a cigar, strangling the neck of a whiskey bottle. I focus on his laugh as everything around me turns fuzzy and gray at the edges.

  “You don’t know a lot about me, do you?” Griff asks, he pulls out a switch blade. He lets up on my throat so I can answer. I pull in a deep breath.

  “I know that you buy and trade human beings like baseball cards,” I say.

  Griff smiles proudly. “True, but there’s more to me than that, my dear. Did you know my mother was a midwife? For many years, she delivered babies, and I was her little helper. That’s how I was able to cut the child from Morgan’s womb. That’s how I was able to keep it alive.

  “You’re a fucking monster,” I say. I’m vibrating with rage.

  “I have no interest in being the hero of the story. Quite the opposite. I am only interested in being the one with the most money in the end. Morgan was asking Smoke to leave the business. I couldn’t let that happen, could I? He’s too valuable to me. But now, you’ve ruined everything. You’ve stolen my money, and I’ve lost my best man. You, you little bitch, have thrown out the anchor and you’re making this ship drag. I don’t like to drag.”

  Griff runs the blade across my cheek, blood drips to my chin. “Where the fuck is my money?” he growls.

  “I used it to pay mercenaries to stop your trading of lives.”

  Griff raises the blade above my head.

  “But not all of it. I’ve hidden a big chunk where no one but me can find it. It’s not in one place. I’ve spread it around. I can get it back, though” I say with shaky words.

  Griff rolls his eyes. “Like I’d allow you near a fucking computer after all the damage you’ve done. I’m not that fucking stupid. Besides, I don’t fucking believe you.”

  “I’m telling you the truth. I’ve got nothing to lose,” I say. “Not anymore anyway. Kill me if I’m lying.”

  Griff thinks. “No, you won’t do it.” My hope sinks. “Leo, my nephew. He’ll do it. You’ll just tell him where to look. Leo!”

  I’m looking at the floor at bright white sneakers. I lift my head. Khaki pants. I look higher. Bright green polo. Higher still. Bright white smile. Curly blonde hair.

  “Duke?”

  Chapter Fifty-Three

  I push my bike to its limit. The engine growls at me as I lean forward, willing it to go faster. The wind stings against my skin, but it won’t slow me down.

  Nothing will slow me down.

  Not now, not ever.

  Revenge has fueled me for so long. The thought of taking the life from the person who’d taken lives from me. Revenge is the ultimate decision maker. The one thing I thought that could turn a rational man into the devil himself. I was a step closer to the devil than most men already, but I know now it’s not revenge that makes the sane insane.

  It’s love.

  For love, I’m willing to burn down the world and everyone in it.

  For Frankie, I’ll destroy, maim, and aven
ge until I’m swimming laps in the blood of those who dared to lay hands on her.

  The landscape passes me by in a blur. I can’t see it even if I slow down. I can only see one thing right now and one thing only.

  Frankie.

  It’s fueling me to go faster, push harder, and fight the wind to get to her.

  The thought of her smile, her laugh, her heart, her body. Her everything I didn’t deserve but can’t imagine ever living without.

  Please be alive, Frankie. Please be FUCKING alive!

  Chapter Fifty-Four

  “It’s gonna take some time, Uncle Griff,” Duke says, but he’s not really Duke. Griff had called him Leo.

  I’m in a state of shock when I’m pulled up and dragged to another room. One lined with a wall of computers and another with a server just as large. Fans blow on them from the ceiling.

  The ties at my feet have been cut, but my hands are still bound.

  “But can you do it?” Griff asks, his jaw ticking impatiently.

  Duke looks from me to Griff. “Of course.”

  “Good, you have two hours.” Griff turns his back and leaves the room. “Or you’re both dead.”

  Duke lifts me up by my elbow and pushes me into a chair. “Shocked?” Duke asks, firing up the center computer and taking the seat next to me.

  “Why?” is all I can ask.

  “Coincidence if you can believe it. I didn’t realize you were my Uncle’s enemy number one until he asked me to break into your house and install the cameras in the basement after you were taken from school that day by that cop.”

  “He’s not a cop.”

  “I know that now,” he says.

  “Since when are you good at computers?” I ask. “Didn’t you fail your computer course last semester.”

  “I guess I’m like you in that way,” Duke says, flashing me a sad smile. “Hiding in plain sight.”

  He turns back to the computer, and for a second, I feel bad for Duke. I don’t know all the details, but from where I stand, he might be just as much a victim as I am.