And that wasn’t me being a chicken shit either.
The Russians were cunts. Dirty fuckers with no honor. No code. And, without a code of conduct, there might as well have been rabid jackals roaming the streets.
But as allies? I was honor bound to take action.
Honor bound to do as Mariska had made me promise—take care of her girls.
Speaking of ‘no code,’ my phone beeped with an incoming message, one I read when there was a lull in the traffic.
Lyanov: Svetlana Vasov’s pregnant. Antoni’s crowing about it. Says it’s a boy.
Shit.
That was going to fuck with my timeline.
Me: Appreciate the intel. Keep me in the loop.
I’d been sowing seeds for a long while in the Russian camp, and with this one revelation, the fortune I’d spent might have just paid for itself.
Arriving back in the city faster than anticipated, I was glad to have shaved off some minutes—time was precious at the moment. As was the element of surprise—and Lyanov’s news had put the wind up my ass and my foot firmly on the accelerator pedal.
As I pulled up alongside Elemental, a valet appeared, hovering in place as I opened the door when the coast was clear, and dangled the keys for him to snatch. Using a valet meant I’d have to sweep my car for bugs later, but it was better than having to park in the sardine cans they called parking lots in this space-poor neighborhood.
I didn’t need to warn the kid that I’d have his head if he scratched the paint job. The second his eyes collided with mine, his gulp told me he knew who I was.
Most people in the city were aware of the O’Donnellys. Especially this close to our home turf—Hell’s Kitchen.
The kid swallowed once more as he reached for the keys, and I let them drop into his palm before I rounded the fender and stared up at the club.
It was on the border between our territory and the Famiglia’s, but ever since the Satan’s Sinners’ MC had joined our side in the war against the Italians, their hacker had joined forces with my brother, Conor, and had started stirring shit with their gambling businesses. Shutting down casinos, draining the bank accounts of their illegal gambling dens, sending cops to their whale poker games on massive busts...
Their losses were approaching the eight figures—that was how much damage this Lodestar bitch and my younger bro had done. As a result, the Italians had started shedding real estate, and we were snapping it up.
Their financial losses were our gain.
Still, that the club had changed hands hadn’t hit the news. Our legit front, Acuig, hadn’t been buying up these pieces of property, shell corporations had. That was down to Conor and Finn strategizing long term.
I had no idea as to their end game, but I didn’t need to. Just like they didn’t need to know why I was here today.
It sure as fuck wasn’t a spot check by the new management...
Elemental was lit up in light bulbs, raw, old-world glamor that fit the esthetics of the place. The doors were swathed in red velvet curtains, and as I walked in, the heady scent of incense overwhelmed my senses—musk and sandalwood. Overpowering smells. Smells that made me want to sneeze.
I fucking hated perfume.
A glance about the front hall revealed a porter’s chair by the door which was manned by a bouncer who barely fit on it. He kept his gaze trained on the door, which told me he wasn’t interested in registering my identity—smart man.
Any trouble that went down today would bypass everyone’s attention.
Even if a server witnessed it, they’d never go to the cops.
Not unless they had a death wish.
As I headed down the corridor, the coat check attendant kept her face turned away too as I strolled down the rich burgundy carpet and toward the inner sanctum of Elemental.
A quick check of my phone had me seeing Forrest had sent another message.
Forrest: He brought Frederica. They're in the back.
Me: Perfect. Just in the lobby. On my way.
Tucking my phone back into my pocket, I smirked to myself, satisfied by the success of today's plan. Something I'd been working on since Declan and I had learned about the Sparrows from Caroline Dunbar—a dirty Fed.
We'd had several lackeys working to bring down Coullson, and in all honesty, that the fucker had picked Frederica would give us even more leverage than we'd be getting with a regular hooker.
Barely refraining from rubbing my hands together, I focused on the club once I pushed open the doors.
Even at this time of the day, it was busy.
The rich bastards who frequented Elemental weren’t worrying about their nine-to-five jobs, that was for fucking sure. These were trust fund brats with nothing better to do with their days than waste their ancestors’ hard earned cash.
Cunts.
I hated this type of place and the type of person who used it. Waste of space morons with their minds high on blow and their cocks riddled with Chlamydia.
Pulling a face, I stared over our new domain. A domain that contained at least one person who should be worrying about his nine-to-five.
Elemental, on the surface, was a regular club. There was a large expanse of space where people were dancing. It was dark, pitch black, with strobe lights that lit the place up, and a DJ played earache-inducing tracks that had everyone twerking like they were in a strip show. I saw a few people sniffing from small bottles—poppers—and saw others snorting white marching powder—coke.
The folks here were still dancing from the night before.
That was the kind of place Elemental was, a modern day Studio 54.
The party never stopped until you passed out.
But this didn’t interest me.
This was all for show.
Around the back of the room, there was a low lying wall that cut off the dance floor from a corridor. It meant I could walk around the atrium without being accosted with high dancers, and because I wasn’t in the best of moods, that stopped any bloodshed.
For the moment.
I knew that the ‘Fire Exit’ sign led to an inner courtyard. The health inspector saw what they were supposed to see—a short path that led to another door which took people out to the street.
Me? I saw the wall opposite and registered that the arched door which looked like it had been bricked up forty years ago, was a front.
I moved over to it, tapped on it once, and Forrest pulled it open for me.
Tipping my chin at him, I stared over the real reason people came to Elemental, and the real reason why people spent tens of thousands of dollars on becoming a member.
It was a fancy sex club.
As I scanned the scenery, nothing impressed me that much.
But maybe I was just fucking jaded.
The place was segmented into three, and truthfully, I couldn’t deny it was a neat set up, especially as, from my vantage point, I could see what was going down in each part and could make my decision about which one I wanted to approach.
Each had a stage at the head of their section, but the one to my left had a string quartet on there while some burlesque dancer messed around with a bunch of fans. The audience used chaise longues to watch the show, lounging around like they were fucking Ancient Romans as they sucked on ornate bubbler pipes that had a haze hovering below the ceiling like a dense smog.
The middle stage had a large movie screen on it, except, there was nothing playing—the action was going down in front. A large bed housed four women, each of whom were going down on each other in a kind of human centipede formation that held no interest to me.
I didn’t even tip my head to the side or squint harder.
I never had liked doing shit in public.
What I preferred required privacy.
The seats in that segment reminded me of a vintage cinema, red velvet, upright, and the viewers weren’t eating popcorn, that was for fucking sure. I had no idea what they were munching on, and neither did I want to goddamn know.
On this particular stage, there were three guys tied to St. Andrew’s crosses. A woman, dressed up to the nines in leather, was paddling them with a spiked cat o’nine tails. The spikes weren’t dulled, either. She drew blood with every strike.
Here, the audience were seated on, what could only be called, mattresses. They were circular, and reminded me of those sun loungers that were like a shell—the ones that came with a roof? Well, these had roofs too, but they also had curtains. A soft squeal confirmed what was going down within the privacy of the one nearest to me.
“Let me guess,” I directed at Forrest. “He's watching the chicas on the middle stage?”
Forrest’s lips twitched. “Nah, he ain’t that kind of politician.”
“Ya mean he ain’t a hypocrite?” I shoved him in the side when he smirked at me.
“He’s all that and more, I promise. He's one of them." Pointing to the stage with the Domme and her subs, he said, "Sanctimonious prick is over there."
“You sure Frederica's in with him?"
He scowled at me. “You think this is my first fuckin’ sting, Bren? Shit. What the fuck do you take me for? An amateur?”
I had to grin at his umbrage. “Forrest, you’re too good at your job.”
“Remember that when you're handing down bonuses,” he grumbled. “You think I’d have let you waste your time by coming here if we couldn't twist it to our advantage?”
“Shit always goes wrong,” I reasoned, even though I knew he was right.
“Not on my watch.”
Forrest had never let me down, so it wasn’t like I could argue with him. Instead, I straightened my shoulders, swept a hand over my cuffs, and asked, “Which cabana?”
“The largest.”
“Of course,” I said with a grunt.
I wasn’t the type of man who judged other people—only those who were fucking hypocrites, and this place was hypocrite central.
Coullson had been coming here long enough for Forrest and Tinker, another guy on my crew, to get to know this place real well over the past two weeks.
We'd known for a while that anyone from politicians and celebrities to business tycoons, all had memberships here—and it wasn’t for the tunes being played out front—which was why I’d encouraged Conor and Finn to shell out top dollar to buy it.
Blackmail was dirty work, but someone had to do it.
“You sure you want to start the ball rolling today?”
“Yesterday’s Summit was illuminating.” My brothers and I had been called to the parents’ place for a briefing on what went down. I’d stuck around for a coffee with Ma—I was glad I had now. “We need to get shit rolling.” I cast him a look. “Be better if we had our ducks in a row and we can do that once we have key players on our side.”
He shrugged. “You’re the boss.”
That I fucking was.
Heading toward the darker section, I made my way to the largest cabana. There was no missing it, nor was there a way to miss the fact that it had a central view of the stage. It was the same color as the walls, a deep, dark red, but it had gold trim that was illuminated in the low lights.
As I moved around to the front of the cabana, bunching the fabric so I could make a small gap in the curtains, I shook my head at what I found.
Coullson, the Mayor of New York City, the renowned anti-gay Christian, was sucking Frederica’s dick.
I rubbed my chin as I cast a look at Frederica. She was good—didn’t tense up or anything. Her smirk lit up her eyes, but she moaned and groaned like the great actress she was while Forrest took out his phone and started taking snaps like he was on the set of a GQ shoot.
The soft sound didn’t register with the Mayor who was really getting into sucking Frederica’s dick, but the flash? That did.
He tensed, then turned, cock still in his mouth.
Forrest took another picture.
“That’s the money shot right there,” I rumbled, shooting a grin at Forrest who turned the phone around so Coullson could see himself with his lips stuffed full of Frederica's wiener.
“I think you’re right. You can still make out who’s doing the sucking. I think I’m a fucking artist.”
Laughing, I nodded. “You’re right, Forrest. I think you could make a real exhibition out of that shot. Could take center stage.” At that, Coullson spat out Freddie’s cock. “Think he’s finally figured out that we ain’t servers, bro.”
“Never let it be said the Mayor ain’t smart.”
“Keep your fucking voice down!” Coullson snarled, peering around like people might hear, not registering I was the shark amid the guppies.
My lips curved. “I think you’re misunderstanding the situation, Mr. Mayor. You don’t control shit anymore.” I took a seat at the edge of the cabana. “I control you.”
Where would the horses be without me?
Six
Cammie
I’d discovered the ‘Ride Back’ project when I was sixteen, and had to do an essay in school about a charity that meant a lot to me.
I’d been a brat. A spoiled rich kid who knew that she could have whatever her heart desired, just not her father’s respect, so I’d spent his money like it was going out of style.
That Papa could handle. Giving me love was too much hard work. Buying me Chanel purses like they were holding a 'closing down' sale was well within his limitations.
I hadn’t given a shit about anything, hadn’t even given a crap about my grades, but then, I’d stumbled upon a charity that was only a half-hour drive from our house. When I was a kid, Mama had taken us horseback riding, but just like parental love, that had died with her.
Finding that charity had been pure happenstance. I was threatened with after-school detention for a month if I failed to hand in any other projects after weeks of completing no homework, so I’d done a rudimentary Google search, my intention to write a twenty-word essay—most of those words being the charity’s address.
Then, I’d visited the site.
That was when something had clicked with me.
The ‘Ride Back’ project was a way of getting disabled kids, vets, seniors, and at-risk teenagers onto a horse’s back. For strength and agility training, but also to help them be a part of a group. It was a form of therapy that was proactive, and horses were angels sent from above. Always understanding, always willing to listen, and far more affectionate than most people knew.
I could have done my research online for my essay, instead, I’d visited in person.
For the remaining months of that year, and all throughout Senior year, I’d gone to the stables to volunteer at least three times a week.
The horses, not even my sisters, had been what I missed the most when I was in West Orange.
So near to them, yet so far.
In the early days, when I hadn’t been under the Sinners’ protection, the urge to visit them had been strong, but I hadn’t dared risk coming to my father’s attention. Instead, I’d tried to stop missing my four-legged friends—spoiler alert, I never had—and I’d worked my butt off at the local cafe to make ends meet, pulling shifts at a nearby bar in the evenings until late. Back then, the Sinners’ MC hadn’t owned their own bar, so when they weren’t at the clubhouse, that was their local.
That was where I’d met Nyx.
That was where my life had changed, and not exactly for the better.
The only joy in this interminable situation I found myself in was the horses.
As I ran a hand over Terry’s head, the Palomino’s long lashes fluttered slightly as I whispered, “I brought my baby a treat.”
The dry, yet somehow wet, raspy, but somehow soft, mouth brushed across my palm as I held out a couple of sugar cubes. The sensation tickled, making the sore flesh there stir to life as the rigid cubes rubbed agains
t the Band-Aids that were already starting to wrinkle and rise up from my skin.
My back pocket was loaded with treats—Band-Aids too—but not just for Terry, for all my favorites—all twenty of the horses stabled here, each one a retired racehorse the program had rescued.
On the ride over, I’d stopped off to grab some carrots, apples, and sugar cubes because I was a sucker for these beauties.
Terry neighed softly, his head butting my chest, nuzzling into me like he remembered me from before.
I wanted to think that he did, but I’d been gone a long time, and these guys had so many people on their backs.
Was it stupid to want to be special to a horse?
Was it stupid to want to be special to someone?
Teeth tugging on my bottom lip, I ran my nose along Terry’s, then murmured, “Let’s get you ready... after I hand out my goodies.”
I hadn’t meant to time it this way, because I had no problem with mucking out stalls, but I’d arrived just after the stablehands had finished up so my time here today would be a lot less stinky than usual.
I wasn’t a regular volunteer.
Father, with the obvious aim of buttering me up so I’d marry his prick of a Sovietnik without too much of a fuss, ha, had reinstated my allowance, all of which I’d plowed into the charity who needed it more than I did.
The perks of being such a big donor was that I could roll into the stables whenever I wanted, unlike the other volunteers who came in on a rotation.
I took my time, moving down the aisle, treating them all and stroking them, chatting a little with each before I made my way back to Terry who, though I shouldn’t have favorites, was my numero uno.
For a few minutes after my return to his stall, I just stood there, swaying with him as he nuzzled into me.
He was the most affectionate, but Princess Plum was as well—she was more demanding though, always wanting more apples.
Reaching up to fondle his ears, I murmured, “Okay, enough relaxing.”
He neighed like he was in agreement, making me smile as I pressed a kiss to his nose.
Before I went through the motions of setting him up for a ride, I checked my phone, wanting to make sure I hadn't missed Inessa's call.
Filthy Sex: The Five Points’ Mob Collection: Four Page 5