Awakening

by Evelyn Montgomery

  “He is! Now back the hell off before all hell breaks loose and I forget my loyalty to your fucking boss.” The man takes a step back as Leo issues his warning with a final shove. I stare in the asshole’s eyes for a moment longer, needing to pull all the hate, all the hostility I can from him if I am going to make it through this night.

  Turning, I begin to walk a few steps before not entirely trusting the two men behind me and glancing back to make sure they don’t try anything. When I am sure we are in the clear for now, I look straight ahead and take the steps two at a time to quickly reach our destination. It takes us a few minutes to climb the stairs all the way down to the dark crypt of a meeting place only the most sinister of men call their office. When we reach the bottom, my eyes adjust to the darkness before finding a light coming from the far side of the room. I hear voices and try to make out who is speaking, but they are talking too low and with several large crates stacked on top of one another in my way, there is no way to know for sure who the people are waiting for us on the other side.

  “Follow me close and remember what I damn well told you.” Leo starts to walk cautiously towards the group on the other side of the room as I reach down low and pull the recorder from the inside of my right shoe’s corner. Stashing it in my pocket, I follow as the voices get louder, my thoughts get cloudy and my breathing matches the rapid beating of my heart. As we walk, I make out a door in the far corner of the room which is odd to me because I never thought basements had more than one entry and exit point. But if all hell breaks loose it is good to know we have an alternative route to safety.

  “I told you Ramon, the shipment will be here as promised. The dealer just hit a few snags when coming across the border that tied him up a little longer. All I am asking for is five more minutes and then you will have what was promised to you.” The closer we get I make out Natalie’s voice as she attempts to calm the Russian mob boss and deliver on what she has promised. Rounding the corner, her eyes lock with mine for a brief moment causing a break in her character and it doesn’t take long for many in the room to notice, including Ramon.

  The boss turns and stares at me in judgement before his eyes land on Leos and they soften slightly. He pulls the cigar he was smoking from his mouth and cocks his head back and to the side as Leo walks further into the room as if he owned the damn place. Only something he would do.

  “The shipment is late Amico,” he states harshly with emphasis on the Italian phrase for friend. “Any later and we’ll see if your word is as good as I’ve been told it is.”

  Leo eyes the room. His gaze roaming over all in attendance. Natalie. Viktor. Ramon. Even two men in the shadows that I have never seen before. He walks to a table near Ramon, one set up with a bottle of vodka and four glasses to toast to a job well done once the shipment and reason we are here tonight is completed. Picking up the bottle, Leo pours a shot into two glasses and raises one offering it to Ramon.

  The man takes it with a mischievous smile as Leo picks up his own and holds it out in a toast. “Za vashee zda-ró-vye.” (To your health)

  Ramon clinks his glass against his and I watch as the two men before me shoot back the clear liquid before my eyes fall on Natalie. She holds her head high when her eyes meet mine and looks away quickly. Whatever she may be hiding, if Leo is right in his assumption, she sure as shit doesn’t want me to see. Even if she did just tell me yesterday she was carrying my child.

  “Za fstryé-tchoo.” (To our meeting) Ramon says as he aggressively sets his glass back down on the table. “May the ending be better than the way we got started.”

  The door above us opens and I hear the men from before talking with another man in Russian. Someone, who sounds oddly familiar, even if I don’t speak the language they are using. As the person descends the steps and his voice gets closer my heart doesn’t want to believe what my ears are already telling me and I spin around in disbelief as he walks into the room.

  “Anthony!” I hear Natalie exclaim as my eyes fall on Brett. My own fucking brother. My flesh and blood carrying the first half of Ramon’s shipment as two more men enter the room behind him. His eyes meet mine and he stops dead in his tracks. What the hell is going on here? My eyes flash to Leo’s in disbelief although I try and reign it in and hide the fact that my brother is his hit. The fucking target. Someone I thought I knew and trusted but who also ended up having another life, a second identity, that I would never ever believe unless I saw it with my own damn eyes. Leo catches my stare and I can tell he is lost, that he has no clue what has me shaken up having never met my brother before in his life. Hell, I am not even sure I ever mentioned him to Leo before to be honest, a fact I am now regretting as a fucked up reality hits me square between my eyes.

  Quickly, my stare raises and locks with Natalie’s as she makes her way towards Brett. Anthony. Fucking I don’t know what to call him, as my heart races and I know I can blow this cover for all of us if I don’t get my shit together right fucking now. Her eyes meet mine for a brief second and fuck, I know she knows. I can tell she played this. Played us. In the way she smiles. In the sick evil confidence radiating off of her.

  “Nakonets ty zdes’,” (finally, you’re here) I hear her whisper as she steps up beside my brother and I watch her slip something in his pocket only I can see from my viewpoint. My eyes raise and lock with his and he glares at me. A different man than the one I grew up with. A different person than the one I fought beside overseas. Shit we haven’t spoken in over a year, his demons waring with my own in the time we served together until the truth finally came out. That he never could and never would forgive me for what happened to our mother, my wife, my daughter. Just like my fucking father. A truth I am still trying to run from if I am being honest taking on fake names and making a disaster out of life the further I tangle my web. His stare is almost sinister, like my fathers, as he slowly smiles, his jaw clenches and he looks back her way as she steps back from his embrace.

  “Let’s get started,” I hear Leo say behind me as my body flinches slightly and I am brought back to the here and now, my mind completely blown as to the change of events and the brother I thought I knew standing in front of me.

  Suitcases are thrown up on tables but I am too oblivious to the items in them as my stare stays locked on the back of my brother’s head the further he makes his way into the room. He leans in and whispers something in Natalie’s ear as he passes by her, and I watch as his hand lowers and he cups her ass through her skirt. She smiles and eats up the attention like crazy, a side of her I have never seen over the years I have known her, before glancing behind her and locking eyes with me. A blush flushes across her cheeks as anger rises inside me and I realize I’m not the only one she’s been warming up to over the time I’ve known her.

  Words are exchanged. Promises made. And I thank God for the recorder in my pocket because there is no way in hell that I am paying attention to anything the people around me are saying as my mind swirls with the new knowledge I suddenly have. The treason that was right under my nose the whole fucking time, but I was too blind to see it.

  Leo was right, people can only meet you in life as far as they have ever met themselves. Natalie has made a living selling information about the people closest to her, to me in fact. It was only a matter of time before she sold me out as well and I don’t know why I ever pegged her for being any different. With my brother in the picture, Anthony Petrov, or whatever the fuck he is calling himself, it’s damn evident that my clock is running and if she doesn’t spill soon he sure as hell will to not blow whatever damn cover he is working under.

  I guess we are more alike than I care to admit at this moment in time. Him working for the Russians, illegally given tonight’s meeting, while I’m helping Leo oust the Italian scum that needs to be taken off the street all in the name of selling a damn newspaper. But something about this all still doesn’t make sense. Something still doesn’t feel right, and as I watch as Natalie turns her head and gives Leo “the signal,”
my world implodes as my brother catches on and suddenly pulls a gun, shooting Ramon, then Viktor, before grabbing Natalie quickly and wrapping his arm around her throat holding her against him before thrusting his pistol at her temple.

  Another shot rings out and I look at the men across the room, the ones formerly standing in the shadows and see one of them lying on the floor as the other closes in and backs up my brother. “Either of you fucking move, and she’s dead!” I hear him shout just as the man behind him runs towards the door once we hear footsteps. A couple shots ring out a few seconds later and from the sounds of it, the two men guarding the entrance have now been rejoined with their boss, heaven rest his damned soul.

  “Brett,” I cautiously say and watch as my brother’s eyes flicker towards me in fear. I see Leo glance my way out of the corner of my eye and know he must have a million questions, one of which might just get my ass killed if we even make it out of this alive. “You don’t want to do this. I’m not sure what you’re mixed up in, but please, just let Natalie go.”

  He laughs as my eyes fall to Natalie’s and I see her crying, shaking, fearful of what the man holding her hostage might do. A man she thought she knew and now suddenly realizes played her, just like it looked like she played the rest of us too.

  “Men in this family don’t spare the women closest to them, shit you should know that, if you were fucking smart enough. You wrote the damn book on the subject, Justin Gatz!”

  My eyes dart to Leos and he looks at me as rage fills him inside. He thinks I sold him out. Sold us all out to this man who is a stranger to him and who knows my real name. But I didn’t and heaven hopefully will be on my side as I attempt to save us all from the clutches of a quickly approaching ending we never expected when we planned every last detail of how this job was supposed to go down.

  “How dad did mom in included. Cutting the breaks to the fucking car. It was all too perfect for the town tramp. I even helped him do it. Set the trap. Until you came along and ruined it. You always ruin everything, Justin. Just like Natalie here. A whore no better than the one that fucking deserved way worse than the justice she got,” he tightens his grip on Natalie and she screams. “Guess the men in this family have a type, huh brother?”

  What the hell did he just say? Mom? Dad? But he’s wrong, so wrong. I was the one driving the car that night. But as he pulls Natalie after him and closer to the exit I push everything I’m feeling aside, the fear, the hate, the self-loathing his words bring up as I glance back his way and watch as he man-handles Natalie before glancing at Leo and seeing recognition flash in his eyes. I’d never sell him out. Shit he is more of a fucking brother to me than the man standing before me right now. The man confessing a truth I knew nothing about and holding life hostage in his evil tarnished hands.

  “Did you believe her?” He asks with a demonic stare. My brow furrows in question as I stare at him and my heart rate increases the closer he gets towards the exit. “When she told you it was yours? Did you believe her? Want it to be Emma? Want to take her away, like you did with Charlette?”

  Natalie cries in his arms as he drags her with him. I go to speak but she cuts me off with her shrill yell. “Brett please!”

  “I want to know, Natalie,” he seethes, as he takes a few steps backwards and I watch out of the corner of my eye as Leo prowls in the shadows waiting for the right time to make his move now that Brett has let down his guard. “Did he? When you told him it was his,” he says, tightening his grip and shoving the pistol against her lower stomach.

  “No!” I shout, but the bastard cocks the gun and my heart stops as time pauses and I look up to see her eyes. Frightened. Scared. Afraid for what is coming next.

  “It wasn’t enough you took Charlette, the fucking girl I loved more than anything, away from me when we were younger, but you had to take our mother and now Natalie too!”

  I look at him confused before shaking my head twice and swallowing hard. “What are you…”

  “Charlette!” He yells. “I told her. Warned her. Just like everyone fucking did about you. But she wouldn’t believe me. And now this,” he says, driving the point of his pistol into Natalie’s stomach and making her scream. “This is mine. She is mine. Tell him Natasha, now!”

  She screams as he drives the point of his pistol home, into her stomach, until she finally speaks. “It’s true.” My heart sinks. “Justin I swear, I never…”

  But my brother has other plans besides letting her continue her confession and quickly starts backing away again towards the exit. Cutting her off he says, “and there is no way in hell I am letting you take her away from me. Not like before. Mom always thought you were the better son. Her shinning fucking star. But I always saw you for what you were, and I’ll do anything I have to, anything at all to keep you from taking what is fucking mine again.”

  He pushes her away from him and I take the moment to reach out for Natalie. To try and pull her away from the clutches of a mad man, but as she goes to reach out for me her hand misses and she falls against the floor.

  “Fucking perfect,” Brett seethes, as she turns to face him and I watch him raise the gun he is holding. “Not much more you can expect from a fucking whore, now can you. He can have you back, Nat, over my dead body. Or better yet, maybe yours.” He pulls the trigger and my heart leaps out of my chest. I lunge forward but miss, falling short as I shoot to my feet and stand tall once again as the bullet rips through her chest, her screams fill the room and blood flows out in a puddle at my feet.

  I hear the gun click at my left, hear Leo in the shadows, and my eyes raise as he takes a step into the light and aims his weapon at my brother.

  “Do it!” Brett taunts. “I fucking dare you!”

  We hear motion up above and Leo’s eyes lift for a brief second, a second he can’t afford as my brother cocks his pistol, aims, and a shot is fired. A shot I never expected as I stumble backward and hold my gun in my hands in disbelief moments before I see my own flesh and blood drop to the floor.

  The canister is still warm from where the shot was fired when Leo pulls it from my grasp a few moments later and everything I thought I ever knew about myself shatters as my brother lays at my feet, next to Natalie. A bullet through his head that I put there.

  “Fucking hell!” Leo hisses as the noises above get closer. “We got to move, J!” When I don’t respond, my eyes wide in disbelief at what I just did, the bastard slaps me making me jolt back and stare at him blankly. “Get your shit straight. We got to get out of here unless we want to end up like them.”

  Them!

  But it was all my doing. My fucking curse.

  “Move your ass, J. Let’s go!” Leo insists as he grabs my arm and pulls me towards our only exit, the lonely door in the corner I spotted when we first walked in. My feet slip in the pools of blood at my feet as I take one last look at what I’ve done and wonder just how in the fuck I am going to live with myself now. Even more, how will I ever know the damn truth to the confession that just ripped me apart moments before I took a life to protect a man who’s always been better to me, more like family, than the ones I used to call my own.

  Chapter 8

  Rose

  “The meeting was moved up,” I hear Leo whisper in the hallway to our room as life slowly tries to stir back into my body. “I’ll brief you in the damn car. Grab what you need to and meet me outside. We’re late as it is.”

  It’s still the afternoon, isn’t it, and I had only intended to fall asleep for an hour or so as I quickly sit up in bed and look at the time. 6 o’clock. Holy hell. An hour or two that turned into three or four. I guess I was more tired than I thought after the emotions I was put through yesterday and the night I spent making love to the only man I could ever want. Running my hands through my hair, I attempt one final time to shake the fog from my mind as I hear Justin’s voice low and stern just outside the door.

  “No, I got all that I need. I don’t want to wake her. I don’t want her to worry. Jobs like this an
d the women I care for don’t mix too well if you remember?” I hear Leo let out a low sorry laugh and wonder just want in the hell Justin meant by that comment. “Just let me hit the restroom and I’ll meet you out back. Who’s driving?”

  “James and the new kid, Pam. She wanted a chance at proving her weight so I’m letting her tag along and watch. She’s been instructed to stay in the car though. No fucking around.”

  My mind races as I try and think in a pinch at how I can get them to take me along. I know I said I wouldn’t interfere, but shit that is my son. My boy. If I could just get a few more minutes to plan, something, anything, maybe I can convince them to let me just sit in the car too.

  “Got it. Just give me five minutes.”

  “Make it three!” I hear Leo say, as footsteps echo down the hallway and I hear the creak of the door to our room. I fall back against the sheets and pretend I am sleeping. Why? I don’t think I can bare to see his face walk away not knowing if he is coming back to me in one piece. I used to do that all the time with Michael, watch him walk away, and the pain it caused was almost too much to take as I waited for any word every single day that passed if he was unharmed and safe. Even in the end, even after the woman who showed up at my door only three damn weeks after I found out I was pregnant with Olivia, I still worried.

  Plus, I may just be trying to come up with some brilliant plan that enables me to go with them, and I don’t want to blow my chance. Not yet that is, and let him catch onto my mischievous ways if he notices I am awake.

  I hear his footsteps come close to the bed and tell myself to keep my eyes closed and breathe deep. He lowers himself down beside me, the shadows helping hide any hint that I may actually be faking it. “I love you,” I hear him whisper right before he leans in and kisses the top of my head. “Always have, Rose. Always will. Til the day I die, Sunshine.”