by A. G. Khaliq
“Well then?” Steve asked, shrugging. “Have you got a plan on how you’re going to take him out?”
“Not yet,” I mumbled awkwardly.
“Why the fuck are you here then?!” Steve spat bitterly. “You know I have business to take care of. This better be fucking important, Louis, or I’m gonna get real fucking pissed off.”
I took a deep breath in, and then took another deep breath out, as I tried my best to compose my sentences together. I wasn’t thinking rationally, but the words started spilling out of my mouth before I could even stop them.
"Steve man, I just wanna be accepted by you,” I mumbled. “Everything at school is going shit, Mum's always at work, and I just want to get away from everything and start something new."
I took another deep breath in, and Steve folded his arms.
"C - can I join you and everyone here?" I asked, scratching my arm.
Steve stared at me. "Louis, do you know what you're doing?" he said sternly. He took a long inhalation of his spliff.
"Yes I do," I confirmed, although I didn't quite know what I was doing myself. Was I ready for the responsibility? Was I ready to get involved with my crime lord of a stepfather? Was I ready to leave everything I knew… to join a criminal organization? To work for the Mafia? Was I going to be able to step up, as I uncovered a world that I never imagined?
I don’t know. But I was willing to learn. I’d been through so much heartbreak these past few years. What was the point of being a good boy? It fucking got me nowhere so far in life.
Ellie died, and she was a good person. Even when I behaved nicely towards my Mum, she was still never satisfied with me no matter what I did. I used to be nice to girls, but they just used me and played me for a fool.
And now, Thomas didn’t think twice before he almost beat me to death. And with Thomas walking free from prison because of his self-defense claim, I would have to watch my back now more than I ever had. Thomas was going to come for me, especially after finding out that I was still alive. He wasn’t just going to let this go.
This was now a feud.
We were now enemies…
And the only way this would end would be with one of us killing the other.
I had to train myself. I had to learn to become the same stone-cold murdering bastard that my stepfather Steve was. I needed to learn to stop showing remorse. To stop feeling bad or guilty about the things I did. To kill people who crossed me.
It’s kill or be killed in my world.
It’s eat or be eaten in my world.
It didn’t matter what history I had with a person. In the end, everybody was just out here trying to survive.
And that was all that I was doing.
I was joining the Mafia as a means of learning how to survive. As a means of protection.
I was going to become the biggest goddamn drug dealer in the whole of Birmingham.
I was going to become the Mafia Kingpin.
The don.
The Mob Boss.
I was going to learn the game.
I was going to take over Steve’s Mafia after learning how to defend myself. After proving myself to him. After showing him that I was capable.
And I was going to do whatever it takes to get to that.
Whether it meant pushing product, smuggling firearms into the country, murdering bastards, doing fraud, collecting debts, or laundering money…
"I want to join you Steve. I've had enough of everything. I know what I want now,” I said confidently.
Nothing was going to stand in my way.
There was a long silence between us. Steve inhaled deeply. "Fair enough," he said finally, and then he smiled, throwing his arm around me. "My lad," he smiled. "My little lad."
I smiled back. I loved this feeling of acceptance, feeling like I belonged somewhere. I needed validation. I needed to get rid of the void within me. Maybe the road life was built for me. And maybe becoming a Mafia man would help to fill my void. To help me feel satisfied about something in my life. Being a goody-two-shoes got me nowhere. I was just so emotionally attached to my stepdad, I couldn't think of any other option.
Me and my stepdad were the same, deep down. We weren’t as different as I once thought we were. At the end of the day, my stepdad was in the game to make money. For business’s sake.
And me…
I was in it to survive.
To feel powerful.
To be feared.
So that motherfuckers would know better than to cross me.
There aren’t any friends on these streets.
TO BE CONTINUED
WHAT WILL HAPPEN NEXT?
FIND OUT IN BOOK 2 OF THE MAFIA KINGPIN SERIES
DON’T MISS THE NEXT BOOKS IN THE SERIES:
THE DON
SEX & DRUGS
LOVE, LUST & LIES
VENGEANCE IS MINE
THE ULTIMATE SACRIFICE
Bundles are also available
Bundle of Books 1 - 3
Bundle of Books 4 - 6
Bundle of Books 1 - 6 (the complete series)
These can all be found on the Author's Profile on Amazon.
FOR UPDATES FOLLOW THE AUTHOR ON INSTAGRAM @AGKBOOKS
VISIT HER WEBSITE
HTTPS://AGKBOOKS.WIXSITE.COM/AGKHALIQ
AUTHOR'S NOTE
If you are enjoying this series, then it would mean the world to me if you could leave me a review on Amazon to help other readers to discover my books too, and share this story with your friends and family. If you do leave a review, don't hesitate to get in touch with me, and I will thank you personally.
MORE BOOKS BY THIS AUTHOR
The following books are coming soon to Amazon
Corrupt Me series
Dangerous Desires part 1
Dangerous Desires part 2
Forbidden Fruit
Bundle of Books 1 & 2
Bundle of Books 1, 2 & 3
Married to the Mafia series
Stripped
Capo
The Cartel
Trafficked
Bundle of Books 1 & 2
Bundle of Books 3 & 4
Bundle of Books 1 - 4
The following titles are available on an app called Episode Interactive, which is an interactive storytelling roleplay game available to download on Android and iOS
Married to the Mafia
Kingpin of the Mafia
Dangerous Desires
Forbidden Fruit
CHAPTER 1 SAMPLE OF THE DON
LOUIS
My eighteenth birthday was just two weeks away.
It was crazy how much my life had changed over these past two years.
The life my mum spent her whole life trying to get me to avoid, was the life that I was now dissolved in, and she had no idea.
No idea about Steve, no idea about me.
We were no longer as close as we used to be.
I'd dropped out of school as soon as I joined Steve.
I just figured that there would have been no point sitting my exams considering how close they were and how badly I was failing anyway.
Steve offered me a route out and I took it.
It wasn't that bad.
I liked having a lot of money, being able to buy clothes I wanted, concert tickets I wanted, gadgets I wanted, with no limits.
I told Mum that I owned a massive retail company, (which I did, but it was just a front to help me launder my dirty money from the Mafia), and this time I could feed her properly - she didn't have to work anymore. She could stay at home, kick her legs up, watch TV, and just enjoy herself, without having to worry about me. Without having to waste endless hours working, just to put some baked beans on the table.
It felt good to finally be able to provide for her, after she spent her whole life wasting away at countless jobs just to clothe me.
I'd made some new friends through this life, and we had a laugh.
They'd helped me to clear my name in court from Th
omas.
They'd helped me through a lot of things.
I was even inspired to start making my own grime music, since I spent my whole life listening to it.
Stormzy had inspired me. His amazing lyrics and flow, his amazing background instrumentals.
I'd already started writing some bars of my own…
A year after I joined Steve, I knew the game from back to front. I learnt how to push product, how to collect shipments without getting caught by the feds, how to smuggle guns and firearms into the country, and expand territory.
I was desperate to prove myself to Steve. Desperate to level up within the organization. There were days that I hardly slept, because every hour, there was money to be made.
I hustled so hard. I didn’t just sell in Birmingham, Cardiff, Manchester and London, like Steve did. I expanded to the whole of the United Kingdom. I had operations in every town and every city that there was. Nottingham, Stoke-on-Trent, Glasgow, Edinburgh, Ireland, Sheffield, Blackpool, Blackburn, Leicester… The list went on and on. I killed countless people who got in the way of business, mercilessly. I collected debts that people owed me, and some days, I was selling so many drugs, that I’d take in £50,000 a day all by myself in profit after giving everybody else their cut. There were thousands of people involved at this point.
It was enough to show Steve that I was capable. And eventually, Steve took a backseat and let me take over…
I became the kingpin of the mafia, the very thing that I’d set out to do when I joined. I didn’t need protection anymore. It was me that gave other people protection.
People feared me. They knew what I was capable of, and how dangerous I was. They knew how I treated people who double-crossed me. The people who double-crossed me got a bullet in between their eyes.
I was only two weeks away from being eighteen, and I had to put blood, sweat and tears to get to where I am. To become the kingpin. But I didn’t regret it. Being part of the Mafia made me feel powerful. Dominant. Invincible.
I didn’t have to fear for my life anymore. Nobody would dare to put a hit on me.
I hadn’t seen Thomas ever since my sixteenth birthday party, when he stabbed me and left me for dead. It was like he’d disappeared off the face of the Earth. He hadn’t posted on his social media for two whole years. It was like he was a ghost. I’d paid so many hitmen to try and find him. I offered so much money to anybody who could bring Thomas to me.
But he was nowhere to be found. I presumed he was dead… Either that, or he’d ran away out of the country. And I knew that as soon as he was across the border, it would be literally impossible to find him.
I’d eventually given up on finding Thomas. There was no trace of him anywhere. None of his old friends had seen him or heard from him. But if he ever did come back to Birmingham… I would be prepared. The whole reason I joined the Mafia in the first place was because of the feud I had with Thomas. Because it was kill or be killed in my world… And I wasn’t just going to let that go. The motherfucker deserved everything that was coming to him. He deserved to be tortured. To be left for dead, just like he left me. And then brought back to life. And then left for dead again. An endless cycle of torture, until I was satisfied that he’d suffered enough.
Another thing that I’d vowed to do when I levelled up in the organization was to get justice for Ellie. Ellie was also the reason that I was the stone-cold killer that I was today. If Ellie hadn’t passed away, things wouldn’t have gone in a downwards spiral. Her death had a massive impact on me, and not in a good way. I was so triggered… and so hurt by what happened to her. The fact that God let bad things happen to good people. Ellie had been a bully… but the reason behind it in the first place, was because of all of the shit she had going on in her personal life. She didn’t deserve to be fucking raped… And nobody deserves to be depressed to the point that they would take their own life. No fucking body does.
I used to think that only God could give and take life. But after Ellie had been raped and killed herself, I decided to take justice into my own hands. I was tired of praying to God to make things better, and to stop fucked up things happening in the world, with no results. If God wasn’t going to let pedophiles and rapists die, then I for sure would fucking kill them. Every time I heard about rape cases from a cop that I had working on the inside, my blood would boil to the point it almost dried up. I had convicted rapists killed inside prison for what they did. Beaten to death, for being the scum that they were. And for the women who didn’t get justice, when the police didn’t believe their story and didn’t arrest the suspect… I would kill them my damn self. The justice system was fucked. It was so fucked, that only 1.9% of reported rape cases resulted in a prosecution. And that shit wasn’t right. I had to give those women some form of closure. Some form of justice.
I did all I could. I never murdered an innocent person, even though I’d become the kingpin of a Mafia. I only ever killed people who deserved it. People who didn’t deserve to live in the first place. People who human trafficked, and did stupid shit like that. I knew that two wrongs didn’t make a right, because I still sold drugs and shit like that. But to me, it was the lesser of two evils. Ever since all the trauma that I’d experienced as a fucking kid, killing scum was how I projected my anger. It was my way of trying to show that there was some justice left in this world.
But even after I did it… countlessly killed disgusting motherfuckers who abused women. Hit women. Sexually abused women…
The reality was, I still felt alone.
I wasn't trying to fool anyone.
This road life wasn't built for me.
It didn’t matter how many people I killed. It wasn’t going to bring Ellie back.
And the fact that it wouldn’t bring Ellie back had me kicking and screaming throughout the night, torturing myself for not doing all I could. For not being good enough. My mental health was suffering so fucking much. I was so depressed, and there wasn’t any way that I would be able to feel better. Whoever said that money buys you happiness, lied… Because now I could afford private jets, holidays every weekend, flashy cars, fine dining, to buy as many businesses as I wanted…
But I still felt empty inside. Nothing satisfied me.
It didn't feel right, going behind Mum's back. It killed me that I couldn’t tell her the truth about who I really was. It killed me that I couldn’t tell her the truth about what I’d become. Even though I was able to provide for her now, the way that I was making my money and living felt so fucking wrong. Mum wanted me to grow up to become an educated man, with a successful career, to get out of the hood… But I was still in the hood. I was the crime lord of an illegal enterprise.
I never saw some of my closest friends again.
I never saw Keelan again. Keelan. My fucking brother, who was there for me through thick and thin. I even had to let him go. I didn’t want him getting involved in my lifestyle…
The same way Steve didn’t want me getting involved in his lifestyle when I was fourteen.
Whenever waves of sadness would hit me, I'd turn to drugs.
Get high, drink until I passed out. I tried anything… any solution that would help to numb the pain inside of me.
And it wasn't right.
It wasn't right.
I was only two weeks away from being eighteen, and I was making my money off destroying other people’s lives. I was showing Steve that I was capable of being the kingpin by doing whatever he told me to do.
And it was dangerous.
But I had no choice.
I had no choice.
No choice at all.
This was the life I'd chosen, and now I had to live it.
It was another day of teaching motherfuckers who was boss. Me and Ijaz had caught wind of a bastard that had been stealing from our shipments. One who we let into our organization. One of our very own, who double-crossed us.
Ijaz was the man that I’d met when I asked Steve if I could join his organization back when
I was sixteen. We’d become close over the years. He was a Bengali man, with dark-brown hair and tanned brown skin.
And now, it was time to teach the bastard that crossed us, a lesson. It’s sad that the poor motherfucker thought that we weren’t going to find out. We always weighed the amount of product that we shipped in through the canals in Birmingham, to make sure that we weren’t being cut short or ripped off by our supplier.
Bash. That was the name of the curly-haired bastard who did it. He’d stole from the boxes in the warehouse, to try and make some extra cash of his own. Was extra cash really worth risking his own life? If he’d been patient, I would’ve promoted him my damn self. This was the thing with people. The lack of trust that they had, buried deep inside of them.
Me and Ijaz tracked down Bash, and he was in a field playing football with his little brother. I felt bad that his brother was getting caught in the crossfire… But I’d groomed myself into not caring. Into becoming the same stone-cold bastard that Steve was.
“Hi Bash,” I said bluntly, folding my arms.
Bash jumped, and spun around. “Hi Louis,” he said sheepishly. “What are you doing here?”
“Just wanted to talk about business,” I said flatly. “Do you want to make sure your brother goes somewhere else while we talk?”
“Sure,” Bash shrugged, turning to his brother. “Come on, bro.”
His brother was only seven years old. And now… he was going to grow up without Bash. The same way I’d grown up without a father. The poor kid was better off without a criminal in his life, anyway.
Bash led his brother away, giving him money to go to the shop. As soon as he came back, I shoved him, hard. He collapsed onto the floor, and I kicked him seven times in his ribs in repeat succession, to the point he was howling in pain.
“You've been stealing from our shipments, haven't you, you bastard?” I roared, as Ijaz continued to kick him.