Total pages in book: 89
Estimated words: 84752 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 424(@200wpm)___ 339(@250wpm)___ 283(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 84752 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 424(@200wpm)___ 339(@250wpm)___ 283(@300wpm)
“You stole from me, Phillip.” He flicked his cigarette aside and stood, feeling the blood rush through his veins, adrenaline consuming him. “You took my product. You know what happens to people who take from me.”
Malachi’s fingers itched to deliver violence, his adrenaline a force of nature within him. He wasn’t a good man, never had been, and never would be. His childhood had been fucked up, with an absentee mother and an abusive, drunken father. But there had been a ray of light in all that fucking darkness.
His sister Adelina.
Just thinking about her caused his cold, dead heart to ache something fucking fierce.
But just like everything else in his godforsaken life, in this unforgiving, bastardly world, she’d been taken from him.
Dead at the tender age of eighteen.
Killed by a boyfriend who’d used her as a punching bag, killed by the man who should have protected her, loved her.
I should have protected her.
But he’d been too fucking focused on himself to save his baby sister. He’d run with the wrong crowd, gotten into fights, pushed drugs to make money. He did all of that to survive, to not have to go back to his broken home and get beat up by his old man.
That gritty life had shaped him, made him the person he was today… a drug lord, an underground king.
He was a bastard, a killer. He had no remorse, no empathy. When shit needed to go down, he made sure that happened. And when people stole from him they met the barrel of his gun.
“It was just an ounce, Malachi. Just an ounce.” The fear came off of Phillip in waves, but Malachi was used to that. He was used to taking that into himself, absorbing it to become stronger.
Although he was a bastard, his emotions shut off, that didn’t mean he didn’t know all the acts he did were depraved.
He reached behind himself, pulled out the gun that was tucked in the waistband at the small of his back, and cocked it. He stared into Phillip’s eyes, hearing him pleading, begging for his life. “Never trust a junkie,” he said, letting his body go rigid, his heart go cold. “And you’re one of the biggest junkies I know, Phillip. It’s what helped keep me in business, your need for my product. But then you fucked me over by stealing. I have to make an example of you, have to show everyone else what will happen if they go up against me.” Phillip begged more, and the sight of him pissing his pants didn’t even faze Malachi. He’d heard and seen this far too many times. “You knew that and still took the risk. I have to give you credit. That takes some balls.”
“Chi. Please. With everything going on in the world surely you can overlook this just once? Let me have a chance to survive the shitstorm going on.” Blood ran out of Phillip’s nose, a slow drip that landed on his once white shirt. Malachi didn’t know if that was from the right hook Xavier had given him, or the coke Phillip had snorted when they found him in that piece of shit trailer outside of town.
It didn’t matter either way. This had to be done.
“This world has always been a shitstorm, Phillip. It’s just finally caught up with everyone else.”
The virus, a nasty motherfucker that was sweeping through the country, hell, the world, was taking everyone under. People were dropping like flies, but that didn’t make any difference to Malachi. He had a business to run, product to push. If he wanted to stay above, rule his underground world, virus or no virus, he still had to do his shit.
He lifted his hand and pointed the gun at Phillip, pressed the barrel right between the junkie’s eyes, stared at him, and saw the fear coming off of him.
Then he pulled the trigger, watched as Phillip’s body bowed before falling backward, blood pooling beneath his skull from the hole in the middle of his forehead. Malachi stared at his lifeless body for a suspended second, and then motioned for his men to clean up the mess.
Made no difference that the world was going to hell. In fact, Malachi welcomed it.
He’d be right at home.
Chapter Three
It’s never easy to say goodbye
Two days later
Sasha tossed all the supplies and bags in the back of the car, slammed the trunk shut, and walked over to the driver’s side. She could see Lucy sitting in the passenger seat, her head down, her long blond hair shielding her face. She knew her sister was scared, maybe even broken over all of this. Hell, Sasha was as well, but she had to be strong, had to show her sister that she could carry both of them.
She opened the door and held on to the edge, staring at the house she’d grown up in, the place she’d called home. Her parents were in there, their lifeless bodies locked away in their bedroom, their crypt. She’d covered them with the blankets her mother had knitted, the ones that were faded and tattered, but meant so much to all of them.