Total pages in book: 79
Estimated words: 77205 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 386(@200wpm)___ 309(@250wpm)___ 257(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 77205 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 386(@200wpm)___ 309(@250wpm)___ 257(@300wpm)
It wasn’t just the apartment buildings and businesses you had to worry about. Big Brother had eyes everywhere too.
It was not an easy time to be a criminal.
But thanks to people like me, the mob made sure that they forever remained in that forty-nine percent of homicides that never got solved.
Or, rather, the twenty-five percent of missing persons cases that are never solved, since when I did my job right, no one ever knew a murder took place at all.
I did have a body get found once. But thanks to careful concealment, insect activity, and relatively high humidity, that thing was down to the bone by then, leaving nothing behind to find, save for the bullet hole in the head.
“At least it’s not an apartment building,” I mumbled to myself as I parked around the corner of the front of the closed shop that appeared to be a shitty little bagel shop, but actually operated as an illegal payday loan store.
Those places were fucking criminal in general with their high interest rates. This one was far worse, though, given that there was no regulation to keep them from gouging the fuck out of their desperate clientele.
I wasn’t surprised the Family was involved with the fucks who ran the place. You’d have a hard time finding any non-chain businesses in Manhattan that didn’t have the bagman of the Costa Family showing up at their door, collecting their protection money to kick back up to the boss.
That was the nature of the operation.
You wanted to run a business in the city? You paid for protection.
If you wanted to run an illegal business in the city? You paid out the ass for that protection.
And, if you suddenly decided you didn’t want to pay that anymore? Well, that was when shit got ugly.
Sometimes, that was when a bastard like me was called.
“You’re not Miko,” I said as I climbed out of the car, finding someone there waiting for me. Six-one or two with black hair and brown eyes with the classically good-looking bone structure that Miko had. A brother, maybe? He had Miko’s sort of style, with the perfectly tailored suit and the slicked-back hair.
“Nero,” he said, inclining his chin at me. “Miko’s inside.”
“And you thought standing out here getting seen by any cameras around and passerby was a good fucking idea?” I asked as I grabbed the empty tub, and brought it with me.
“Should I come back in?” he asked as I moved past him.
“No, just keep standing there, looking fucking suspicious,” I said as Miko appeared in the doorway, leveling a brow raise at me for snapping at his little brother, but he said nothing as he held the door open for me to enter.
“Cameras were off before we came in,” Miko said. “I double-checked. Meaning I touched the office door handle on the outside only, the mouse, and the keypad. I didn’t rest my hand anywhere else.”
“Good,” I said, nodding, glad to have someone to work with who wasn’t a complete fucking moron. “Touch any of the cameras themselves?”
“No. I wiped the feeds, there was no need to.”
“Got it. Where’s… fuck,” I sighed when I rounded the corner right inside the back entrance to find not one, but two bodies there.
I hadn’t thought to ask for a body count.
It was usually just one corpse at a time these days.
“There was a struggle,” I said, my gaze moving over broken fingernails and a bloody nose.
“Yeah,” Miko said, making me turn to look at him, standing there all stoic.
No scratches.
No bruises.
That kid brother of his, though? He had his hands tucked in his pockets.
I sighed.
“Little brother got into trouble, and big brother came to save the day?” I asked, glancing between the two.
“It was a routine job. It went south. Shit like this happens,” Miko said.
Only… shit like this wasn’t supposed to happen. That was why Miko was here doing damage control. The Family had just dealt with a lot of heat thanks to a murder my brother carried out, then went on a big, flashy trial for. The Capo dei Capi, Lorenzo Costa, was trying to keep everyone’s heads low for a while until the media and the general public forgot about us again.
Which meant two bodies splayed out on an illegal check cashing store was an epically big fuck-up.
As far as I knew, Miko was a made guy.
His brother, though?
Maybe an associate. No way was he higher in the organization at his age. Not with how careful Lorenzo had become about opening the books and letting men rise higher in the ranks.
“This is the gun,” Miko said, producing one from his pocket, and placing it down on top of one of the bodies.
Both were men. One, in his fifties with a pockmarked face and jowls. The other, short and skinny, maybe in his thirties. My money was on them not being related, just in cahoots.