Rogue (In the life of the Rogue Book 1) (8 page)

I was at his mercy.

Or so he thought.

He exhaled, his hard eyes getting even harder. “Thou that live by the Rogue have already sacrificed thy life for the Rogue.”

Those words always goosebumped my skin. “My father sent you?”

“Your grandfather, Tristan, and you should grab some pants on for the meeting.”

I was still naked but that was the least of my worries. I still lingered on the burning cigarette. I took another healthy puff and blew out the smoke. “Is my grandfather in Miami?”

“He is.”

“Why?”

The man helped his partner off the ground and dusted the back of his jacket off like me and Zander’s apartment was dirtying up his friend.

Maybe it was.

“You’ll have to ask him that yourself,” he said, “You want me to get your cousin or do you have it handled?”

I stubbed the cigarette. “He’s under the weather.”

Lord, protect me from my family; they’re worse than my enemies…

I breathed into my hands. The bar felt good and solid underneath my elbows. Here I was, in another nice resort, but this time there wasn’t a dead man upstairs that needed to be
misplaced
.

Dragging my hands down my face, I came face to face with a bartender who smiled a little too hard for me to take as genuine. I figured I looked a little too rough around the edges to be sitting in a place that was atleast a grand a night to stay in. Surely, I wasn’t a hotel guest; I didn’t fit the part. I hadn’t shaved in weeks – as to the request of my father – and my hair was an afro of curls that flopped against my forehead. My suit was wrinkled, stained and dirty. No money for a cleaners, or laudromat that could at least help with the smell of sweat, liquor and self-pity mixed with depression.

“Take your order, sir?” The bartender asked. And it sounded nice enough for me to really believe he wanted to take my drink order.

I quirked an eyebrow as my eyes scanned the assortment of pretty bottles with beautiful liquor resting inside, just waiting to touch my throat and ease the stress.

Maybe the night was looking up?

The gunman who had the gun pressed against my temple just an hour ealier, known to me now as Mr. White, slid a pre-paid phone next to me. “He’ll call when he’s ready for you to come up.” Then he glared at the bartender.

The smile on the bartender’s face altered slightly from, I’m here to help with your drinking problem, really I am, to, I’m happy to serve as long as you don’t tear our shit up.

Mr. White squeezed my shoulder, and I didn’t think it was as hard as I imagined until I heard his knuckle crack from the pressure. “Keep it light on the sauce.”

When Mr. White took his leave, I smiled at the bartender, “The strongest drink you got, please.”

I had plenty to drink about. My last twenty I had hidden in the bottom of my shoe went to the bartender to keep the drinks coming, but that would lead to him giving me a bill I wouldn’t be able to pay for when Papa called at the rate I was downing the booze. Zander was still in our hotel room with his eyes still half way up in his head, but at least his arm had stopped bleeding. He had tried to dress himself for the meeting but I ordered him to stay and sleep off the shit he took. No one needed to see him like this. Especailly Papa: the man with no qualms in having family killed for mistakes.

I laughed into my glass because I knew life couldn’t get anymore fucked up, and then found myself near tears when a wave of sweet scented perfume brushed past my nose. I inhaled deeply, and instantly my mind was drowning from the familiarity.

Life couldn’t get anymore fucked up? Life had answered back a little too quickly with: ‘yes it could.’

“May I have a seat,” Lulina asked.

I motioned to the stool next to me. She eased down beside me, her bare arm brusing against mine. The way her arm touched mine had shot sparks throughout me.

Like always, Lulina knew my body better than I did my own.

“Easy, Tristan,” she said, “we’re in a bar full of people. You can’t bend me over and take me here.”

She smiled. Her perfect white teeth were glistening in the dim lighting. By far she was the most alluring woman in the bar. I could feel the men watching her, sizing her up and liking what they saw. She wore a tight leather skirt that split at the side where her long leg shown almost to her pelvic. She had a tight, white, sleeveless blouse that was unbuttoned low enough to make my mouth water. Her lips were heavy coated with red lip stick; heavy mascara that brought more attention to her hazel eyes. Her hair was down and wavy, touching her shoulders.

Looking at her now made me think less of her but more of Dominique. Lulina reminded me of the girl who still had my mind plunging and my heart racing.

Lulina had the sureness that Dominique had.

I grasped my drink for a long, healthy sip but Lulina caught my arm. She didn’t like when I drank. Although she was married into a family that drank profusely, she didn’t like when
I
drank.

She would say: You look like you’re never going to stop, Tristan.

That was only because I never intended to.

Her hand touched my knee and squeezed. She eased her hand higher up aiming towards my crotch but I turned my body away from her grasp. She smiled heavily but withdrew her hand. Part of me hated her. A lot of me didn’t like her, but most of me wanted her. It had been too long since I had her.

She ordered a glass of wine. I drank only when she took a sip, and did my best to put the glass down when she did. My insides burned to ingest more but I did not.

I ran a thumb over my growing beard, wondering dumbly if she would like the way it would feel against her lips if she kissed me.

“Why are you here?” I questioned.

She took another sip, ignoring my question, and I too quickly took another pull on my drink emptying my glass.

The bartender came by and asked if I wanted another.

“He’s done,” Lulina answered before I could even open my mouth.

Denied more liquor and not happy about it, I went on, “You and Johnny having a vacation?”

She took another sip from her wine glass but this time she swallowed her wine, hard. “Johnny’s not here.”

Not here
could mean many things, but by the way she said it, and how she avoided my stare, but couldn’t cover up the quick sadness in her face, only meant one thing to me.

“When?” I growled.

My insides were steadily tightening but it didn’t reach my face. I didn’t like my brother, and I sure as hell didn’t love him, but he was my brother.

I wanted to kill him.

As for anyone else, it wasn’t fair game.

It also meant that we were at war with either a neighboring family, or a street gang, or a punk kid who had got trigger happy when demanding my brother’s wallet. All elements I didn’t like. The latter was the easiest to revenge but blood was going to be spilt either way. But Johnny wasn’t like the rest of the Rogue men. Papa had made sure that his hands were barely dirty. He was sent to college. He had a degree and he worked the books. He never had to touch a gun, so he being killed wasn’t supposed to happen.

Ralph? Yes, he was in the line of fire.

Me? Yes, I did the dirty work too.

Lulina waited until the bartender served her another glass of wine before she answered. “It happened last Saturday.”

Today was Friday.

I growled under my breath. I wondered when I was going to get the message that my brother was dead. It was the Katie incident smacking me in the face all over again - twice removed from the family circle and still falling lower and lower on the food chain.

Still paying prices…

I clenched my teeth and jumped when I heard my jaw pop because of it. “Do we know who?”

Lulina glanced around at the half empty bar. “This isn’t a good time to talk about this.”

The pre-paid rang, startling me. I swiped it up and squeezed until her the plastic crack alittle. “Is this what this meeting is about?”

“That and more.” She exhaled and moved a strain of hair from out of her face. “It was a family occasion, Tristan.”

Family occasion
meant that Johnny had done something horribly wrong and a hit had been excuted within the family, which meant that my father had his own son killed. This wasn’t a good situation for anyone. Me fucking another man’s wife had been hell but I was still living and breathing.

“He cooked the books, Tristan. Johnny was sitting on a very nice nest egg and got caught,” Lulina explained.

It shouldn’t have surprised me and it didn’t. Johnny was greedy. Because of his degree, he thought he was smarter than everyone else. How he had gotten caught was a good question. It had taken teeth to get as much as I had from Lulina, and Papa would tell me even less.

“Shit,” I whispered. I wanted another drink.

The phone buzzed again. This time I answered it. Of course it was Papa. He hadn’t been happy that I had missed his first call but he bypassed that and barked the room number. He also wanted me to dump the phone after I hung up with him.

“That still doesn’t explain why you’re here, Lu,” I said.

“Your grandfather is waiting.”

“And I’m waiting on you to answer my question.”

She leaned over and planted a long, lingering kiss on my lips. It was wonderfully deadly. In my head I jerked away, but in reality I was frozen stiff.

“No one is here to see us, Tristan. Relax.”

My heart was in my throat. My eyes were as wide as the lights hanging over our heads. I wanted to look and see who had seen the kiss but was too scared that I would come face to face with Mr. White, or the other gunman in my room who I nearly killed, now known as Mr. Black, watching as I kissed this woman.

Lulina pulled a slip of paper from between her cleavage. “Come see me when you’re done. Like I said, this isn’t a good place to talk.”

She leaned in again and kissed me. Thankfully it didn’t last as long as it had before. Not so thankfully, I hadn’t jerked away this time, either.

Lulina gave an important piece of advice before going back to her wine. “And act surprise when you hear the news, Tristan about your brother’s death.”

*

Mr. White had the pleasure of frisking me the moment I stepped into Papa’s suite. I felt his calloused hands biting into my hair as he pushed my face into the wall, while his free hand squeezed at my pockets.

“Your wife likes my ass too,” I taunted.

He grunted into my ear. “If we were on the inside, I would have you for lunch.”

I ignored the bead of sweat that swept down the side of my face. “I hear breakfast is the most important meal of the day.”

“Of course, I wouldn’t dream of letting my boys go without breakfast.”

I found it best not to taunt anymore. I could hear my teeth scraping against eachother while I clenched them as he took his time squeezing my back pockets and then swept around the inside of my thighs for any hidden weapons.

I didn’t know these men; I had never seen Mr. White or Mr. Black around my father’s compound, but I got the sense they had been working for the Rogue much longer than I’ve been alive. I knew that these weren’t the men who had killed Jimmy Ricky or Z. Moss. Mr. White and Mr. Black were bone breakers, here to give messages and leave pain behind, and your life still intact, whether you wanted it or not after they were done.

These were Papa’s men. Of course I shouldn’t have been surprised that my grandfather still had hired muscles. Retired or not, the
real
hobbies were never too far away from what you did for most of your life.

I was found cleaned and ushered to the living room where my grandfather waited for me. Papa was sitting in a polo shirt and loose khaki pants. Still he wore his sun glasses even though it was getting dark outside.

Papa nodded to Mr. White. “He’s clean?”

“He’s good.”

“I’m your grandson, Papa,” I said and really wished I hadn’t.

It was the little boy talking that was still trying to be accepted by the man whom never hugged him because he meant it.

Papa didn’t waste time and gave the news: Johnny was caught taking money from the Rogue and was ended –
quietly
. Papa hadn’t blurted it out, but he didn’t take his time saying it either. I nodded to his words, keeping my face blank and emotions as tight as I could. Inside I wanted to laugh in his face. Papa’s perfect little grandson had fucked up big.

“Has he been buried?” I asked.

Papa motioned towards the couch he was sitting on. I took a seat and was handed a drink. Suddenly I perked up at the turn in the conversation – drinks were always a
pick-a-Tristan-up
.

“Your father wants you home for the funeral, but he needs you do something first,” he answered.

“What’s that?”

Papa grabbed a folder and tossed it in my lap. “There’s a job we need done. It’s a hit. Usually we have men to do this sort of work, but this isn’t our territory and we need to keep the bodies coming in low not to raise anymore suspicions.” He stopped, took a sip then cleared his throat. “Mr. White is the head of it; you’re going to be working with them. He’s going to tell you what to do and I sure as hell better not hear that you gave him shit.”

I opened the folder. Inside was a picture of a pretty beach house. It was an off white home, homely with a modern touch. The ocean was the real reason anyone would pay for it. The ocean waves looked like it would damned near lapped at the front door steps.

Papa pointed at me. “There’s more to this, Tristan. Lulina’s daughter is in this house.”

“We’re killing Lulina’s kid?”

“No,” he barked, “Listen you dumb fuck and don’t you interrupt me.” He eased slightly and took another sip. His body relaxed. “They’re men in the house protecting her. You need to take them out – that’s why I said it’s a hit, but she goes with us.”