Chapter 72: Chapter 72

ASH

Setting up a tactical team doesn't just involve specialist marksmen trained in high-tech weapons and tactics - which by the way is a very important aspect - it also involves the operational sector as well as the administrative sector, but then there's the section I like to think is the most important and the one I like to call the think-thank sector.

Yeah, I could go in there, guns blazing, geared up to the hilt with high-tech arms, but all that will do is to put Hazel eyes and my baby in danger.

I don't want that.

So I put together a five-man team, four of them, retired army veterans, for the brawn.

A bit excessive, you say, maybe, but very necessary for this mission. I've studied face-impostor, and I think I know how he reasons and where he's coming from. As difficult as it is to admit, I believe he's related to me -probably a distant cousin - which is why we've got similar looks. He's also got an entitlement mentality. One I've got to take down several notches.

Suffice it to say - I've got to take him out.

"Give me a cig." I lift my hand in a peace sign waiting for the cigarette to get slipped in between my fingers.

"You mean another cig," Koldis says from beside me.

"I don't pay you to be a smart ass, a cig, now, please."

Wordlessly, this time, he places a lit stick of cigarette in between my fingers and I immediately put it in between my lips and drag deeply on it, relishing the taste of nicotine as it fills my lungs. So, Koldis is my fifth man - he's the only one in the think-thank sector, the butter to the sandwich, and the glue to this whole arrangement.

"Ash. . ." when he calls my name like that and then pauses, I know a lecture is on its way, so I brace myself and wait. "These sticks will kill you if you don't let up on them. Since we got here last night, you've smoked a whole pack.

I met Koldis when he was working for the then-head of the mafia in Los Angeles. I used to wonder why he always loitered around him. He was a difficult man to kill, you see, but Koldis told me exactly how to go about it. He also said if I did, he'd work for me.

That was when I knew he was a strategist.

I adjust myself and try to get comfortable - as comfortable as lying belly flat on the ground will let me - and blow out some smoke before replying to him. "I don't remember the role of health adviser as part of your attributes on your CV."

I can feel his eye roll before he gives me a comeback. "I never showed you a CV."

I'm about to reply to him when static sounds from the wire in my ear and a voice barks out. "Movement upfront, what are your orders?"

My eyes whip to the figure making its way out of the abandoned building and rage courses through me when I recognize the person. "That's Leonard, get him."

Two of my tactical team men jump up from the ground, a short distance in front of us, and race toward Leonard. He doesn't stand a chance. They're on him in a jiffy, cuffing his hands before dragging him away to the vehicle we parked two streets away from the cemetery. I reel out instructions for the other men to stay alert and keep their eyes on the building, before going, with Koldis in tow, to meet the two who have Leonard in their custody.

Seeing Leonard wearing anything but a suit is weird. He looks like any ordinary man you'd see on the street. As I walk closer to him, I grudgingly accept that suits definitely change the look of a person, making them seem more dignified. Dress up a monkey in a suit and it'll change into something you can respect. I shake my head, not in the least amused by my musings.

As soon as Leonard sees me, his eyes almost bulge out of his head.

"Come, now, don't tell me you didn't expect this to happen?"

He opens his mouth but no words come out. His silence is irritating as hell, plus the more time we spend doing nothing, the more harm Hazel eyes and my baby might come to.

"Here's what's going to happen - from now on, you're going to be working for us. Translation: You're going to go back inside and act like you're not going to sell out that motherfucker in there."

Leonard's eyes can't get any bigger at my words. "B. . . but he'll kill me."

"I'll kill you here and now if you don't do as I say." My teeth are grinding with the urge to reign in my anger.

Two of my men who are standing on either side of him, shake him until he begins to get red in the face.

"I'll do it, I'll do it, I promise." He begins to yell, but I put a hand against my lips stopping his word flow.

"Now listen to me," I inform him of what I need him to do and he nods furtively. After that, I tell him to get the food supplies to face impostor and told him to get them while we wait. As he starts walking away, I call him back. "How's Alicia?"

He can't look me in the eyes as he nods. "Fine."

"If I find out you or that fucker in there hurt her. . ." I shake my head because whichever way you look at it, he's still a dead man walking. Both of them actually.

He nods and scuttles off as fast as he can. It doesn't take long before he comes back holding two moderate-sized brown packs with fear streaked across his face. He nods at us in passing and we follow at a discreet distance. It's back to lying on the ground beside Koldis, while Leonard, the cowardly fuck, gives us a backward glance before stepping inside the ramshackle building.

As the minutes tick by, I war with myself as questions roar through my mind at lightning speed.

Did I do the right thing by letting him go? Shouldn't I have cut his wings? Would he betray me? Should I be worried for Hazel eyes and my baby?

I'm not a tender-hearted man or a love-besotted fool. I'm a man who regrets the monstrous things I've done, regret the monstrous thing I've become but I won't stop or change. I will always revel in violence and in death because that is who I am.

I've achieved things I wanted - things I needed - and like someone lacking moral sense, I cared not how I attained them, but I know without a fact that if anything happens to Hazel eyes and my baby - damn - I'll light the match myself and watch Los Angeles burn.

As uncertainty makes its way throughout my system, I catch movement near the building. Face-imposter walks out, but he's not alone. Walking beside him and being dragged by the neck, is Alicia.

That's not all - he's holding a gun to the back of her head.