Page 22 of Bleed (Two Wheeled Psychos #4)
The day goes by at a snail’s pace, dragging on and on with one shitty song after another played over the café’s speakers.
The coffee seems to be getting hotter with each cup, until I finally stop ordering it and switch to bottled water.
Dani on the other hand is happy to continue to down the creamy, sweet, girly, foo foo drinks all day, and it’s fucking adorable.
“You’re going to have to pee in the middle of the genocide aren’t you?” I laugh to her, squeezing her to me, holding her tightly like she’s a stuffed animal giving me comfort.
“Probably.” She says with a nonchalant shrug of her shoulders.
“Typical woman.”
“Hey. There’s nothing typical about me.” She squeals, then headbutts me in the chest, forcing the air from my lungs.
Coughing from the blow, I hug her tighter and kiss the top of her head. “I know baby. I know.”
Through the front picture windows overlooking the street between us and Valentino’s I can see the sky start to darken as the sun sets behind the buildings.
It won’t be long now, and instead of getting more anxious, I settle into a relaxed acceptance, just like I should feel, like I always do before a kill.
Just this one is going to be people who don’t deserve it outright, like the rest of the family.
But there can be nothing left, women to bear heirs, no relatives, nothing left.
They’re all a disease that must be eradicated.
The Reaper is coming through, past Damien, taking over, pushing the man with morals to the side so he can be the monster he needs to be. With the Recluse by my side, we will do what must be done, and we’ll do it together.
“I love you.” I say to her and kiss her forehead. “It’s almost time.”
“Good.” She smiles and snuggles into me. “Just hold me till you’re ready.
It’s another two drinks, and about twenty ungodly stupid songs before the night has descended and the lights in the restaurant across the way brighten up the street. I can see the family sitting down at their tables, knowing exactly where everyone will sit, up to and including Salvatore himself.
There’s no kids running around the place playing, almost like they are expecting something, and for that I’m happy.
The women chatter amongst themselves though in conversations I can’t hear from where we are.
They all look so happy, and so oblivious to what’s coming, but they must know something.
They would have to. I mean it’s me. Would they really think I’m just going to let this slide? No.
The Reaper is coming. That’s what’s coming. The weapon you created is coming for you all.
“It’s time.” I say to Dani, shaking her shoulder a little, rousing her from a catnap. “You good?”
“Mmmm, yeah.” She says, stretching like a little kitten in my lap, grinding against me with a sleepy, yet sly look.
“How could you sleep after all that caffeine?”
“ADHD brain. Caffeine has the opposite effect on us. Relaxes the shit in our heads a bit.”
“Whatever floats your boat.” I scoff, bouncing my lap up and down, making her jostle and wake up more, but giving me a hard on in the process.
“Well, that floats my boat.” She giggles, reaching between us, palming the lump in my jeans.
“Wait till the show is over baby.”
“Hmmm, party pooper.”
“Oh no baby, you’ll get your kinky little party of two. Don’t you worry.”
The turmoil in my head is all but gone as we rise from the loveseat and stretch our backs. I watch as her shirt rides up, showing me her flat stomach, and I bite my lower lip.
“Come on, before I change my mind and bend you over right here.”
“Yes Sir.”
It’s her leading the way out of the café, her hand again in mine, pulling me towards the parking lot and the gas cans hiding just where we left them. But it’s me leading her when we grab them and cross the street, going down the sidewalk and into the alley behind Valentino’s.
There’s no cars on the street, and the whole block seems deathly quiet, like the universe has warned everyone who should not be here away. I’m happy for that, because for one, it won’t allow witnesses, and two, no one besides the family will perish.
No crickets chirp, and no birds sound out above us as we hunker down in the back lot behind the building.
I try the back door, and it doesn’t open, but that’s no shock, it’s usually locked.
I’m surprised to find that my key still works though.
You would think that with everything going on, they’d have at least changed the locks.
Unless they’re planning something. Too bad for them, I’m always more than one step ahead.
“I’m gonna go in. You stay out here. When I come out, you use your can to douse the dumpsters and the doorway. Got it baby?” I say to Dani, waiting for her to nod her acknowledgement.
When she smiles broadly and nods up and down, I turn the lock and pull open the door, staying low, dribbling the gasoline from the doorway into the restaurant.
I leave a thin trail of it down the back hallway, and into the offices, dousing a large amount on Valentino’s desk that’s been empty since his death.
I can tell by the amount of dust already gathered on it that turns to a grey mud with the wetness of the fuel.
After the office, I go to the kitchen, keeping quiet, hiding around the corner, watching as my cooks and servers mill about, not working near as hard as they ever used to for me.
Fuck!
In a split-second decision, I stand up and walk into the kitchen like I own it, with my chest puffed out, and clear my throat loudly, getting their attention, blowing stealth right out the window, but I can’t let the innocent staff perish with the family, they don’t deserve it.
“If you want to live, get out, now.” I say, shushing any sounds they could make at my sudden appearance.
I see the look of excitement to see me change to looks of solemness, because they know who I am, and if the Reaper is telling them to leave, they have no choice.
Silently, they put down their pots and pans, knives and dishes, and file out of the kitchen through the back hall from where I just came. Each one of them shakes my hand or pats my shoulder as they go by me, a silent farewell to the years we’ve been together, and a thanks for sparing their lives.
“Dani will meet you out back.” I say as the last of them goes to walk past me, the second in command to Antonio, a young man named Mark.
I stop him with a tight hold on his hand, pulling him into me, hugging him and slapping his back.
“Mark, Antonio didn’t suffer.” I whisper to him in his ear. “I took him before they could get him.”
“Thank you.” It’s all he says, but it’s heavy with his appreciation.
Waiting a minute for them to be safely outside, I toss the red can on the floor and walk into the heart of my kitchen, taking one last look around. I’m going to miss the place where I’ve cooked my heart out for the past decade.
My lighter clicks a few times before the flame licks up from its wick, and I stare at the little dancing blue and yellow fire, mesmerized at how something so little can cause the destruction I’m hoping for.
It clinks loudly when it lands on the tile floor at my feet, lighting the end of the trail of gas, pushing outwards down the hall and into the offices.
Walking further into my kitchen, I grab the corners of the fryers, shaking them until they tip over, spilling all the cooking oil on the floor and all over the nearby equipment.
The heat from the small fire on the floor quickly finds the spilt oil, and the kitchen goes up around me like an inferno, burning as hot as the bowels of hell while I walk over the flames to the saloon doors.
Picking up a burning rag off the ground, I carry it with me into the dining room, where the chatter and fun times stop instantly and the family all looks in my direction.
The ladies scream, and rush towards the men as I stand there waving the burning cloth. The men stay in their seats all except Salvatore who stands up, adjusting his suit jacket, staring at me like a petulant child.
“Reaper.” He says, cocking a brow at the fireball in my hand.
“Salvatore.” I respond, slowly walking over and blocking the front door with my body as his eyes and the guns hidden underneath the tables all focus on me.
“You won’t get away with this.” He says gruffly.
“I already did.”
The yelp he makes as I toss the oil covered burning rag at him and it lands on the table just in front of his crotch is comical. He bats at the flames with his hands as they immediately take over the tablecloth and the table, catching the dishes of olive oil and spices up like little lanterns.
It becomes utter chaos as a gun fires off, and the wall beside me blows apart with fragments of the plaster and wallpaper spraying out, and the fire spreads. The women scream and run towards the kitchen, only to be backed up by the inferno already ablaze in there.
The laughter that peals out of me sounds like something from an insane man, as I kick over the nearest table, reaching underneath and grabbing the barrel of the rifle aimed at my knees before the goon can even take a shot.
I plunge the weapon back into his dick, doubling him over, and yank it from him, shooting into the air, stopping anyone from coming towards me.
“Let this be a lesson to you all.” I say, firing the weapon into the ceiling again, dusting them with the powder from the tiles that catches fire as it falls. “Never create something which you cannot control.”
The heat is becoming too much, and the smoke is quickly filling the room, stifling out my breath as I spray a round of cover fire from the assault rifle and back out the front door, leaving them all inside where the smoke and flames will take them all.
The door rattles with someone pushing on it as I slip the rifle into the handles, barring it shut, locking them in, making sure that they all die in a fucking blaze of glory.
“Fuck you all.” I spit out as I turn away from the glass door and walk away from the place I’ve called home for so long. “Fuck you all.”