Page 44 of Gabriel

“Again,” I said. “What are you up to with Amara?”

“I-I don’t know. I swear,señor. Por favor?—”

My knuckles split his cheek open this time. Blood ran freely now, dripping from his chin onto his shirt. Still not enough.

I settled back in my chair, brushing a piece of imaginary lint from my shirt. My heart rate hadn’t even gone up. Running the cartel out of Miami meant staying calm while people screamed.

There was a general belief among factions that I was too rich, too distracted, too comfortable. That I wasn’t across every part of my organization. I found that it worked in my favor for the most part.Let them believe it.

I leaned forward, eyes locked on his. “Your priorities are fucked up, Esteban. You’re scared of Amara, but you should really be terrified of me and what I’m about to do to you if you don’t start singing.”

The idiot actually started singing. “Pooor faaaavooor.”

“You’ve already pissed me off,” I said, cutting him off. Blood was soaking through his pants now, turning the fabric black. “But I’m giving you a chance. One chance. Tell me what she wanted or I swear to God, you’ll wish I’d killed you when I walked in.”

I slid the switchblade from my pocket and clicked it open with a deliberate snap. The silence did the rest.

“I don’t know,” he whispered, eyes darting, lip trembling. “Nobody came to visit me.”

I drove the blade into his thigh.

Esteban screamed, a wet, animal sound. The room trembled with it.

“I can’t tell you,” he roared. “She’ll kill me.”

“You’re missing the fact that I’m about to kill you if you don’t give me answers,” I said, twisting the blade.

“Stop, no—I… She wanted me to hack into a device she recovered in the jungle,” he choked out.

“Whose device was it?”

“Her sibling’s,” he cried.

“Which one? Did she give you a name?”

“No! She just gave me a locked phone.”

“What did you find on it?”

“I didn’t read it. She took it right after I broke through the encryption.”

A slow, menacing smile spread across my face. “Come on, Esteban. Let’s not pretend that you didn’t copy whatever was on that device.”

“I… I…”

“You kept a copy, didn’t you?” He let out a sigh and nodded. “Good boy.” I untied his hands and handed him the burner phone. “Now send it to me.”

He reached for his phone with a shaky hand and I watched him as his fingers flew across the screen before my phone beeped.

“I haven’t had a chance to… decode it.”

“Don’t worry about that.”

I yanked the blade out. He howled and collapsed sideways, blood smearing the floor. I stepped around him, wiped the blade clean on a filthy towel slung over a drawer, and slipped it back into my pocket.

I didn’t look back as I left the shitty apartment and stepped into the stairwell.

I took the steps two at a time as I pulled out my phone.