Page 34 of Shadow
The Los Muertes take their dead ex-leader and leave the asshole without another word. I don’t particularly like them, but that’s a problem for another day.
Now, it’s time to deal with Trey Everett.
Twenty-Three
PAID IN FULL
SHADOW
“Why go through all of this?” I ask Everett the question because none of this shit was necessary.
He should’ve been a man and paid his debts instead of luring unsuspecting women and girls into sex trafficking and death.
Trey Everett is a connoisseur of crudeness and dishonesty. He would do any and everything he could to be the high man on the totem pole, but really he was just an errand boy.
“It was just a job. I had to pay off my debts. They were going to kill me!”
I know he’s not talking about the Los Muertes. I know he’s talking about the Russians. The fucking Russians.
Stefani may have hooked him up with the Santino for this latest scheme, but the Russians are really who Everett owes everything to.
The fake kidnapping was orchestrated so Everett could flee from his debt to the Russians. The idea was to kill Teagan in the process, and he’d have plenty of money to start life off the radar anywhere in the world. He never intended to give her to me as collateral, hell, I was supposed to be collateral. Teagan wasn’t the only one that was supposed to be killed that night.
If they had taken me out at our club, all roads would’ve led to the Russians. They would’ve effectively started a war, leaving Santino to rule Vegas.
We still have issues with the Los Muertes. They are disloyal and turn on one another without a second thought. We figured that out when we found Manny’s cousin was given to a cartel in Los Rios, Chile. Manny was the second in command and all too willing to take over as leader. In the long run, his greed will fuck up everything for their crew, but like I said before, that’s a problem for another day.
“You weren’t worried about being killed. You worried about making your pockets fatter. You and this cunt bitch will burn in the deepest parts of hell.”
When I mention Stefani, she begins blubbering and begging to spare her worthless life. I don’t know why she thinks I would give a thought of mercy when it comes to her. She may not have pulled the trigger, but she’s just as responsible for the deaths of those young women and girls as Everett is.
Just looking at her makes my blood boil, so instead of prolonging the inevitable, I pull out my nine and shoot her in the heart. A perfect way to kill a heartless bitch.
It’s Everett’s turn to start crying. He already knows that his life is over. The bastard doesn’t bother begging for his life. He just sits crying hysterically like the bitch he is.
“You don’t even have the decency to die like a fucking man. All of the shit you’ve done. All of the lives you’ve senselessly ruined for your greed.” I shake my head in disgust.
Trey Everett doesn’t deserve a quick death. He deserves to be tortured for years, but I want to give my doll the solace in knowing the devil who started all this shit is dead. But I will beat his ass before I put the bullet I promised him in his gotdamned head!
After I beat Everett damned near to death, I finished helping the bastard meet the devil with a bullet. We dropped his body off to the Russians with a note naming the Los Muertes as his accomplices.
Petrov and his minions didn’t appreciate that Everett was working with their meat market competitors, and they were so busy killing off the Los Muertes crew that they didn’t bother trying to figure out who killed Everett. But, of course, they wouldn’t have been able to figure it out anyway. Tech and Gates covered our tracks. It’s like Everett never had any association with us.
Now, it’s time to take out the Russians while they’re vulnerable. They lost a lot of men and support while warring with the gang. Making the Petrov’s kill off the disloyal Muertes was easier than us going to war with both of them at once.
Thomas and Leo found that the Russians shot up my store in retaliation for not giving them Teagan. So, both Grimm and Aries let me take the lead on taking them down because not only do they know how important this is to me, they know I’ve been itching to kill Ivan Petrov since I’ve met him.
I normally take my commands from Ice, and I am happy to do so. Leadership has never been my thing, but in this case, I couldn’t let anyone else do my job. The instant I saved Teagan from that bullet, she became my responsibility. Mine to protect, just like my brothers.
“You ready for this?” Preacher asks.
“You know that I am, Preach.” He knows more than anybody how ready I am.
“Only thing I wanted to hear.” He slaps me on the back and walks away.
It’s late, and the Russians have just closed their seedy nightclub on the even seedier side of town. We have prospects casing the joint, and we know the important members of the Petrov family are inside.
We load up in vans because blacked-out SUVs are too noticeable. And we definitely can’t ride our motorcycles; they would hear us coming from a mile away. We want the element of surprise on our side.