Angel’s Promise by Aleatha Romig

Rett

Sitting straighter in the back seat, I realized where we were, not simply east of Baton Rouge but the exact location. Time had made its mark. Nothing was exactly the same as it had been, but that didn’t change the fact we were here. I was here again. “This isn’t the fucking warehouse,” I said as the lightening sky brought the buildings into view.

“Yes, it is,” Leon answered. “I told you, it don’t feel right.”

“I had the damn place leveled.”

“Building’s different. Place is the same.”

“Fuck.” I should have bought the land and made sure it wasn’t rebuilt.

The realization of where we were was as if a dam had broken. Memories I had kept at bay gushed into my thoughts.

Over seven years ago, I’d accompanied my father to this same location. Being outside of New Orleans city limits was agreed upon by both my father and Isaiah Boudreau. My father hadn’t been the one to call the meeting, but he knew once it was called, he needed to attend. The factions of discontent in the different wards were growing. The issue at hand had been a supplier of Molly to the city. Molly was the street name for ecstasy. People came to New Orleans to have a good time. Ecstasy was a popular drug especially with the younger tourists who were willing to pay more than necessary for it. The main supply had been arriving via cargo ship to our busy ports on a regular basis. Unfortunately, the drug lord who was our biggest supplier had been arrested on a litany of rigged charges while in the US.

No one dared interrupt that chain while Félix was in control, but with his arrest, there were upheavals in his ranks. Those events opened a window for new suppliers. A few of the bigger gangs saw that as an opportunity to avoid the middleman and work directly with the new suppliers, leaving my father and Boudreau out of the mix.

Out of the mix meant out of the money.

A few of the smaller gangs in the Tenth and Eleventh Wards decided they wanted in on the rebellion, so they organized under an umbrella of sorts, calling themselves the 110ers gang. The whole way of independent thinkers was getting out of hand. Ramseses and Boudreaux ruled for a reason. They kept each individual subset in check. The recently established 110ers had to be an example to other gangs on why our families were essential within the chain of command.

Abraham and Isaiah chose to not extend their protective cloak to the 110ers. They wanted independence, they got it. That joint decision opened the 110ers to more than they expected.

In reality, Abraham and Isaiah’s decision killed two birds.

It gave the city a perceived win on their fight on crime, the mayor’s NOLA FOR LIFE project, and it cut the 110ers off at the pass, reinforcing to others why it was important to keep the status quo with our families.

With our protection gone, the multi-agency gang unit from the Orleans Parish district attorney’s office received a sweeping fifty-one count racketeering indictment against fifteen members of the 110ers. The indictment wasn’t limited to their drug activity. It also connected members to over ten murders that they may or may not have been responsible for and money-laundering charges.

Rumors began to fly.

While the other gang leaders fell in line, there were rumblings and questions.

Some of the non-indicted members of the 110ers went back to their smaller gangs where there were questions about money. Many assumed it was the multi-agency taskforce that confiscated the cash; the staggering amounts rumored to have been under their control were never listed on any reports. Accusations and fighting ensued between the surviving members, pitting small gangs against one another.

I hadn’t had a hand in the disappearance of funds, yet I’d been involved in starting the rumblings. Never had I expected for things to happen as rapidly as they did, but when Boudreau called the meeting here, I knew it was my time to act. The city was ripe and ready for a coup. The people were riled up and itching for something new.

I was that something new.

The last time I was on the property where our SUV was now parked, I walked away as the new king of New Orleans. Taking a deep breath, I fought the sense of déjà vu.

“Ingalls and Boudreau are already here,” I said. The evidence was the trackers.

“This feels like a trap,” Leon said.

“I can’t walk away if Emma is in there.”

“Wait for the rest of our men.” Leon looked at his phone. “Ten minutes and we’ll outnumber them.”

“Unless they have more men on the inside,” I said.

Leon was right. This was not how I normally did business.

Since I’d found Emma, nothing was normal.

Leon and I with two others of my men entered from the rear near the loading docks. There were four other Ramses men entering from the front. The door moved silently as if it were well maintained, yet I’d learned during research while in the parking lot that the warehouse had been rebuilt only three years ago and had remained without a tenant.

The area we entered would serve as storage for shipping if it were in use. Thankfully, the sun had risen. Windows near the ceiling allowed the early morning light to enter. Rays of sunshine shone down, creating pillars of light containing particles of dust floating through the air.

Our shoes on the concrete floor echoed in the nearly seven hundred thousand square feet of emptiness. There wasn’t a corner that was hidden as we scanned the perimeter.

“Are we sure they’re here?”

“No, boss, just their cars.”

I took a deep breath.

The meeting that occurred with my father and Boudreau hadn’t happened in the large storage facility but in the attached offices. I tilted my chin toward doors on the far side. My men who entered through the front should already be in the offices.

As we continued with our guns drawn, the sound of gunfire reverberated through the large building. Leon, my men, and I rushed to the edge of the room and continued along the wall. Loud voices came from within the office structure.

Leon’s hand was on the doorknob when another shot was fired.

Pushing our way through, we all stopped.

On the floor, lying in a puddle of blood, was William Ingalls.

My breath caught at what I could see in the attached room.

Isaiah II had his gun aimed. Not at me but at the back of my wife who was sitting in a chair. Facing the other direction, her long golden hair cascaded over her shoulders. Her head was tilted to the side as if she were unconscious. And her hands were tied behind her.

“No,” I screamed, my gun aimed at Isaiah as I entered the office.

He didn’t turn or even acknowledge that I was there.

“Drop your weapon,” a deep voice ordered from the shadows to my right. When I hesitated, the barrel of the gun came closer.

I didn’t recognize the man giving the order.

“Don’t hurt her,” I said as I lowered my gun to the floor.

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw my men who had entered the front. They were close enough to see, but they hadn’t been discovered.

Isaiah spun my direction. “You did this.”

“Fuck you.”

“You set her up, seeing if I’d save her.” He pointed at Ingalls’s body. “Him too. We both got your texts.”

“I didn’t fucking send you a text message. I received one.”

Isaiah’s brow furrowed beneath a crown of hair the same color as Emma’s.

Slowly, I took a step toward Emma. “What did you do to her?”

He shook his head. “This is how we found her.”

“Let her go,” I said, lifting my hands. The words came out before I could give them too much deliberation. They didn’t make sense, went against every sin I’d committed, but I said them anyway. “The city is yours. Let Emma go back to her life. Forget this happened.”

“The city isn’t mine until you’re dead.” He lifted his gun again, this time toward me.

“I know.”

Isaiah’s head was shaking. “Emma won’t go. She wants New Orleans now too, and it’s your fault. We should have left her out of this.”

I moved close enough to touch her hair. I imagined the way her hair created a curtain around us as she rode me, the way her perfect breasts heaved with heavy breaths, and the way she looked as she came apart. Emma was the best damn thing that I’d ever found and I didn’t want to lose her.

From my position, I saw her blouse and blue jeans. I was relieved to know she wasn’t naked as she’d been the last time she was found.

My hands were still raised. “Let my men take her. She’ll be safe with them.”

Leon nodded. The older man’s gun was still aimed at him.

“Let them take her and once she’s out of here, it’s you and I. We settle this once and for all. I’ll even send my men away. You can do the same, or you can fucking outnumber me.”

“Like you did at your house on your wedding day,” Isaiah said.

I ran my fingers through Emma’s hair before looking up. “Yes.” I nodded to Leon. “Come take her.”

“Stop,” Isaiah yelled. “I don’t trust you.”

“Let her go,” I repeated. “She doesn’t deserve to be hurt anymore.”

“By you. You’re the one who did this.”

I nodded. “You’re right. I wanted her in New Orleans.”

“Not because you love her.”

“I didn’t when I had her brought here. I lured her here. I admit it. But now” —I turned back to Emma— “I love her.”

Isaiah aimed his gun.

The next few seconds happened too quickly to think.

He spoke, “She can’t live either and if you really love her, then you can watch her die.”

I rushed toward Isaiah.

His gun fired.

The room echoed with the deafening explosions as other guns fired.

Isaiah was down, wounded but alive.

Kicking his gun away, I ran toward Emma as blood began to pool near her chair.

My men had entered. Leon now had a gun on the old man. If others of Isaiah’s people were present, I wasn’t sure where. I didn’t care as I rushed to my wife.

“I’m sorry, Emma.” I sent prayers to the God my mother loved, to her, and even to Miss Guidry’s spirits. There was no reason for any of them to listen to me. I was the self-proclaimed devil, and yet I begged them all for another chance to show Emma that I did love her. That in itself was a miracle. I asked for one more.

Please let her be alive.

Kneeling, I rushed to untie her hands.

Her wedding rings were gone.

The realizations probably happened in less than a second, consecutive thoughts that reached an unbelievable conclusion. Such as watching a string of numbers being assembled on a computer screen as digit after digit made sense, that was my process.

I walked around to the front of my wife.

“Leon,” I screamed.

He hurried to my side, reached down, and held the unconscious body, his hands covering with her blood.

With her head on his shoulder, he looked up at me. His dark eyes opened wide as he stared at me. “Where’s Mrs. Ramses?”