Bratva Beast by B.B. Hamel
Mack
Azar Repairs was an ailing, rundown shop up near the Olney subway stop, several blocks down from Villanova. I parked the truck nearby and walked over with Fiona, her cousin’s phone tucked into my pocket.
The front windows were plastered with fading advertisement for computer parts that were probably ten years out of date. The door jingled when I opened it, and the interior smelled like dust and melted plastic and was overwhelmingly hot. There were shelves around the far wall and a counter straight ahead, and old equipment covered every inch of the place, some of them with little white number tags, but most without.
There were cassette tape players and stereos, old computers and laptops, radios and even a huge ceiling fan sitting on its side. Anything mechanical, Azar could fix it—or so he claimed, anyway. Based on the amount of stuff piled up in various stages of decay, I had a feeling Azar wasn’t as proficient as he claimed.
Which didn’t matter. The whole place was a front.
I leaned forward on the counter while Fiona wandered around, looking at the junk. Several tower computers were lined up on the floor, each of them plugged in, their fans whirring.
Azar came out from the back, a scowl on his lips. He was an older man in his early forties, thinning black hair, dark brown skin, sunken eyes, skinny frame. He dressed like an accountant and wore wire-rimmed glasses with the right arm taped in the back to keep it from slipping off his ears. He looked up and met my gaze, and his scowl disappeared.
“Mack,” he said. “Haven’t seen you in a while.”
“Hey, Azar.” I nodded at the computers. “What’s with those things?”
He frowned down at them. “Bitcoin miners.”
“Seriously?”
“It’s not going good. Too much power.”
“I don’t know what that means.”
Fiona joined me. “He means, he’s using too much electricity to mine the coins. So he’s spending more money on power than he is on making coins.”
“Exactly,” Azar said, glaring down at the computers again. “Can’t figure it out. Don’t know how they do it.”
I gave Fiona an appreciative look. “How the hell did you know that?”
“Watched a documentary about it.” She shrugged and drummed her fingers on the glass. “I think those things are too old. Are you using the GPU?”
“Obviously, I am. But I guess you’re right, the GPUs aren’t great.” He sighed and messed up his hair. “All right, well, what brings you in here, Mack?”
“I’ve got something for you.” I took the phone from my pocket and put it down on the counter in front of me. “I need you to unlock this.”
Azar stared at the stolen phone. “This is yours, right? Forgot the pin?”
“Yep.”
Fiona smiled, but said nothing.
He picked it up gingerly like he was trying not to leave fingerprints anywhere.
“Okay so, here’s the problem. Apple is really into security and privacy, yeah? So when you lock a phone, the whole thing encrypts itself, and you can’t just pull crap off it without the pin.”
“Are you saying it can’t be done?” Fiona asked.
Azar held up a hand. “It can be done. But it’s expensive.”
“Don’t worry about the cost,” I said.
“Ten grand.”
I barked a laugh. “Ten grand? Are you serious?”
“And it’ll take me a month.”
“Okay, no way,” I said, reaching out for the phone. “I’ll find someone else.”
Azar pulled it away. “I can do faster, but I’ll need to devote more resources. Which means you need to pay more money.”
“This feels like extortion,” I said, glaring at him. “And trust me, I’d know.”
“Here’s the problem. Apple isn’t easy to crack. Not even the Feds can do it without issues, right? They usually don’t go through all this crap and get a warrant for Apple to unlock it for them. But I can’t get a warrant, so I’ve got to brute force the password.”
“Brute force? You mean like smash it open?”
Fiona patted my shoulder. “He means he’s going to try every single passcode combination possible really, really fast until one of them works.”
“Oh,” I said. “With computers, right?”
“No, I was going to type them in by hand.” Azar rolled his eyes. “You’re good at beating people up, Mack, but you sure don’t know shit about computers.”
Fiona laughed and leaned over the counter to stare down at the Bitcoin miners while I flipped them off and walked a few feet away. They chatted about computers or whatever and I tuned them out, not interested in feeling like a moron any more than I already did. I flicked at a broken doorbell lying on its side with its wires sticking out of its guts until they were finished.
“We got it all worked out,” Fiona said, leaning against my arm. “You owe him fifteen grand and he’ll do it in a week at the most.”
“Extortion,” I said over my shoulder.
Azar only waved like he was finished with the conversation and had nothing more to say.
The bastard.
“Come on,” Fiona said. She looked happy, like she’d solved a particularly hard puzzle, and some of my annoyance softened and faded away. I liked when she looked like that—which was a new sensation for me. Caring about another human’s happiness had never really been a priority before, and yet now suddenly I wanted to make her the centerpiece of my world.
For so long, I did nothing but obey orders, go on kills, and hover around the Pakhan and the rest of the Morozov family.
But now I had a new sun to orbit.
Outside, Fiona chattered about Bitcoin mining and computer hacking, which apparently, she knew about from some other documentary she watched, and I listened patiently even though I didn’t understand a word she said, until she trailed off and came to a halt in the middle of the sidewalk.
“What’s wrong?” I asked, turning back to her.
“Fiona.” A voice from halfway down the block.
I frowned at her, then turned.
Three young men stood together not far off. I recognized them right away: Doyle cousins.
Ah, shit.
“What are you guys doing here?” she asked, walking forward a few steps, her normally pale skin suddenly devoid of all color entirely.
“There’s a fence near here, we’ve got some stolen watches we wanted to drop off.” The middle one shook a big, black bag and stuff inside jingled. “What are you doing?”
“I was, uh—”
“You guys going to see Jimmy Schmidt? That guy’s a fucking rip-off.” I gave them my best smile.
“Who the hell are you?” the big guy asked.
“Donal, don’t,” Fiona said.
Donal glared at her. “Are you with this guy?”
“Just trying to give you some friendly advice.”
“Leave her be,” one of the redhaired guys said, grabbing Donal’s arm. He looked like he was the youngest, a little baby face with a flop of messy hair. “She made her choice already.”
“Fuck off, Tully,” Donal said.
“You two are idiots,” the third one said, shaking his head, hands shoved into his pockets.
“And fuck you too, Ferris.” Donal glared back at him then over at Fiona. “Who is this guy?”
“My name’s Mack,” I said, stepping in front of Fiona. I didn’t like the way the leader looked at her, and I definitely didn’t like the way the one named Ferris was slowly reaching for something behind his back.
“Yeah, Mack? And who the fuck do you work for? ‘Cos you’re definitely not a Doyle.”
“I’m definitely not,” I agreed.
“It’s not what you think,” Fiona said, waving her hands in the air. “He’s just a business associate.”
“That’s almost worse,” Tully said.
“You’re working with some asshole from another crew?” Donal stepped forward, staring at me with cold, dead eyes.
I suppressed a sigh.
“We don’t have to make this hard, boys. Fiona’s a grown woman, she can—”
“Fuck you, asshole,” Donal said. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a knife, thumbing the flip tab. “Give me a reason not to end you right now for going anywhere near a Doyle girl.”
I rubbed the back of my head. “Well, for starters, you’re holding that knife like you’ve never used it before.”
“There are three of us and one of you,” Donal said, stepping forward. He flipped the knife open. The blade was long and slightly curved and looked pretty sharp.
What a pain in the ass.
“Donal, stop it,” Fiona said. “This is so stupid. What the hell is wrong with you?”
“Stay out of this.” Donal stared at me, not taking his eyes away. Apparently, he wasn’t stupid, even if he was impulsive.
“I wouldn’t come closer if I were you,” I warned. “The only reason I haven’t killed you yet is on account of Fiona. I have a feeling she’d be unhappy.”
“Donal,” Fiona said, walking forward. “Put that down and go away. I’m on business.”
“My ass you are.” Donal shifted forward, and I grabbed Fiona’s wrist before she could throw herself into the middle of this. I yanked her backwards, knocking her off balance, pulling her from harm’s way as Donal sprinted forward.
I faced him as he threw the bag of watches at my face. I caught it and used it to bat away the knife as he tried to jam it into my ribs. Fucker was going for a kill, the little bastard, but he was weak and untrained, and the bag of watches was a pretty good weight.
I knocked his wrist to the side, and his momentum carried him forward.
Right into my elbow.
I jammed it into his mouth. I heard a nice grunt and a crack. His jaw probably broke on impact, or maybe I knocked out a tooth.
I didn’t stop to investigate. I grabbed his knife hand and wrenched his fingers open, forcing him to drop the knife as I whipped his arm around and shoved it up behind his back.
Seconds later, Ferris ripped a gun from his waistband.
Two things happened too fast for me to stop them.
First, I got Donal in front of me, his arm pinned up behind him. I planned on beating his ass and making sure the other two didn’t try anything stupid.
But second, Ferris pulled the trigger.
Bullets blasted into Donal’s chest. He gasped in shock and I felt his body stiffen in pain. Ferris got off two good shots before he stopped and realized what he was doing.
Donal was in the perfect position to act as a human shield.
Not that I planned it. Just sort of worked out that way.
Donal coughed blood. I stared at the wounds in his chest as he slumped forward. Ferris let out a strangled cry and dropped the gun.
I grimaced. Guns went off when people dropped them. Fortunately, this one didn’t.
“No,” Fiona screamed, shoving past me.
I released Donal and he dropped to the ground.
Ferris turned and ran. Tully stood there, staring with an open mouth, before he turned and ran too. Both of them sprinted off, leaving their leader to bleed on the pavement.
Fucking cowards.
“Oh, god, Donal.” Fiona turned him onto his back. He coughed more blood, a fine spray splattering over her shirt. “Oh my god. There’s a hospital. We’ll get you to a hospital.” She looked up at me, desperate.
But I shook my head. The bastard wouldn’t last another five seconds.
Whether he meant it or not, Ferris was one hell of a shot. The first bullet ripped into Donal’s lungs. The second hit the poor guy’s heart.
Donal convulsed and Fiona held him tight. She spoke soothingly to him, but his eyes dimmed rapidly. I knelt down, watching closely for that last moment, when the final bit of life disappeared.
I reached out and brushed his eyelids, closing them over his lifeless stare.
Fiona was shaking when I peeled her away from the corpse.
“Come on, we have to go.”
“Donal.” She stared in horror. “How did that happen? How did that just happen?”
“Your cousin was a little trigger-happy.” I didn’t add that I was lucky as hell and probably should’ve been dead in Donal’s place.
She was in shock. I guided her away from the body, back to my truck. Azar glared at me as I went and I gave him an apologetic shrug.
For once, that wasn’t my fault.
Fiona leaned up against the window. Her clothes were smeared in blood and she had splatters on her cheeks and forehead. I drove off, heading away from the scene before the cops could show up.
“It’ll be okay,” I said softly and tried to take her hand.
But she pulled it away from me, shaking her head. “Donal’s dead because of me.”
I stared at her, my jaw working. “Donal’s dead because his dumb fuck cousin decided to start shooting.”
“He saw you with me and got scared. God, Mack, they’re just stupid kids.”
“They’re your age. Would you shoot someone just because they were hanging around with a family member?”
“No, of course not.”
“Then it’s not your fault. You didn’t make them overreact. They chose it.”
Tears rolled down her eyes, smearing the runny blood down her chin.
It was the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen in my life. And I knew how sick that made me.
“I was just with them last night. It was like the old times again, you know?” She stared out the window as more sobs ripped from her chest. “God, and now Donal’s gone. Right when he was starting something with Shannon.”
I didn’t know who Shannon was, but it sounded like she wouldn’t be happy when she heard the news.
Fiona cried and I kept my hand on her leg. I couldn’t stop, not with the cops back there, not until we were safe. But when I finally reached home, I pulled her over and wrapped my arms around her, heedless of the blood.
There wasn’t much I could say. She was too upset to hear any of it, and I could only imagine what was running through her mind. Blaming herself, anger and sorrow, a mix of all that plus a thousand more little details I’d never fully grasp.
That was what family did. They sucked you in and changed you irrevocably, and no matter what happened, there’d always be that mark.
She was a Doyle, whether she liked it or not, and watching one of her cousins get killed right before her eyes was probably a nightmare come to life.
I took her inside. I was as patient and as tender as I could be. I drew up a bath and got her undressed.
She was pliant like a doll.
I put her into the warm water and washed off the blood. The water turned pink. I drained it then filled it up again. Her hair spread out, the red tips floating around her shoulders.
“I liked Donal,” she said softly. “He wasn’t such a bad guy.”
“I’m sorry.”
Although I wasn’t, not particularly. He did try to stab me to death for no reason.
“What do we do now?”
“We keep going forward. You don’t want your brother to end up like him, right?”
“No,” she whispered.
“Then we keep going.” It took all my willpower not to look at her gorgeous, naked body, but I did kiss her neck and her lips.
My tongue entered her mouth like an invading force.
She reacted with a soft moan, and that only set my blood burning for more.
I always felt like this after a kill. Even though it wasn’t my kill, the adrenaline still raged inside of me, looking for an outlet. I wanted to break something. To murder it to bits.
Instead, I could make Fiona feel better.
I kissed her harder, deeper. She moaned softly and her hands came up. She weakly tried to push me back.
I grabbed her hair tight and held her lips against mine.
Her moans turned urgent. I reached down into the water, heedless of my long-sleeve shirt, and found her gorgeous slit. Her hips wiggled as I teased her, rolling around her folds before pressing against her clit.
Her kiss turned wild. She bit my tongue and I let loose a savage growl. I grabbed her and lifted her up from the water, perching her on the wide shelf beside the tub. She sucked in a breath, body running with water, beautiful and perfect.
I spread her legs and licked her folds, lapping my tongue up along her pussy. She moaned in surprise and pleasure, and I pressed a finger inside, teasing her wet little cunt—god, she was soaked already, and not from the bath. I pushed another finger inside, fucking her slowly at first, then moving faster as I licked her clit, sucking and nibbling, using my teeth to make her gasp in pleasure and pain. I dug my fingers into her back with my other hand, and she gripped my hair like she might rip it from my scalp.
I wanted to make her feel better, and this was the only way I knew how.
Death didn’t mean much to me. I grew up around blood, taught to constantly anticipate my own demise.
Evgeni made sure I knew that my life was contingent on my loyalty. He made sure that I knew I owed him everything.
But to Fiona, this must’ve been a horrible experience, watching one of her cousins get killed. If I could get inside of her and take away that moment, I’d do it without hesitation.
I’d give up a lot if I could protect her from that.
I couldn’t though.
The best I could do was to give her pleasure. To make her feel so good that for one perfect moment, she forgot all about her pain and existed only in that space of incredible floating ecstasy.
The little death.
I wanted to make her come.
I kept going, licking her clit and sucking it, fucking her with my fingers, and digging my fingers into her ass, gripping her tight. Her moans echoed through my house like she wanted to scream until the windows shattered, and I kept going, pushing her harder, fucking her faster with my fingers, tasting her sticky-sweet clit, eating her delicious arousal, tasting every drop of it, until her back arched out and I reached up to tease one stiff nipple, still fucking her, still licking her, and she came in heavenly waves, in gasping, screaming moans, my name on her tongue, her eyes rolled back, her pleasure on my lips.
I lapped her up, licked every last drop, drank her down like cool running water until she finally came to a gasping, twitching halt and leaned back against the cool tile wall, staring at me with her lips parted.
I stood and slowly took off my shirt.
She stared and there was a hint of fear in her eyes when I took off my pants.
I was hard. I couldn’t help myself.
She was a goddess and her taste was like heaven.
I climbed into the water and pulled her down with me. I held her, only held her, my big arms wrapped around her body, and after a moment, she relaxed into my embrace.
She didn’t speak, but I felt her tears on my chest, mingling with the bathwater, slipping away into nothing.
