Taming the Monster by K.J. Thomas

Chapter 17

Avery

The bullet that entered my shoulder slammed me against the wall. For a couple seconds I had the worst pain that I’ve ever experienced in my life. Unfortunately the blast from the gun knocked me hard into the wall and knocked my ass flat on the ground.

I was out cold.

It couldn’t have been for very long, one of the guards starts kicking me. At least it wasn’t a full debilitated kick that startled me awake, he was only checking for life.

You know when you first wake up in the morning, you just want to jump out of bed sometimes or open your eyes and yawn and stretch. I think the only thing that saved my life is that I didn’t do either.

All I want to do is scream, the pain is relentless and maddening, I’m biting my tongue and doing everything I can to stay in this position where the guard thinks I’m dead or almost there.

Thankfully after a few slightly painful kicks he stops and I can hear the static and clicking from his radio.

“All three are dead, let’s get out of here,” the guard says.

I don’t know if he’s just saying this for me, just to see if I am truly dead. Maybe they don’t have any more bullets. But I remain unmoving, the excruciating pain that has torn through the meaty part of my body is also breaking my heart in two. The guard said three people and there were only three targets: me, Vito and Asher. Oh God, does that mean that they’re all dead?

Calm down, I keep telling myself in my head. They think I’m dead, maybe the others are just playing possum or maybe they got the wrong people. Yeah, that could be it.

I’m still in hell, I can’t move because I can feel him watching me. His eyes are staring holes through my body, making this unimaginable pain drag on.

The only thing that’s keeping me from screaming and just doing everything and anything I can to bring these men down is the fact that they still might be alive.

If they are, are they in as much pain as I am? Maybe they’re just knocked out.

The guard’s footsteps walking away gets me out of my very unhealthy thought process. I can hear the static of the radio crackling again. “I checked the others, let’s get out of here, we’re done, Rob.”

Oh God, I clamp my mouth shut as a sob tries to break free. That was Luca’s voice on the radio. He checked the others to verify that they were dead.

The guard walks away leaving me in my own little pool of blood and despair.

Unfortunately for them, the rage is building stronger as it pumps through my veins, getting rid of all the pain and enticing my revenge.

I slowly crack open my right eye, just a slit at the bottom, in case that fucker is standing right there. I take in a deep breath and let it go when I notice the coast is clear.

I drag myself to the nearest bathroom. It starts as an army crawl that moves up to a crawl and then finally I find the strength to lift myself up, using the wall for leverage. I feel like dead weight, like I weigh double of what I did this morning.

I need to stop the blood from seeping out. Too much keeps coming out. I’m no doctor, but I don’t think there’s a huge artery in the arm or the shoulder that would cause me to lose this much blood.

I spot a nearby bathroom. It takes everything I have to get there. I’m running on reserves trying to clean some of the mess that is my arm.

The pain has morphed into madness, which helps me to do a somewhat sufficient sling around my arm in under two minutes.

As I get ready to open the door, more shots pop off. They sound a little farther away but one shot for me is enough, close or not. I drop to my knees and cover my head silently rocking back and forth. The anger is still there, but the emotional pain of seeing and hearing a gun again is working horrors on my psyche right now.

“I need to get out of here,” I whisper to myself. I’m the only one that can avenge my family if it’s true what the guard said about Asher and Vito.

I have to get out of here. Now!

I’m moving on adrenaline as I slowly creep the hallways biting my tongue not letting a painful whimper escape. There are men down everywhere, these must’ve been the guards that came from outside, mixed with Luca’s men.

A horrible thought goes through my mind and of course it’s something that Luca would do. Kill everybody while they’re sleeping. That asshole probably didn’t even bring that many guys.

Looking at the ground around me I can see bodies of men who do not work for us. I’ve only heard one guard still alive talking with Luca. He hardly brought anyone with him.

I start to move faster. My first thought was to stay alive but now my main goal is to not let Luca escape alive.

I make out a familiar figure lying about one-hundred feet in front of me. This isn’t the same spot I left Asher, but it’s close enough. I drop to my knees ignoring the sob that goes through me, the one that’s been wanting to escape the pain and shit that we’ve been through in this life.

I touch his face and gasp, he’s still really warm. “Asher,” I whisper at him. “Please wake up, they’re gone.” Asher doesn’t move.

I look down at my knees where I dropped down next to him and they’re covered in his sticky blood. He has no wounds on the top part of his body, it’s all lower.

Guards rush in, grabbing my attention making me push myself as far back against the wall as I can. Thankfully, and I’m thanking God for this a million times over, they’re our guards.

They rush in and drop next Asher checking him over. One of them even has a first aid kit in their back pocket. They probably all do which is pretty smart. A sob escapes again as I think about talking to Vito about them carrying that. But I know deep in my heart that there is no more Vito. The guards glance in my direction, they never even noticed I was there.

“Avery, we’ve got to get you out of here.” I nod. I don’t want to be here right now.

Out of the corner of my eye I spot two men dipping and diving, so to speak, making their way to an SUV that’s parked five-hundred yards away.

I look back at the guards about ready to say something, but there’s only two of them in here and they both are needed to take care of Asher. I have to do this on my own.

I tighten my sling, making me bite my tongue hard drawing a little blood. I need my fucking arm to not fail me now. Hopefully the blood will slow down until I kill Luca.

I slip down the hallway past the guards. I probably don’t need to hide what I’m doing, these are Vito’s men. I guess they’re my guards now, too. I wipe away the tears and shake my head. I’m not doing this shit now. I need to be fully concentrated on making sure this bitch burns.

From what I can make out, those two were heading toward a newer SUV not far away, so I don’t have that much time. They’re moving slowly not to draw attention to themselves, because there are still a shit ton of our guards outside. We do have an alarm system that can alert them in the house but there’s no way I’m hitting it. Luca deserves to die, and I deserve to do it.

Once I’m in the clear, away from the guards, I start to run. You never realize how weak you are until you lose a shit ton of blood. Nothing’s going to stop me, not even blood loss.

Once in the garage, I start sifting through tons of keys that are everywhere. This is a twelve car garage and there about ten different vehicles in here, from a beat up SUV to a freaking Bentley. I’ve never see my grandpa riding in a Bentley, maybe he just had it for show, or maybe my grandma wanted it. There are keys on the edge of the toolbox, I grab them and hit the fob letting me know who they belong to.

I smile as I take in the black Maserati. This would not be my choice, it’d be better for me to have the old crappy SUV but I have no idea where the keys are and my time is very limited.

I jerk my head up to see if I can see them anymore, but luckily for me they’re just getting to the SUV now. I jump in the car, get everything ready, even opening another garage door on the backside so that they don’t see me. I want them to get a little bit ahead. At least I think that if they believe they’re safe, then they won’t keep looking for anybody behind them.

Those two are not getting away, I want their heads on a fucking pike in our front yard.

Of course, we’ll have to leave them inside the house, this isn’t the medieval times.

I watch them, feeling the anger boiling in my veins as Luca and the guard are laughing and patting each other on the back. I have no idea how I’m able to see this well, especially in my weakened state. I’ve always had awesome eye sight, but this is ridiculous, maybe I’m just seeing what I want. I shake my head at that thought, I know that’s not even true, Luca is acting exactly how Luca does, selfish and self-centered. That’s why even if he gets away from us, he won’t last long. Other families will tear him down, he’s pretty much the epitome of fucked.

I start the Maserati and the thing bursts to life. I need to show him that if you mess with the Romano’s and the Mancini’s, you won’t walk away, and all of this delivered by a fucking woman.

I sound mad and crazy!

I pound the steering wheel as I slowly start to creep after them. It’s time to get my revenge.