Total pages in book: 150
Estimated words: 136791 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 684(@200wpm)___ 547(@250wpm)___ 456(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 136791 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 684(@200wpm)___ 547(@250wpm)___ 456(@300wpm)
He won't be using it anymore.
I pull back the hammer on the gun, grunting when he cries out in fear. I don't feel satisfaction. I don't feel relief. I don't fucking feel anything. I haven't since January told me that she was done with me. Every person I ever cared about is gone, and the motherfucker in front of me is responsible for part of that, but I feel nothing.
It's almost a relief.
"I know who killed them!" he yelps.
I hesitate for a second.
"You let me live, I'll tell you," he says, tripping over the words in his haste to get them out. "I'll stay off your block. I'll leave you and January alone. Don't kill me, Kincaid. Please."
"Who?"
"Jace Adams, Sean Cortez, and Tully Adcock," he says. "They're Diablos."
"Where are they?"
He rattles off an address.
"You sure?"
"It's Adcock's house. They hang out there most nights."
I nod and press the gun to his temple again.
"Kincaid! Please, man!"
The enraged, wounded part of me whispers that I should pull the trigger and blow his fucking head off. He deserves it. After all the evil he's perpetrated, he deserves to die with piss in his shorts and tears in his eyes. But I can't do it. Because I don't know who will take his place if I do.
Kaleo is beaten, whimpering and pleading for his life. He acts so hard, so big and bad, but he's just a pathetic little boy, hiding behind people like they're human shields. He's a piece of shit…but he's a piece of shit I now know how to control.
"I know about the guns and the drugs. I know you're pimping out girls. Cheyenne Trundle is sixteen years old."
"I don't know Cheyenne," he lies.
"Bullshit. Titan collected all kinds of info on you, Kaleo. I know all your dirty deeds." I dig through my pocket with my free hand and pull out my phone. Scrolling quickly through the videos, I load up one of Kaleo and Dante that Titan took a few months ago. All the evidence he collected was in his bedroom, exactly like he said. There's enough there to send Kaleo to prison for a long time.
"Cheyenne's sixteen, Kaleo," Dante says in the video, his voice full of hesitation.
"I don't give a fuck how old she is, D," Kaleo laughs. "That's prime pussy. Tell her she can work off her debt on her back. She's a whore anyway. Might as well use it to my advantage."
"Fuck," he whispers as the video plays.
"You're a sick motherfucker," I growl, stopping the video. "Pimping out teenage girls?"
"I can explain," he says like there's some reasonable excuse for the things he's done. We both know there isn't, though. The only explanation he has is greed. He thought he was untouchable. That he could do whatever he wanted because he had his hands around Titan's throat. He thought I wouldn't come for him so long as he had Titan on a leash, that no one would, but he never counted on Titan being the one to ruin him. He was too fucking stupid to think that far ahead.
"Please, Kincaid. I'll do whatever you want. Please don't kill me."
"The block belongs to January now," I tell him, holding the gun steady against his temple. Either he agrees, or he'll be my first murder tonight. "You don't set foot on it. You don't go anywhere near her. If your people even step a toe onto her block, I'll come for you."
"Okay," he agrees, practically sobbing the word. "Okay, man."
"The pimping ends right now. I find out you're even thinking about putting your hands on another girl, and I'll fucking kill you."
"Even the older–?"
I crack him in the back of the head with the gun, driving it down hard against his skull twice in rapid succession.
He cries out and falls forward, his face slamming into the edge of his dresser. Before he can hit the floor, I yank him up and throw him into the wall, shoving the gun in his face.
"What the fuck did I just say?" I roar at him.
"No girls. Okay, Kincaid. Okay." He holds his hands up, babbling and crying. Blood smears across the wall from the gash on the back of his head. There's another cut above his eyebrow where he hit the dresser. "I'll cut them all loose, I promise."
I keep the gun pressed to his cheek for a long moment, just watching him cower and cry. He's pathetic. All that talk about how he's the baddest motherfucker out here, but he's begging for his life like the cockroach he is.
"Give me a reason to kill you, Kaleo. Just one, and I'll be on you so fast you won't even see me coming."
"The block is January's. I'll let the girls go. We're cool, Kincaid. We're cool, man."
I nod, satisfied he'll keep his word. He's too fucking terrified to try to wiggle out of this. He knows that video alone is enough to destroy him. And I think he knows I'll kill him without hesitation or remorse. I'm done playing defense, trying to keep people like Kaleo from taking what doesn't belong to them.