“The devil made me do it. Tell them that. Tell them anything I don’t give a fuck,” I put my cigarette out on the table. “You didn’t even finish that one,” my lawyer says as he wipes the ashes and the butt into his briefcase. I light up another one out of spite more than need. It is the first hit that we all crave not the last. “We need to come up with a better strategy than the devil,” He starts up. “Like what? That I took a pistol to each one of their heads and pulled the trigger willingly?” I take a second drag off the cigarette. “Will you please keep your voice down?” He asks me because he knows he has to ask. No one tells me to do shit. Not the cops I killed, not the dealers I create, not even that bitch of a wife back home, no one and I mean no one tells me what to do. “Did you get me that drink or what?”

He hands me a flask out of his briefcase. Sucking down a big gulp of only the finest whiskey. He judges me with his eyes from across the table. A devilish grin as I remove the flask from my lips. Disgusted he shakes his head in disapproval as though I care what he thinks. “Really? Nice, look I’m not telling you what you should say or how to run your business, but killing cops? In cold blood no less. That is strictly insane. How am I supposed to get you out of here with these charges?” He wipes another cigarette into his briefcase and I take another drink. “Shouldn’t have been trying to extort me. In my own home no less. What can I say I got a little upset?” “You could have said no or instead of tying them up and executing them you could have dropped them off somewhere. Honestly, anything but what you did might be better than this. The cops?” He questions.

“The cops can go suck a dick. Do you have any idea how much I pay them to not interfere with my business? A fucking lot and then these rebel ass fuckers come to my house, in front of my family, and ask for more? They got what they deserve and you will get me out of here like you always do because I pay you a fucking lot of money too. So, get off your ass, march through those doors, and do what it is that I pay you to do,” I order him. He stands up and runs his hands through his greasy hair, “I’ve been up all night trying to do just that. News flash you and all the money in the world are not going to get yourself out of this. What you have done this time is just plain stupid. All this money has made you blind. Blind and stupid. I quit,” he says as though he grew a spine in the last thirty seconds.

“You can’t quit. This isn’t some company you can just walk away from. I’m not some CEO who stuck his dick in the wrong hole. You know damn well that once you walk through those doors you are a dead man. Your wife and kids are dead too. I’ll make sure that when my boys are through with them it will make what I did those cops look like a mercy killing.” I can’t help but smile as my words settle in. “You know you may have a point. Maybe the devil did swoop in and take care of these cops,” he snaps his briefcase closed. “See know we are getting somewhere,” I grin. Threats the world is run on threats. Figure out a man’s weak spot and exploit it to no end.

“Empty threats Marco because your boys already hired me to run their new criminal empire. It is almost too funny that you brought up the idea of your former empire as a business. Because that is how we intend to run it from now on,” he grins. I can feel the blood rush from my face, “Who the fuck do you think you are?” My heart skips a beat as my blood pressure rises. “You know if you had listened more. Like I had listened to you. Things could have been different. Though I don’t know. The devil never changes. The devil does what he wants and deals with the consequences later,” his voice fading as the blood in my ears pounds harder. Didn’t even hear them come in. “What have,” I try to get out before a knife pierces the back of my neck and comes out the other side.

“Everyone knows you don’t fuck with the police. You hire them. Sure, there are always going to be some opportunists. But that isn’t anything that can’t be negotiated. Nothing that can’t be talked out,” he informs me picking up his brief case as my blood slowly washes over the metal table. He takes two photos out from inside his jacket pocket and throws them down in front of me. “Probably doesn’t matter now, but it is only right that you should know,” he pauses. I stare at the photos laid out in front of me. “They suffered until their very last breath,” he finishes.

Enraged I attempt to get up before hands slam me into the table from behind. I struggle as they hold me down. One of them pulls the knife from my throat. More blood releases from my neck and onto the table in front of me. Over and over, they stab me in the back. The metal tip of the blade slamming into the table underneath. “I take it we are even now?” The lawyer asks from the other side of the glass. His questions going unanswered. “Good, if there is anything else you know where to contact me,” he says before walking out of view. I don’t die as I watch. Not right away. Time seems to stand still as I fight for air in the glass. Struggle against their will until there is no struggle left in me. A witness to my own death. Because in my world I get everything that I deserve.

M.T. Billings

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