Page 12 of Gray Area

“Why did he tell you to take this job?”

“He said he wanted me to start moving some product here. Th-that it would be a gold mine.”

Dad nods slowly, taking in what Dennis has said, and then he turns to my brother. “Axel, I see you’ve had a discussion with our other new hire. Am I correct?”

“I did,” Axel grunts out.

“Okay, well, let’s see how these stories match up, shall we?” Slade says, smiling widely and clapping his hands together like a game show host.

Dennis starts to visibly shake. “Wait, I—”

“Oh no,” Slade interjects when Dennis tries to speak. He goes over to Dennis and slaps his cheeks. “You’ve had your moment in the spotlight. Now this fellow”—Slade gestures to the lump on the floor—“gets his turn.”

“What did he have to say, Axel?” my father asks.

“Said at first this is Vavito’s plan.”

“At first?” I clarify.

“Mm-hmm,” Axel says. “But after some further discussion, he relented that Perez put them both here and told them to pin it on Vavito if anybody pushed them.”

“Perez told him that?” I ask Axel.

“So he says,” Axel says, angling his head to the guy on the floor. “Says he offered him 50k and ground floor on his new operation.”

Silence envelops the room. The only thing breaking it are the groans from the bouncer on the floor. “So Perez is trying to put us in the middle of his drug war?” I ask Dennis, my voice softer than before but clearly more terrifying to Dennis as the kid starts to shake.

“He didn’t tell me what he wanted,” Dennis rattles out quickly. “He told me to come here and start slinging. Says if anyone asks, to say I was sent here by Marco Vavito.”

My father studies Dennis from behind his desk for a few seconds, then moves over to him, picking him up from the chair by his stained white T-shirt. “You better not be fucking lying to me, you little shit,” he growls in his face.

“I-I swear, man, I swear to God I don’t know any more than that. I started working for Perez six months ago. I’m a low man. I get my orders from Cruz, and I just do what he tells me to.”

“And did he tell you to sing like a fucking bird the second you were cornered?” Axel queries, earning a chuckle from Slade.

“Please don’t hurt me,” Dennis whimpers to my dad and I watch it soften him a little. I know he is looking into the face of this guy, who is probably barely eighteen, and he sees one of us in the kid’s face. My dad isn’t made of stone the way he likes to project.

My dad throws the kid back in the chair he’d ripped him from and starts rubbing his bald head, motioning for Axel to come to him.

Just as my dad’s and Axel’s attention is drawn away, I notice Dennis sliding his hand into a cargo pocket on his pants and starting to pull something out. I spring, grabbing his arm, and a small pocket pistol is in his hand.

“Dennis,” I say softly as I crush his hand in mine, making him scream like the little bitch he is, “you fucking scumbag.” I pull the pistol from his hand easily, having crushed many of the bones in it. I examine the gun, empty the bullets from it, and then while holding the small gun in my palm, I slap him across the face with it. Dennis lets out a high-pitched squeal, and I grab him by the throat, squeezing. “Don’t you dare, don’t you fucking dare scream like that, like you’re a victim,” I hiss at him. Dennis glares back at me, and then spits blood into my face, and I explode.

I throw Dennis against the wall and pummel his face with my fist of the hand that is still holding the gun. It’s not until Axel pulls me off that I stop and release Dennis, watching the kid slide to the floor. I turn around and face my Dad. “There is more to this, a lot more. This fucker was about to shoot one of us.”

“Yeah,” Axel says, nudging the man he’d brought in with his boot, “and this guy had two guns and a knife on him.”

“I don’t know what Perez is playing with, but we need to find out,” I tell my father.

My father nods. “But right now, boys, we need to pack up his trash and return it to him, with a message of our own.”

Chapter 6

VIVIAN

It is Thursday, and I am getting myself ready for another class. And even though I hate to admit it to myself, I am a little curious to see if I will catch Declan glimpsing at me in class tonight. The curiosity started when I realized it hadn’t freaked me out as much now when I thought about it as it first had. And then again at the end of our meetup in class, when I found myself a little hypnotized by his stare, not creeped out. The way it seemed comforting to me both times. It got me wondering if I would feel the same ease in class tonight if he stared. Would he even bother with me?

I arrive just as a couple of students are getting there, and we all start to move our desks into the circle that Professor Edwards prefers. I am just starting to hang my backpack on the back of my chair when I got a spidey-sense feeling on my neck and turnto find Declan sitting across the circle from me, his gaze pinning me. Once again I look into his blue-gray eyes, wondering what it is about them that has me so mesmerized.

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