Page 13 of Justice

“Warden,” Stone stood inside the entrance to her office, the urgency in his voice telling her all she needed to know. They had come to arrest her, place her in the same prison she ruled with an iron fist. “You have to help me.”

She ignored Stone and his pitiful pleas. Crossing the room to the cabinet against the wall instead, pouring herself one last drink from the crystal decanter, welcoming the burn as it washed down her throat. As she placed the empty glass on the desk, she considered burning the files inside the drawers, evidence which would send her to the electric chair. The stacks of money in the bottom drawer from Area Sixty-Nine would be seized and used to help whatever organization the bleeding heart politicians invented to make them feel better at night, or stuff back into their pockets, a smile on their face as they walked away triumphantly with the assumption they had gotten their pitiful dicks sucked for free.

She would never survive a day on the other side of her office door, not with the number of enemies she had out there. Reaching into the top drawer, she pulled out the handgun she kept there, never fully trusting her officers to keep her safe. Smiling to herself as she touched the ledger she kept with the names of every man who had stepped foot inside her strip club. Oh, how she wished she could see the fall out of when these names reached the ears of the voting public, and more importantly the wives and parish followers of some of the more regular clientele.

“Go fuck yourself, Glynn.” She tossed back as she placed the barrel of the gun under her chin and pulled the trigger.

CHAPTERTEN

Drake Hannigan lovedthe finer things in life; a voluptuous woman, a good cigar and fast cars. He detested artificial anything, including the set of tits on the girl dancing before him.

He was celebrating. It wasn’t every day the wife you never wanted was behind bars, convicted of murdering a state police officer. He could have sent in his best attorney, lined the pockets of several people, but he chose not to. Drake hated everything about his wife Deidre. He would admit at first, she was great, winning over his drunken cock, and a place at his family’s table.

Deidre was everything he needed between the sheets, and a big enough con on her feet to make his mom pressure him into placing a ring on her finger. Too bad she became a frigid bitch the second the ink dried on the marriage license, demanding everyone be at her beck and call. She felt it was her right to have access to the same doors Drake had as leader of his Family. She expected to be given the same respect and the ability to order his men around as she pleased. Assuming it was within her rights to have anyone punished when they failed to do her bidding.

She spent her days in bed until noon, hair and makeup professionally done every afternoon, whether or not she went out of the house. Spray tanning in their home three times a week, nails, shopping, and lunch with friends he had never heard of. Demanding plastic surgery when she knew how much Drake hated it, refusing to allow a single dime of his money to land in the pockets of one of her many plastic surgeons.

Her need to defy him was the straw that broke the camel’s back. When she came home from a trip with her mother and sister, sporting a new nose and a pair of tits, paid for not by him, but the man he placed too much trust in.

Drake didn’t need to see his wife screwing one of his associates to know they were fucking. She demanded the best of everything, which included the latest high-tech cell phone, which he kept track of. Making long calls in the middle of the night, flights to Miami where Lloyd Bremmer owned several homes. He had footage of them in a hotel hot tub in Boca, fucking like a pair of rabbits. She had checked in under her married name, the bitch too prideful, or stupid, to use an alias.

And while he was a devout Catholic, keeping the vows he spoke before God, her unfaithfulness didn’t affect him in the least. What did bother him was how the man who had professed his loyalty to the Family, lied and stole from them at the first opportunity. Adding insult to injury, discovering Deidre had taken his new car when she left Boston on her way to Miami.

When he got the call she’d been arrested, he had his secretary choose an attorney, Steven Jacobs, off the internet to represent her. Getting his car back was a little more difficult, but after a few calls, and cash slipped into the right hands, he was able to place the Maserati in a cargo trailer, getting her safely back to Boston a few days later.

Deidre’s attorney called when the verdict was read, assuring Drake he would file the proper paperwork to contest the decision. Drake declined, advising him if she wanted to appeal, she would need to do it on her own dime. He knew how angry she could get, and how easily her mouth could get her into trouble. So, he contacted the warden at the prison, who, surprisingly, was willing to divulge any information he needed, including any visitors requesting to see her. For a price of course.

A month or so later, he received an alert Bremmer had made an airline reservation to Barbados, followed by a text from a private number advising him of a pending request for a friend to visit his wife. Wiring the agreed-upon amount to the warden, the next call was to a long time, and trusted friend, Tobias Marks.

Tobias was a man he met and befriended during his first stint in prison after taking a job with a known mob boss against his father’s advice. But Drake’s family was starving, and his father, John Hannigan, couldn’t keep a job more than a week.

He started out watching the corners for the cops, pulling enough money at the age of sixteen to cover all the family’s bills and put a little away.

His father refused the work his boss, O’Leary, offered him, saying he didn’t work for killers. He sure as shit didn’t have a problem sitting at the table and eating the food his son purchased with the same money.

Drake was seventeen when he had his first run-in with the law, serving a few weeks in juvenile detention, long enough for his father to be fired from one job and quit another. He met Tobias at one of the religious meetings they made him attend. The pair kept in touch, and when the opportunity presented itself, Tobias came to work for O’Leary.

Things were great until the pair turned nineteen, the money poured in as Drake kept climbing the ranks, Tobias right beside him. O’Leary called them in, said he needed to make some money fast, offering a big payout to the two of them. The plan they were given turned out to be a ruse to get Drake locked up, as O’Leary was no longer comfortable with how fast he moved up.

The cops had been waiting on them and they were arrested and sentenced to eighteen months. Drake took the time he spent behind bars making alliances, while Tobias honed other skills. Once they were released, Tobias took a job in a private security company. Drake allowed O’Leary to welcome him back with open arms, playing the part of the grateful employee.

However, he was anything but, as he watched O’Leary; where he went, who he was with, learning everything he could about his schedule. Three months after his release from prison, Drake followed O’Leary to a girlfriend’s house, strangled him, and then fucked the girl against the wall, as O'Leary lay dead on the floor.

One by one, Drake took out O’Leary’s inner circle, when no one else would stand against him, he took over as the leader of the Family. His father came to see him shortly after word spread across the city, asking for a loan so he could start a construction company. Drake denied him but offered to let him work on one of the crews they already had. John lasted half a day before fraying sick and returning home. Drake moved his mother into the house O’Leary built, leaving his father in their old apartment to fend for himself. John showed up at the house when Drake was away on business, beating his mother for asking him to leave. Tobias was the first to respond to the alarm, shooting John in the head after he found him pushing Drake’s mother down the steps, and then charging at Tobias. While their friendship had been solid, it was unbreakable after that.

Tobias had turned down an invitation to Drake’s favorite titty bar, but he had jumped on heading down to Georgia to silence the mouth of one Lloyd Bremmer. Tobias lived for a good hunt, waiting for the perfect moment when his prey least expected it, pouncing when it’s too late for them run to away. He hated Lloyd from the first moment he met him, so convincing Tobias to take him out was effortless.

Now, Drake was awaiting word from Tobias, choosing to pass the time watching a girl take her clothes off, while sizing him up for how much she could squeeze out of him.

“Their fake, motherfucker.” Tobias took the open seat, reaching out and lifting the left breast of the stripper, revealing the small scar underneath.

“No shit, Sherlock.” Drake countered as the stripper covered her chest and moved off the table, not bothering to collect her money in her rush to get away.

“Hey, I know you hate the fake ones, I was trying to save you the frustration later.”

“Do we have reason to celebrate?” Drake knew better than to play into Tobias’s hand. He didn’t share the same level of devotion Drake did, willing to screw anything and everything that presented itself, fake tits or not.

“You mean besides the shit you’ve been doing since the cops called you?”

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