Page 35 of Odin

Chapter 18

I'd had to be patient, and tonight, I was collecting my reward. The break-in at my penthouse had been gossip for a few weeks, and I had to wait for the heat to die down.

I didn't have to wait very long. The news broke the story of Senator De Luca's scandal with his secretary. They loved political extramarital affairs, but what made this even juicier was where it had occurred. The senator should have known there were cameras in his congressional office. The leaked footage made the rounds on every news channel, and I heard the uncut version was on a porn site. I guess that was what happened when your wife was a nosy bitch. She really shouldn't have asked me to volunteer for the bachelor auction, especially in front of Serena.

I kissed Serena as she left for Euforia. If she was sore, she didn't comment on the all-day sex marathon. It was a man thing, but I wanted her scent on me when I ended the cop. He needed to know that he hadn’t broken her. It was pure pride, but I didn’t care. He wouldn’t be alive long enough for it to bite me in the ass.

Telling her to have a good night, I waited half an hour to make sure that she'd left the building with her guards before heading to my playroom with all the Syndicate toys in the basement.

***

Istood in the middle of the playroom and inspected myself. The cop’s next-door neighbor was a drug addict who spent his day shooting money into his veins. However, he was useful. He always wore a hat so that the cameras in the building wouldn’t pick up when he was high. I had bought the same hat and the same clothes. I trimmed my beard to match his, and with a wig and some new eyebrows, the camera wouldn’t know the difference. Too bad the guy had taken a fatal hot shot a few days ago. I had kept him on ice until he was useful, but I couldn't take credit for that kill. Drugs were bad.

All soldiers had to live within the Lombardo territory, but Carazzo had chosen a really shitty part of town. He was collecting his regular salary from the police department, and the Lombardos had been paying him to do some shady assignments. Shady, yes. Illegal, no. He'd been running around, collecting protection payments from the long-time mom-and-pops. They were so used to paying that when they saw Carazzo, they just handed over the money without intimidation. What had he done with his money? He couldn't have voluntarily chosen this. I wouldn't have, and I didn't have many standards.

Parking my shitty backup car in the parking lot, I walked into the building like I fucking owned the place. I'd swiped the drug addict's keys on one of my trips, so I made sure the camera caught me swinging them against my fingers as I made my way to the third floor. Opening the neighbor’s door, I walked in like I owned the place, but once the door was closed, I slipped booties over my shoes and pulled on my leather gloves. Pocketsand layered clothing were a thing of beauty. I'd hid all my tools against my body.

Walking towards the bathroom, I checked on my corpse. He looked good. The ice had helped slow his decomposition, and he still looked fresh. He hadn't been a part of the plan, but his death had allowed me to use his apartment as an office. If he was going to be stupid, then I was going to capitalize on it.

I'd waited long enough. It was time.

I'd placed the kitchen table underneath the vent that connected the drug addict's apartment to Carazzo's. Standing on top of it, I could unscrew the vent cover and drop the pieces onto the nearby counter. Grabbing the edge of the ductwork, I pulled my upper body into the vent, so that I was bent at the waist. It was large enough that I could crawl forward and pull my feet up, and then it was a straight shot into Carazzo's apartment, as long as I pushed forward.

The last time I had been here, I had checked how secure the vent cover was into the cop's apartment. Whomever maintained the building hadn't even bothered to screw in all of the vents. Now, as I approached it, all I had to do was push it forward enough to hold the top and make sure I had a good grip on it when I dropped in for a visit. Listening, I could hear the water rushing through the pipes, so I assumed he was in the bathroom. Probably cleaning up from some whore.

From all the months of surveillance that I had done, I knew everything about the cop’s routine. He left the compound, picked up a whore off the corner of Lower Wacker Drive, and then went home for an hour of fun. I am not sure how much fun it could be when the girls were barely legal, and they were only giving him the time of day for money. I often paid them a little extra to tell me anything they could remember. Most of it, I really didn’t want to know. He often took them against a wall,from behind, with their hands cuffed. It didn’t take a genius to figure out this was his M.O. He’d never fuck again after tonight.

Dropping through the vent, I made my way to the bathroom quietly. I’d spent way too many years sneaking into tough spots. This was almost a cakewalk, but I didn’t want to be overly confident. The idiot had left the bathroom door open, and I could see his reflection in the mirror. I slid down into a crouch position and waited. I was far enough away that my shadow didn’t cross near him.

Shutting off the bathroom light, he turned towards the bedroom and never realized I was there. With his back to me, he walked down the hallway, but I didn’t let him get very far. I leaped from my crouched position and overtook him. Shoving him against the hallway wall, I had him in handcuffs in record time. This wasn't my kink, but I'd been practicing.

“It’s not so fun when you’re the one assuming the position.”

“What the fuck do you want? Shouldn’t you be tweaking out right about now?” He tried to push away from me, but I held him still with his face pressed against the wall.

He thought I was the neighbor. I laughed, “You’re a dumb fuck. He’s been dead for at least two days, and you didn’t even notice.” Carazzo went still. “Yeah, ass wipe. That’s what happens when you buy a hot shot off the street.”

“Who are you?” he asked. He wasn’t shaking, but I could smell the fear pouring out of his skin. The God of War relished it.

I laughed some more, as I knocked his feet out from underneath him and shoved him face-first to the ground. Shaking my leg, I grabbed the spreader bar that I'd hidden under my pants. I didn't care to spend useless money, but I'd splurged on the deluxe model. I connected the cuffs to the bar and then locked his ankles in to be spread. He wasn't going anywhere.

"You know, I can see why you find these games so appealing. It has to be about the power transfer. One person has all thecontrol, and the other person doesn't. Right now, you're at my mercy, but I can give you some advice to take to hell. It's much sweeter when they submit to you of their own free will. Not because they're terrified and you're paying, but because you've earned their trust."

“Who are you?” he asked again, lying face down on the floor in the hallway. The cop was profusely sweating, and his limbs trembled.

“You picked the wrong woman to rape,” I said. I wasn’t ready to reveal myself yet.

“Rape! They’re just whores. I have money. Let me just pay.” He tried to turn his head, but I was standing directly behind him, and he wasn't able to turn far enough to glimpse me. He was just able to hear my voice.

“Get a little rough with a few?” It was rhetorical. I already knew that he had.

He became silent, like he didn’t know how much I knew and didn’t want to further incriminate himself.

I kicked him in the ass, so that he would move towards the bedroom. He had a hard time finding any leverage to get his limbs moving, and I finally gave up after watching him struggle for a while. Hauling him to his feet, I gave him one last shove onto the bed. He wasn't going anywhere as his face hit the mattress first.

I stood in the doorway to the bedroom and watched him squirm around on the bed. “My wife wasn’t a whore.”

His demeanor instantly changed. “You’re just a doctor. You can’t do shit to me. I’ll tell Lorenzo that she didn’t want to be with you, so she gave me her virginity first. You’ll be a laughingstock.”

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