Page 32 of Empire of Carnage
I didn’t blame them.
So here I was, using César’s church room to conduct a half-ass Black Crow Brotherhood meeting with our members. They filed back in slowly, too many bodies in the small room and these were only the members who were privy to decisions we made, not just any soldier
I was anxious.
But this had been coming, I knew it from the moment she walked back into my life. I’d just been pretending like there wasn’t a countdown above my head the entire time. It was now flashing zero.
Time was up.
“Berserk!” Ethan yelled, hair still wet from a shower.
He greeted Santos with a bear hug, not giving much notice to the change in his face. I embraced Ethan, slapping him hard on the back and Fletcher followed behind, hooting and making animal noises as he bounced on his toes and pushed his way into the room.
“It’s good to see you both.” I nodded as they made their way in the room.
The rest of our men gathered in, taking seats where they found them. The remainder stood shoulder to shoulder as they waited for me to address them. The last four months had been nothing short of a fuckstorm, but the Black Crows could rebuild from the ruins, they deserved that. I just wasn’t sure if I was the one who could stack those bricks anymore.
“This compound is cozy and all boss, but people are ready to go home. Wherever that is. We’ve been in limbo for too long now and we need a purpose. We need to take out the assholes who hurt our families,” Fletcher spoke first, nodding to Santos when he said family.
He was just now back at a hundred percent, and if I were him, I’d want blood too. We needed more than that if we were going to go after the Bratvas. We’d need everything we had and more.
“Everything’s wrong right now. I know that,” I started, getting the attention of all the men in the room. “I’m gonna do whatever it takes to make sure every ounce of blood gets paid back in double.”
“Dez has turned some Crows against you. They don’t whisper loud enough for us to know who they are, but we’ve all heard the whispers, Berserk.” He used the nickname the city knew me by.
The name of the man I was before she came back to me.
Men began to talk over each other, but they were all practically saying the same thing.
They were worried. They had more than enough proof that Dezmond Archer Junior was now working with the Bratvas to get payback for Sokolov’s daughter’s face. We also never gave the other daughter back. Not our fault for lack of trying though, apparently she didn’t want to go home.
Daddy had done enough damage that the Diablo’s compound was cozier than a Bratva penthouse with all the fixins.
And now we had a major target on our back. Our rat problem became a traitor problem and we were down quite a few soldiers. Permanently. The attack on the high-rise killed too many of our people. Out of those who came out unscathed, quite a few decided to leave the life.
Who could blame them?
Not knowing which day was going to be your last and learning to be fine with that was a skill in itself.
Not something either nature or nurture could prepare you for. It was something that was burned into you with the flames of time. For Celia that was a cattle brand in her father’s hand. For me it was a black dog tag and all the men I once watched die in the name of freedom.
“We’re not ready to attack them head on right now.” The second the words left my mouth a chorus of disappointment rang out from half the room while the other chimed in louder to my defense.
We were already divided.
What was I holding on for?
Like a kid who wouldn’t share a toy even though he was done playing with it.
Except the Crows weren’t a toy and these were people’s lives at stake.
Santos stuck his index and middle finger in his mouth and whistled loudly, quieting the room.
“We wiped the floor with Los Muertos, why can’t we do the same with the Bratvas?” Bruno, one of our heavier hitters asked.
“It’s not that simple. Los Muertos wasn’t even half the amount of soldiers as I would expect the Russians to have. They were distracted, the Russian’s are waiting for us. Not to mention, we had over a hundred Diablos holding our hands on that fight.”
“They won’t help us again?” he asked.
