Page 9 of Hostile Rival
Dani.
I waited until nightfall before leaving the villa. Though it didn’t matter, since no one was around when I walked out the door. If Dani was lurking somewhere, she sure as fuck wouldn’t wish me good luck. Not that I needed it or wanted her to think I did.
After speeding along winding roads, heading inland, I parked a few feet away from the stone property and crept closer. Staying tucked away in the shadows until I could find a suitable spot to lie low.
Through a pair of binoculars, I monitor every floor, not having the best visuals given the small windows. With this, I understood why it would be impossible to lock onto the target with a sniper rifle.
I stay across the street for hours, watching the only guy in the place as he wandered from room to room. Finally settling on the ground floor where he fell asleep on a busted recliner after thirty-four minutes.
There’s been no movement other than the flickering TV screen since he’d sat down. Confident the guy’s out for the count, I dart along the cobbled alley separating the old three-story home and his neighbors. I check for activity at the rear. Only to return to my vantage point for a while longer, just to be one hundred percent certain the guy’s alone.
Ready to get the job done, I pick the door lock and move inside. Now I’m standing over the target, a gun pointed at his temple, my balaclava covering my face, and a finger on the trigger.
The power to end his life is in my hands. It’s my mission. My chance to prove I’ve got what it takes to stand shoulder to shoulder with my brutal brothers. Confirming I’m in the same league as them. Not some pen-pushing loser with his only skill finding loopholes in the law. I want to be in on the action.
This sleeping scumbag knew the consequences.
Bang.
By my calculation, it takes .0833 seconds for the bullet to penetrate his brain and then his forty-odd years of life fizzles to nothing. Just like that. Poof. He’s a goner.
I dig out the burner phone, take a picture of the hole in his forehead, quickly hit send, then remove the SIM card, and smash the device under my boot.
I’m not sure why I’m still standing here, though, staring at his blood-drained face.
Something inside of me doesn’t feel right. Killing some fucker who’d fired off a few rounds in my direction, that’s one hell of a buzz. But popping a cap in the head of an Italian guy who’s sleeping––fuck––it feels weird––wrong.
Taking a deep breath, I shirk off the guilt. I’m only overthinking it because I’d studied law, and the balance of justice would forever be woven into my soul. This is how traitors are dealt with in the real world––inmyworld.
Quickly putting the act into perspective, I remind myself this guy had it coming. My family wouldn’t send a sicario to do a job for no reason.
This is the life I’d chosen.
The line I have to cross.
To weed out the enemies who are a threat to my entire family. These days, that means protecting the Cosa Nostra, headed by my sister-in-law and brother André.
The Souzas reach has grown exponentially. We’ve become the biggest crime organization spanning across the globe. And that makes me…the hesitating asshole.
While I’m lost in a whirlwind of cartel anarchy and the willful, deliberate, premeditated first degree murder I just committed, I miss the hatch door, to a cellar I didn't know about, open. I only hear the guy who’d climbed out of it when he charges at me.
I do a one-eighty, ready to shoot. Except I end up being rammed backward and falling onto the warm corpse.
Together, me and this foreign guy fight like dogs, him trying to win over my handgun and me repeatedly punching him in the side of his skull. He somehow manages to knee my ribs, which doesn’t do much other than piss me off even more.
Baring my teeth behind my mask, I throw my forehead into his face, bloodying his Roman nose.
He’s a big guy, more chubby than muscular. Although he uses the extra weight to his advantage when we roll, practically crushing me in a wrestler move.
Tangled, we crash onto a coffee table. The back of my head hits broken wood and the glass smashes beneath us. Temporarily dazed, the guy takes the opportunity to stab a shard of broken glass into my thigh.
“Motherfucker!” I grit out, lunging at him, then hold my tongue so I don’t give anything away––like my accent. This place could be bugged for all I know.
When he strikes again, lodging the glass deeper into my flesh, my temper goes to shit. Blazing pain shoots through me.
How the fuck dare he disrespectme?Then again, my real identity is hidden under a full balaclava. All he can see are the whites of my eyes in the shadows.
I shove him sideways, flick my good leg out, and boot him right in the balls. Using the seconds while he’s retching, I take aim and shoot the fucker in his left eye.
