“Took you fucking long enough,” Tigran says softly as I crouch down beside him.
Across the parking lot, the nail salon looks like it always does. Just another anonymous business in a simple strip mall out in the suburbs. There are plenty of cars in the parking lot and a decent amount of foot traffic between the stores.
“I rushed here the second you called. How long has she been in there?”
“Forty minutes. I’m guessing she’s almost finished.”
“Where are our men?”
“Place is surrounded. I’ve got ten out back and ten more scattered around the front.”
“And who did she bring with her?”
“Four guards. Two are still in the car and two went inside.”
I nod to myself. We have the numbers. But this is a tricky situation.
It’s the middle of the day. Aunt Sona’s not stupid—she wouldn’t risk her life for a manicure at night. I can’t move as easily when there are this many potential witnesses around.
But fuck, I don’t think I’ll ever get a chance this good.
“Neutralize her men in the car,” I order Tigran. “I’m going inside.”
“You sure about that?”
“Obey your patron,” I tell him firmly. I’m not in the mood for bullshit right now.
Tigran’s grin is vicious. “You really want to end this shit right here, huh? Take out Aunt Sona and the rest will fall apart.”
“That’s the idea.” I gently push him away. “Go do your job.”
“Yes, sir.” Tigran hurries off. I watch him meet with three of our men and have a quick discussion. They arm themselves with silenced pistols before creeping between the cars, heading toward a big, white Cadillac parked in the far corner.
My men are good. They’re well trained and they know their business. Tigran takes the first shots, lighting the car up. The silencers don’t make the bullets quiet, but they muffle it enough that it sounds like little firecrackers going off. The few people nearby barely even look over.
Tigran gives me an all-good gesture.
I walk toward the salon. I don’t know how many employees are inside or if there are other customers as well. But none of them matter. Aunt Sona is my only target, and I’m done showing mercy to family.
It has to be this way.
Four of my men fall in with me. I nod at one of them, a cousin named Aaron. He takes point and the others fall in behind.
My father was a ruthless man. He killed without hesitation. The city bled beneath his boots and he took control of the Brotherhood with an iron fist.
But he also treated family well. He loved his brothers and sisters. He even cared about his children in his own sick and twisted way.
Everyone in the Brotherhood expects me to act like my father did. They see hesitation and mercy as weakness.
While all I can see is a patron falling so low that he’s forced to kill his own blood relatives.
Aaron shoves open the salon door. I rush in past him, gun drawn. Sona’s two guards are sitting to the left in the waiting area reading magazines. They try to leap to their feet, but I put them down with bullets to their chests before they can even cry out.
Employees scream. A couple of older women are getting pedicures in the back. They topple from their chairs and cover their heads.
I barely see anyone but Aunt Sona.
She’s sitting at one of the manicure tables. The employee across from her staggers backward away from me, hitting the floor and crawling away.
Aunt Sona doesn’t move. Her chin raises defiantly as I approach.
“Who told you?” she asks.
I point my gun at my aunt’s head. “Doesn’t matter.”
She sneers. “Maybe not to you.”
“You brought this on yourself. You realize that, don’t you?”
“I’ve only been doing what I feel is right.”
“You tried to kill me. I wanted to negotiate, and you stabbed me instead.”
“I was defending myself.”
“Auntie, please. Don’t bullshit me. I have a gun pointed at your skull. You have no power anymore.”
Her stony expression wavers. There’s real fear in her eyes. She knows what’s going to happen. She understands this is the only way. Aunt Sona’s smart, and if our positions were reversed, she’d pull the trigger.
“How were we supposed to follow you after what you did to your father? You betrayed him, Arsen. You accepted the help from an outside crime syndicate, and you killed him.”
“Did you ever ask yourself why?”
“Power. Control. Money. I don’t care. The usual reasons.”
“No, Sona. I did it because of the scars.”
Her mouth twitches and she glances away. “I don’t know what you mean.”
“Yes, you do. I did it because of the hell he put me through. You knew about it too, didn’t you?”
“Your father was a hard man,” she murmured. “I didn’t always agree with his disciplinary choices.”
“He had his soldiers beat me. They stabbed me, burned me, cut me. They treated me like a dog.”
“What does that have to do with anything?”
“I killed him because he didn’t deserve to stand at the head of the Brotherhood. He viciously bullied and brutalized his own child. He wasn’t worthy of the title patron.”
And just like that, I could see myself clearly, as if I were standing across the room and watching this scene play out.
My father wasn’t worthy of running the Brotherhood because he treated his own family like cattle.
And I’m doing the same thing.
The circumstances aren’t exactly aligned. Aunt Sona and Uncle Garen betrayed me and started a war against me, whereas my father was on some kind of sick power trip. But still, it’s the same.
If I kill her now, I won’t be worthy of running the Brotherhood.
I might hate her. I might want to do it so badly it hurts.
But I also love her because she’s my blood.
I took over the Brotherhood because I wanted to be better than my father.
How can I say I’m changing things if I become just like him?
“You’re not going to do it,” she says quietly, her eyes going wide. “You can’t do it.”
“Sona—”
She lunges sideways, grabbing for her purse. She nearly pulls a gun before I kick her in the wrist and stomp down on her hand. She screams in pain, and I bring down the butt of my gun, bashing her in the head.
Blood seeps from a wound. It doesn’t knock her out, but it stuns her.
“Restrain her,” I order.
Aaron comes over with zip ties and wraps them around Sona’s wrists. “What now, Patron?”
“Take her. Bring her back to my property. I’ll deal with her there.”
He looks uncertain. “Are you sure? What about these witnesses?”
I walk over to the counter and drop a big stack of cash. “There are no witnesses. Just a bunch of smart people that know better than to get involved with dangerous men.”
Aaron grunts and lifts Sona up off her feet. He carries her on his shoulder, and she looks so fucking old and frail.
I could’ve done it. Pulling the trigger would’ve all but guaranteed an end to the fight. Garen would’ve been livid, but he’s not clever or strong enough to keep fighting on his own.
But there has to be a better way. I can’t murder my own blood relatives, no matter how angry I am with them.
I’m not my father. I won’t ever be my father.
I can build a better future and a stronger Brotherhood.
