George Pickford sat behind his desk with his elbows sticking out from arms crossed over his pot belly.

  “Look at me,” the sixty-one-year-old crime boss demanded, staring out from behind thick-rimmed glasses. His suspenders clung with all their strength to the black trousers he wore, and cut into the pink-striped, white button-up shirt covering his torso.

  He breathed heavily even though he’d been sitting for the last hour or so. Pickford wasn’t in the best shape, but his labored breaths had nothing to do with fatigue. At least not the physical kind.

  He had, however, grown tired of incompetence.

  “Look at me,” he repeated.

  The two men sitting across from him both raised their battered faces at the same time.

  Two guards stood on either end of Pickford’s unimpressive metal desk. The thing looked like it had come from a hospital yard sale. In the seventies.

  A white clock ticked on the wall over the gray metal door. White walls and gray tile floors felt sterile under the cold fluorescent light above.

  “Tell me again what happened,” Pickford ordered.

  The one to his right looked like he was chewing on his tongue. The one on the left simply lowered his eyes back to the floor.

  “I didn’t tell you to stop looking at me, son!” Pickford shouted, slamming his palm onto the desk.

  The two younger men nearly jumped out of their seats. Both winced, probably from cracked ribs.

  “I’m sorry, Uncle George,” the one on the right said.

  Pickford nodded. “I know you are, Reg. I know.” He turned his focus to the other one. “And I’m sure you’re sorry, too. Aren’t you, Mario?”

  “Yeah. I’m sorry.”

  “What was that?” Pickford pressed.

  “I said yeah. I’m sorry.” Mario threw up his hands and shrugged. “They ambushed us. We had no way to know.”

  “Ah. Well, then that changes everything. Tell me. How did they ambush you?”

  Reg shifted uneasily in his chair.

  Mario, however, tilted his disfigured head to the side, still full of false bravado. “We went in, just like you told us to. Collection day, yeah? We always collect on the first of the month. Like you told us to.”

  Pickford didn’t need to be told the schedule. He had created the thing. “Thank you so much for laying that out for me. What happened when you went into the pub?”

  “The bartender wasn’t there,” Mario said, shifting nervously. The cockiness he’d worn on his face drained away.

  “Bartender? Who cares about the bartender?”

  “Owner,” Mario corrected. “Sorry. The owner wasn’t there.” His nerves gripped him now and wouldn’t let go. Mario had seen what Pickford did to people who failed him. In some ways, he treated those poor souls worse than those who got in his way. Failure, to him, was another form of betrayal. “The owner wasn’t there.”

  “Oh, I see. The owner wasn’t there.” Pickford bobbed his head like it was on a toothpick. He pounded the desk again with an angry fist. “Did he have the money?”

  The two men in the chairs jumped again.

  “No. No he didn’t.”

  Pickford nodded as if understanding the situation now. “So, you go into the pub to collect our monthly dues, and the owner isn’t there. Who was there?”

  “The bartender, Uncle George,” Reg offered.

  “Shut up, Reginald,” Pickford thundered. Within two seconds, he’d calmed his voice back down to a steady volume. “Now, Mario. You were saying?”

  Mario’s anxiety swelled. “Yeah, so—”

  “Sir.”

  “What?”

  “Sir. You call me sir, you impudent little urchin. You’ve been sitting here for fifteen minutes, and not one time have you called me sir.”

  “What?”

  “Say what again, Mario.” Pickford snapped his fingers, and the guard to his right drew a pistol. Pickford held out his right hand without so much as a sidelong glance. The guard placed the gun in Pickford’s palm.

  The boss lazily turned the gun toward Mario. “Say what again.”

  “Wh—I mean, yes, sir. No. I mean, no, sir.”

  Pickford’s lips parted in a sinister grin, the way a wolf snarled at a wounded lamb. “Better. Now. You were saying?”

  “Yeah.” He caught Pickford’s eyes as they narrowed for a split second, and quickly added, “Sir.” He rubbed his thighs, pressing his fingers into the jeans with every pass. “The bartender said the owner wasn’t there.”

  “We established that.”

  “Right. Sir. Anyway, they said they didn’t have your money. That the owner wasn’t there.”

  “And what did you do?”

  “What we always do. We threatened him just like you told us. When someone doesn’t pay, we take it out of them one way or the other.”

  “Yes. That’s correct. Except something else happened. I want to know what.”

  Mario nodded.

  Reg just sat there listening, his eyes firmly locked on his infamous uncle.

  “I was going to cut off his finger,” Mario said. “Like you told us, take fingers if they don’t pay.”

  Pickford laughed. “Yeah. You start taking fingers when they don’t pay; they start thinking about how much they would pay to get their digits back.”

  “Yeah, well, we did that. Or were about to do that, when someone else came into the bar.”

  “Who?” Pickford asked, leaning forward as far as the desk would allow.

  “They snuck in, Uncle—”

  “Shut up, Reggie!” Pickford boomed, turning the pistol’s suppressor barrel toward him.

  Reggie only nodded like a frightened puppy.

  “I don’t know who they were exactly,” Mario explained. “But I know who they work for.”

  “Oh? And who might that be?”

  “Savages.” He said the word with disdain.

  “Savages?” For a moment, Pickford almost looked like he had no clue who Mario was talking about. “Savages?” he repeated.

  “Yes. Sir. Yes, sir.” Mario couldn’t cram the words together fast enough.

  “Then what happened?”

  “There… there were four of them. We were outnumbered, and they caught us by surprise. Before we knew it, they jumped us. You know the rest.”

  “Yes,” Pickford demurred. “I can see what happened. Looks like you boys are lucky to be alive.”

  “They’re the lucky ones,” Mario snipped. “In a fair fight we—”

  “We’re criminals, son,” Pickford snapped back, cutting Mario off like a yippy little dog. “We don’t get to fight fair. Ever.”

  Mario swallowed and issued a single nod, licking his busted lip as he turned his head at an angle to avoid the angry boss’s glare.

  “You know what this means?” Pickford asked over his shoulder.

  “Yes, sir,” the guard to his right said. “It means a little fish thinks they want to be a big fish.”

  “That’s right.”

  “Just tell us where to go and what to do, Mr. Pickford,” Mario said, eager for a taste of vengeance. “I can’t wait to teach those little—”

  The pistol clicked in Pickford’s hand. The muzzle spat a bullet through Mario’s forehead.

  Reg jumped out of his seat amid a hurricane of profanity.

  “What the—” was a common pair of words with some of the expletives.

  “Sit down, boy,” Pickford ordered. He let the pistol wave toward his nephew.

  Reg couldn’t take his eyes off the dead body in the chair next to his. “You killed him. Why did you kill him?”

  “I said… sit down!”

  Reg saw the stern, cold look in his uncle’s eyes. It was a look that meant he would kill his own family if that meant making the organization stronger. Gripped with fear and anger, Reg slumped back into the seat, but his eyes continued to wander to his dead associate to his right.

  “Don’t look at him. He can’t help you now. He’s dead. He don’t know what’s going on.”

  Reg trembled, his body gyrating involuntarily.

  “Hey. Get ahold of yourself, boy. Jeez.” Pickford shook his head in disgust. “If you weren’t my sister’s child.”

  All Reggie could do was sit there and whimper.

  “Some enforcer you are.”

  Reg shook his head in defiance, finally getting a grip. “I won’t let you down again, Uncle. I swear.”

  “Oh, I know you won’t. Or you’ll end up just like your partner over there.” He wagged the pistol at the dead man. “Now, tell me about these Savages. Did you get a good look at them?”

  Reg blinked and nodded after a second of thought. “Yes, sir. I saw them. I saw them all.”

  “What did they look like? Have you seen any of them before?”

  “No,” Reg said. Then he quickly backtracked. “Actually. I have seen one of them before.”

  “Which one?”

  “The ones who beat us up. They were all guys. I didn’t recognize any of them. But there was a girl, too.”

  “What about her?” Pickford leaned forward, pressing the pistol between his palms.

  “Biracial. Curly brown hair. Medium height. Skinny but athletic build.”

  “Well, look at you, my nephew. You might be good for something after all.” Pickford paused for a second and set the gun down. “Where have you seen her before?”

  “One of the pubs in the area. Not that one. Winston’s. I’ve seen her there before having drinks.”

  “Was she on a date?”

  “No. I mean, I don’t know. But I doubt it. There were a bunch of guys hanging around her; two girls, too.”

  “Savages?” Pickford asked, his intrigue building.

  “Yes, sir. And I’m pretty sure they were there with the leader of the gang.”

  “Miles Tidmouth,” Pickford said. “Are you sure?”

  Reg nodded. “Yes, sir. Pretty sure.”

  “I don’t want pretty sure. I need to be certain.”

  “It was him. They run in that part of town, usually working for us.”

  “Yes,” Pickford agreed and leaned back in his chair. He steepled his fingers together and sighed. “We have used them in the past for a number of tasks. But now it would seem their leader has his eyes set on bigger ambitions.”

  “What you want us to do?”

  Pickford thought about it, staring beyond his nephew to the wall behind him. “This is a very risky play by Miles. I’m not sure what’s gotten him in the mood for a fight like this, but if that’s what he wants, that’s what he’ll get.”

  The boss turned to the guy on his left. “Jerry. Take a couple of the boys and head over to Winston’s. Send a message. We can’t have our little underlings thinking they can revolt and change the pecking order of things.”

  “Yes, sir,” Jerry said, and immediately headed for the door.

  “Oh, and Jerry?” Pickford stopped him just as he neared the threshold.

  Jerry looked back at his employer, waiting for the additional orders.

  “Get a cleaner to come in here. They know what to do with the body.”

  Jerry glanced over at the corpse without affect. “Right away, sir.”

  When he was gone, Reg leaned forward, clasping his hands together. “I want in, Uncle. I want to go with Jerry and the guys.”

  “What you want is revenge, son. And that clouds your vision at a time like this. Vengeance has its place. Don’t mistake that. But you must remember the reason for demanding payback. You must take out the emotional component. Once you do that, then you’re ready to deal with the enemy.”

  “I’m ready.”

  Pickford snorted a derisive laugh. “You need to take it easy for a few days. Recover from the lesson you learned.”

  “What lesson is that?” Reg asked.

  “Always watch your back.”

  7

  Mia checked both directions along the sidewalk before she inserted the key into the door of her building.

  The worn-down apartment building featured a red door and cracked white paint over old bricks.

  Mia figured the owners of the building must have thrown the paint on to make it look renovated. They hadn’t bothered touching the interiors of the flats, though.

  She opened the door and walked into the lobby, passing the mailboxes on her way to the stairs.

  No need to check their box. She’d paid the bills two weeks ago, barely.

  They’d almost been late, but she managed to scrounge up a few hundred more pounds to take care of the rent.

  Unfortunately, it would be due again in two weeks. She just needed to hang on a little longer.

  She had a plan to get her family out of this mess, although it was unclear if her father would be a part of that escape strategy.

  He was barely there anymore. He went to work, made money so he could drink, and continued the vicious cycle.

  Mia knew what she was going to find in the flat when she opened the door. It was the same thing every night.

  She climbed the stairs and stopped on the third floor, turning left into the dim corridor. Mia cringed. Dim was the right description. The walls painted in dark gray, the lights that barely illuminated the dingy navy-blue carpet, none of it projected a happy vibe.

  This place was where dreams went to die.

  The owner may as well have hung a sign out front of the manager’s office that read, “Abandon All Hope, Ye Who Enter.”

  She walked down the corridor, moving her feet quickly to avoid lingering too long. She’d never been mugged in her building, but she knew it happened now and then. Even if she was assaulted or robbed, who was Mia going to tell? She was just a street rat, a gang member with a list of minor crimes attached to her name.

  Soon, though, she hoped that wouldn’t be the case.

  Mia was over the gang life.

  At first, she’d joined due to pressure from a few friends in the neighborhood. Without a real sense of belonging and a lack of interest in school, joining the Savages made sense. And it gave her purpose. She finally felt like she was a part of something, and that was a feeling Mia had never experienced before.

  Only one person made her feel that way—her little brother.

  For a while, things had been good after she joined the Savages. She started making a little money, even though she despised some of the activities she was conducting.

  Mia had never been into drugs except a few times smoking pot at parties. She didn’t care what people did with their own bodies as long as she could take care of hers. Now, though, being a part of the machine that was wrecking lives… Regret loomed over her like the clouds over London.

  She still believed people could make decisions for themselves—to eat unhealthy food or not, to exercise or not, to use drugs or not. People could decide who they dated, who they married, what jobs they wanted in life.

  Using all those rationales didn’t strip away the guilt she felt.

  And then there was the other component that gnawed at the foundations of her soul. She’d heard rumors, nothing more, and had never actually witnessed any evidence, but the whispers in the shadows sent chills through her.

  Word on the street was that the leader of the Savages, Miles Tidmouth, was keen on cutting himself in on the human trafficking rings that operated in the United Kingdom, specifically the London underworld.

  One of the other gang members told Mia he’d already started, picking up immigrants as they came in from North Africa and occasionally from Albania by way of France.

  Mia stopped at her door. Number 221. She sighed, still aware of what she’d find on the other side.

  She inserted the key and reluctantly turned the doorknob.

  Disappointment filled her gut as she opened the door and saw inside.

  As expected, her father slouched on a recliner in front of the television. A beer bottle sat on an end table next to him.

  She closed the door quietly so as not to wake him and padded into the living room, setting her keys down on the kitchen counter to her left.

  The little flat had two bedrooms down the hallway to her left, each room on opposite sides. She’d shared a room with her brother since he’d been two, only a few months before their mother passed.

  Fortunately, the boy was asleep. Unfortunately, he’d passed out on the floor at the foot of the couch, she assumed while watching darts with their father—which was still on the television.

  Mia tiptoed over to the entertainment unit—a cheap metal-and-glass job she was pretty sure her father found at a thrift store. Meanwhile, the flatscreen probably cost more than two months’ rent in this dump.

  She shook her head at the thought and turned the volume down slightly.

  Then she stepped over to her brother and nudged him on the shoulder. “Adam. Wake up. Need to get you to bed.”

  She immediately worried about the contradiction in terms but continued to tug at his T-shirt until his eyes cracked open.

  He rolled his head to the side and looked up at her puzzled. “Mia?”

  She smiled down at him. “We need to get you to bed, little brother. Come on.”

  She helped him up off the floor and kept her arm around him, ushering him down the short hallway to their bedroom. Mia steered him over to his bed on the left side of the room and eased him onto the mattress.

  He looked up at her with hope in his eyes as she tucked him in. “Do you think we’ll ever have a house where I can have my own room?”

  She smiled at him, doing her best not to show pity or pain. “Yes, Adam. I do.”

  He grinned back at her, pleased with the answer.

  Part of her felt guilty for lying, even though it wasn’t a real lie. Her dreams were to get out of here and find a place for her and her brother where they could live happily, peacefully, without concerns. Without a passed-out father in her living room who drank up all his money.

  The reality was she’d joined the Savages. And once you were in that gang—like so many others—there was only one way out.

  She reached down and tousled his brown hair, kissed him on the forehead, and told him goodnight.

  Mia walked over to the door and was about to leave when Adam said, “I love you, Mia.”

  She looked back over her shoulder at him with kindness filling her eyes. “I love you, too.”

 

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