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“I’m not,” he says with severity. “You are.”
20
GAVIN
“After all this is over, you will kill Johnny Rusk,” I tell her in a tone that leaves no room for argument.
Because the fucker has to die.
She nods hesitantly. “When this is over. You mean dealing with whoever attacked you.”
“I have to.” I pause to look at her. Can I trust her? At this point, I need to trust her. “The man I believe attacked the casino… His name is Gideon Black, but we call him the Ferryman because when he kills someone, he places pennies over their eyes.”
“Who’s we?”
“The Sinacore Alliance,” I say. “We’re a group of men that have come together to fight Gideon. For months now he’s been terrorizing the heads of certain families for revenge. I’m on that list.”
She adjusts her position so that she can better see me. “What did you do to him?”
“Not me. My older brother, Sean. He was heavily involved with Giuseppe Tadesco, the Don that planned the murder of Stephen Black. Gideon’s father.”
“Where is your brother now?”
“He died two years ago. Fucking quit drinking only to be killed by a drunk driver.” I smirk at the irony.
“I’m sorry,” she says, and I believe she truly means it.
“I wish I could say the same. He was a fuck up most of his life. Sean was much older than me. Our mother had him when she was sixteen. He was already twenty when she became a widow. She remarried, but my dad died before I was born. Unfortunately, my mother put a lot of pressure on Sean to take care of us and he resented me for it. The first chance he got, he bolted.”
“And your mom?”
I shrug. “She didn’t really want to be a mom. Not the first time, and definitely not the second. Most of my memories are of her at work or at home using up the money she just made to get drugged up. I don’t remember her with me much. I spent most of my childhood at home alone, hungry, dirty. Until I was old enough to go out and make friends on the streets. The wrong kind of friends, of course. But they introduced me to the right people. Men that hired me and showed me how to make money fast.”
“Criminals, you mean.” She huffs. “It’s always the criminals that come calling.”
“It seemed like I was made for it. I was really good at fighting. I did it for a living in underground clubs. Won enough matches that I got noticed and set as part of the security detail for a drug dealer in Pittsburg. That’s when Sean finally remembered he had a little brother and came to me one day with a job offer. To work with him in Chicago under Giuseppe Tadesco. I did for a short while.
“Tadesco was fine, but my brother was still an asshole. When I discovered he was stealing from me, I went into a state of sheer rage. My own brother taking what I had worked so hard for. So I left. It was that, or kill my only living relative. So, I took what I had and drove to Las Vegas. But all this happened after Stephen Black’s death.”
Her brow furrows. “What I’m not getting, is why the Ferryman is coming after you if it was your brother that was involved in his father’s death.”
“These attacks by Gideon have been going on for months. Long enough that we have been able to spot a pattern. All the targets seem to be either the men responsible for Stephen’s death, or a successor so to speak.”
“You’re Sean’s successor?”
“Not exactly. Everything I built was on my own. Except…” I deliberate what I’m about to say. “The only thing I can think of, is the house we grew up in. Sean passed it on to me, probably because he felt guilty about everything else he took. I mortgaged it to begin construction on The Red. If Gideon searched far back enough, he could consider that an investment on Sean’s part.”
She looks away, keeping her sight on something distant as she ponders all the facts I’ve stated. “So you really did live on the streets. You were poor. And alone.” The last she whispers as if it pains her to say it.
“It was a long time ago.”
“Everything seems like a long time ago, till it doesn’t.” She sighs. “There’s no doubt the Ferryman is coming after you?”
“No,” I say. “The alliance has been keeping tabs on him. Or, trying to at least. We discovered he’s purchased a few buildings nearby. And just before the attack, he was spotted across from the casino.”
“Shit.”
“Exactly.”
