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I bring up an image of the house I recall from being outside to get my bearings before deciding which direction I need. Gettinglost in a maze that will make horror fans question their love for the genre isn’t my idea of a good time.
“He’s pulling up to the front door now. Are you in place?”
I haul ass toward where I think the main entryway is. The corridor opens to a grand hall. A massive chandelier hangs from the ceiling and winding staircases line each wall before joining in the middle to overlook the entrance. Enormous statues depicting Greek gods bracket the stairs. His decorative tastes are tacky but offer insight into the man’s ego.
I position myself behind a statue of Zeus in time to catch Evan entering the house. He strolls past me as if the most complicated thought to occupy his mind is how to relax after a long day of betraying me.
Lucky for him, I have the perfect plan in mind. I remove my shoes and follow him. My socks dampen my footsteps on his marble floors. He disappears into a room and I stealthily follow. When he’s in view again, I clench my jaw at the sight of him draining a bottle of beer while a sandwich with a piece bitten out of it lies on the counter. Like the rest of the house, I wonder if Evan drove the vision for the decor or if he hired shitty people, and with his lack of taste he couldn’t distinguish the difference.
“Betrayal sure does work up an appetite, doesn’t it, Evan?” I round the doorway with a gun aimed at him.
The bottle in his hand crashes to the floor, breaking on contact and spewing its foamy content over the expensive tiles. Evan gasps, coughs, and sputters, his hand held up to ward me off.
I circle the mess on the floor and grab him by the back of his shirt at his nape. “Follow me. We need to talk.”
We pass by a door that matches the rest of the kitchen. Without knowing what’s behind it, I pull it open. “You have a walk-in freezer?”
Dry-aged beef, chicken, exotic birds, and other meats fill up half the interior. Some are on shelves, while others are on hooks suspended from the ceiling. The amount of meat on hand is excessive even if he feeds his security crew every meal every day. Something tells me Evan isn’t so generous.
“How else am I going to store my whale and tiger meat?” He balks as I try to push him inside. “Hey, we can make a deal. I have about twenty G’s worth of black market meat. How about you take that and I give you a lifetime discount for any weapons you need in the future? We’re talking about a multi-million dollar relationship. What do you say?”
“Does this door have a safety feature so it doesn’t automatically lock when you’re inside?”
“Oh, yeah. It’s right here.” He guides me to the side of the fridge and slides a panel free exposing a screen with various options. On the display is the auto-lock function.
With my plan in mind, I shove Evan inside, shut the door, and lock the freezer. I have more preparations to make. In the meantime, I’ll enjoy the beginning of his descent into the psychological mind fuck I’m about to enact on him.
Evan bangs on the door from the inside. His muffled voice is a sweet chorus of his growing desperation.
I walk away and call my men to join me. I also ransack his kitchen for every blade I can find. My men enter the kitchen to find me sharpening the knives I’ve confiscated. “They’re dull, and he isn’t worthy of my katana,” I explain.
They nod and find seats around the kitchen. Their laughs and jokes at each other’s expense add to the scrape of the blades against Evan’s shitty sharpener. What I wouldn’t give for a proper whetstone. Honing a blade is almost ritualistic for me, the practice puts me in a meditative state where my senses ascend to another realm of understanding. In this instance, I can visualize every move and countermove Evan will try.
Once I have a sharpened deboning, fillet, and chef’s knife, I return to the freezer. To my men, I say, “Stay close. In case this malfunctions and locks me inside, be available to open the door when I give the order.”
They nod and mumble their agreement as I disengage the auto lock and re-enter the freezer.
“Man, I thought you intended to leave me in here.” Evan approaches me in righteous indignation.
His lips have a light blue tinge to them and cold puffs fog the air with his every breath.
“Looks like I came too soon. Lucky for you, I’m working on a timeline.” I pass him to free two of the meat hooks.
While I wrestle with the weight, he tries the door again. “Fuck! Why did you lock us in?” He charges me and I side step his attack.
I spin around and catch him by surprise when I haul him on the hooks, hanging him by his clothes. After the initial piercing and ripping of his shirt, the hook holds Evan’s weight.
“Takeshi, let’s talk things out. I get you need to get your pound of flesh, but you’re on the verge of taking things too far. You don’t want to do that. My network won’t let you get away if you go beyond the point of no return. What do you say?” Evan’s face is a mixture of cajoling and pleading, a combination that only makes my blood rage spike.
“You want to talk things out? Okay, let’s talk.”
Evan enthusiastically nods. “Glad we can agree. Now, why don’t we start with you taking me down and having a civilized conversation in a more comfortable setting?”
“Comfortable? I’m perfectly fine where we are. So, let’s begin with a story.” I circle Evan while keeping my tone neutral. “One day my husband asks me for a baby. Now, something to know about me is fatherhood fucking terrifies me. I think I’ll be ashitty father. Too rigid and set in my ways. But I agreed. Do you know why?”
“Uh… Because you love your husband?”
“You guessed right. Good Job, Evan. Now, my husband was over the moon. However, after getting me on board, he didn’t make a move to make his dreams a reality. Can you guess what the problem was?”
