Roses & Ruin

Chapter 46 (Anthony)

Things had turned eerily quiet. I had an Irishman on his knees in front of me with his hands behind his head, waiting. He kept murmuring prayers under his breath, sucking in bouts of air when I'd press the gun harder into the curve of his skull.

I was waiting for one thing. Confirmation from Enzo that he'd located the girls on the property.

"Anima Christi, soul of Christ, make me holy. Body of Christ, be my salvation. Blood of Christ, let me drink your wine, water flowing from the side of Christ, wash me clean. Passion of Christ, strengthen me. Kind jesus, hear my prayer" I could hear the Irishman muttering over and over again.

"Make peace with your God, because when we find those girls you're dead. And if we don't find those girls, I'll make you wish you were dead, but I'll keep you alive long enough for you to realize your God isn't listening" I warned him.

"Anima Christi-" he started again, but I grabbed a fist full of his hair and yanked his head back to look at me. Cold metal now pressed to his temple. "One last chance" I warned again. If he doesn't know anything he's useless to me.

The Irishman spit out in front of him. I was behind him so it didn't hit me, but the disrespect was clear. Quickly I drew my gun away from his head and BANG. Since the man was kneeling I pointed to the back of his leg and shot a bullet through his calf. He hollered out in pain and almost fell over, but I grabbed him and kept him upright.

"Go ahead, keep praying" I whispered in his ear.

He didn't know I was so close so he yelped again. That's when Enzo came out. He gave me a slight shake of his head no, so I slammed the butt of my gun into the Irishman's head and watched him drop forward right onto his face.

    We were freaking the fuck out. All I wanted to do was punch something, or shoot something...which I already did.

After this long drawn out shoot out between our men at the safe house, and the Irish who tried breaking in, we had to go around taking a head count.

There were only two heads we were concerned about though. Giana and Lexi's.

We ran around the property asking everybody where the girls were to be sure nobody hid them away for their safety. Nobody could account for them though and our anger rose with every new unanswered question. 

    "Where the FUCK are they?!" Enzo was grabbing our guys by the collars and yanking them close. Nose to nose.

"Enzo, a quarter are dead, a quarter are injured, and the rest are picking up the pieces. Let's just go. Someone said they think the Russian got them out. We gotta get this guy's number" I tried talking some sense into my hotheaded cousin.

Our best possible news would be if the Russian guard got them off the property. Things were a mess here. If they stayed I think the outcome would have been different. I don't believe they were taken by the Irish, but still my nerves are shot. Neither Giana nor Lexi were answering their phones, so that begs the question as to why?

    My cousin looked between myself and the Irishmen I knocked out.

"Hold on" I sighed, leaning down to turn the man on his back. His eyes were closed, his calf was bleeding, and he had a smudge of soil against his chin and nose.

I drew my gun and shot him through the eye, his body sagged with death. An eye for an eye. That's biblical, ain't it?

Red splatter came over his forehead and across my shoe. I wiped my shoe along the man's pant leg, and when it was clean I walked over him and joined Enzo.