SPECIAL CHAPTER 44: RHETT KINGSTON
“Another round?” the smarmy bartender asks.
I gaze at him for a minute before I flash a smile, “Another round it is.”
The tall kid who looks like a poser for one of ‘em posters that commercializes the benefits of eating healthy works on another round of tequila shots.
Tequila shots I’ve been guzzling down in the same shitty bar in Jersey trying to regroup, figure out the next plan, figure out the next place I’ll look for to settle down and roll in green.
Since Chicago, money has been a problem.
Shit.
One wrong fuck, one wrong woman, a little fun with my friends and I pissed off the wrong jerk.
But when have I not pissed the wrong dude?
I wouldn’t be who I was if I didn’t have guys chasing after me for vengeance, for money, for any type of shit any common lowlife is chased after for.
Rhett Kingston has never been a lowlife though.
I learned from a young age that being good didn’t bring food to the table, being good didn’t mean you were going to the big man above, to the kingdom of heaven to eat and roll around in wealth.
Frankly speaking, anyone who thought there was a big man above was either crazy or deluded like the normal folks who went to church on Sunday to cleanse their sins.
I didn’t need to cleanse my sins.
I had accepted a long time ago, that I was irredeemable.
If people saw me as a villain then a villain I would be and I would rock villainy like no punk to ever exist.
Another glass on the mahogany counter, another spray of tequila into the low-ball glass and I repeat the same drill.
Take a drink and let that scotch with a hint of vodka burn my throat.
I’ve stayed in Jersey for a week which is longer than I’ve done in any city since I started running from the madman who has his men all over the city, all over the damn state and all over the airport.
The best plan for me right now is to escape to Mexico, rebuild from there.
But a) Mexico needs money. Money I can’t borrow from my friends since some of them have been MIA.
And b) Mexico needs documents. Documents I don’t have, documents I can’t forge unless I get help from my buddy up the force.
The same buddy I’ve been trying to call and the calls land straight to voicemail.
One shot in one hand, the other hand gripping my phone tapping on the same number I’ve been tapping for a week, I dunk down the drink holding my phone to my ear.
“Answer the damn phone, Julius.”
It rings, some snazzy Taylor Swift song plays in the background and it’s déjà vu all over again.
I call, the punk lets his phone ring and he doesn’t pick up. That’s his routine.
I brace myself for the voicemail but it never comes.
Julius finally picks up my call.
“W-what are you doing, Rhett!”
Sucking in air through his nostrils loud enough for me to hear him all the way in Jersey, Julius’ irritation feels almost as tangible as the liquid in my mouth.
But then the fat fuck has always been irritable since we met in high school.
I was the brawn.
Brad was the brains.
Tommy and Trevor, well fuck if I remember what they contributed to the friend group but Julius?
Yeah, he was a fancy rich kid who came in handy when we needed weed or a bottle of Macallan to celebrate.
“Need some help.”
“I-I can’t offer help, you know that. And calling me? You know we can be traced! You know we are being chased and
hunted and you still keep calling. You might tempt fate and death more often but I’m not going to die with you, Rhett.
I’m not gonna die.”
“What are you talking about?” My interest is piqued and if I dig a little deeper, my fear is starting to show.
“He killed Brad. Tommy was taken and he’s never been seen since. Trevor’s body was found buried at some place in a junkyard, police say there’s no evidence on the culprit but we know it’s him.
We should have never fucked his sister, man. This man…he is not resting till he eliminates us. You and I are the only ones who aren’t dead and for my sake, I’m gonna hang up and you are not going to call me again.”
The line goes dead.
Every bone in my body rattles as my heart beats erratically.
I had some fun with Carissa, big whoop.
She never had a brother. She was an only child. Whatever this guy’s beef is, it’s major than Carissa and I’m not sticking around to find out.
I snag a few dollars from my wallet placing them on the table for the drinks.
My ass is off the high stool I’ve been on for half an hour.
The only problem is as I vacate my seat, I spot the blonde guy with the fancy Rolex watch by the booth seated by the corner.
His eyes are on me like I’m his target and he’s been waiting on me.
I can’t leave the bar.
I can’t give him the chance to shoot me or nub me the minute I step out of this public pub.
I sit back down.
My hand grazes the Glock holstered on my waist.
If push comes to shove, I’m not above shooting civilians just to get myself out of here alive.
Is that one of Christian Vitello’s men?
Couldn’t be, I covered my tracks well.
Plus, his men aren’t the fancy kind and neither is the brute of a lapdog Vitello has, called Maximo DiMarco.
And if Vitello sent his men? Yeah, he would send Maximo alright.
I order another shot of tequila, buying time, waiting them out.
This works two ways.
They get tired, they leave and corner me another day.
Or they get tired and they attack.
Two drinks in and I gaze back at that booth trying to remain subtle.
This time the blonde guy makes eye contact and from his left side, where his seatmate is hidden by the vinyl booth, pops out a woman.
“Fuck me”, my mouth waters.
Draped in riches and beauty, hair the color of deep caramel, silky skin like she’s been bathing in milk all her life, the woman gets up from her seat.
Holding her diamond-crusted purse, a little smirk on her, we hold eyes and she tips her chin at me like she knows me.
I don’t know her though. Then again, I can’t remember the last hole I sunk into either.
I’ve never seen a piece of fine ass like her all my life.
She teases. I watch as she walks up to me.
One thing’s for sure, she is not one of Vitello’s goons.
The other thing, the eye contact, the confidence, she knows I’ve been hiding, she glories herself in finding me and I entertain her.
For a while anyway.
The stool next to me gets pulled away before she occupies it.
“Cranberry juice please”, she flags the bartender.
I catch the heavy ascent in her voice and stash it into the little box of ‘who this woman is and what she wants’.
The juice arrives in minutes, she takes a sip from her bendy straw, her lips wrapping around the straw the way she would around my shaft.
“You are a hard man to find, Rhett Kingston.”
“Depends on who’s trying to find me, gorgeous. What do you want?”
She chuckles.
“Straight to the point? I like that about American men. Always business.”
“Yeah? We can be more than business if you want, baby. Name the time and place.”
“I’m not here for any of that, Mr. Kingston. My business is quite different if you would care to indulge yourself in it.”
“Pardon my damn French, but what sort of business do you have with the likes of me? You and your man have been seated there for a while, waiting for me. The question is, what side are you on?
The ones who have a bounty on my head or the ones who want to save me out of the jam I’m in?”
“My name is Athena Pallis from Sicily, Italy. I don’t know any French either but I have a feeling you and I have a common goal.”
“You don’t say?” I ask all humor cupping my voice.
“You upset a very powerful man, Mr. Kingston. Now I don’t know what you owe him but I can help you if you help me.
I’m supposed to marry Christian Vitello Volkov before he claims his throne as the Cosa Nostra heir but your woman poses a problem.”
Out of all the things this woman was supposed to say to me I didn’t expect what she had just said.
Christian Vitello was mafia? Behead me right now why don’t you?
But more importantly…
“What woman?”
“The woman in his house, the woman who seduces him into thinking that he can be normal when he is nothing near normal. The woman with your child.”
I almost cough.
“Lexy?”
“Yes, Alexia Green as she’s called. My fiancé took her and her child to repay your debt but she is doing more than repaying her debt. She’s overstaying her welcome. I need your help in taking her away from my fiancé.
Win her over, convince her she still loves you because you share a child or do anything to get her back and I will not only repay your debt to my fiancé, I will fund your house and anything else you and your woman will need.”
He took Lexy and my baby?
Lexy and my baby are with him?
I don’t understand what debt she is talking about.
I don’t owe Christian Vitello any money, he is after me because of Carissa, his supposed sister.
An unfortunate accident sure but she wanted it. Carissa wanted me and my friends that night.
“What do you get in return, princess? Sounds to me like your fiancé wants to do nothing with you.”
“Get your woman away from him. She is the only obstacle to this. Do we have a deal or do we not?”
Lexy was the one who got away.
And if we are being honest here the only woman who made me think that for a while, I could be good. That was until she said she was pregnant.
I couldn’t afford to be a father. Not me. Not ever.
But she kept the baby. She didn’t give her up for adoption.
Shit, Lexy.
“I guess we have a deal, Athena Pallis.”
“Good. I’m giving you a week to get your affairs right.”
***
A down payment of one million dollars in cash acted as a good motivator to side with Athena Pallis.
I got the money, sure but was Alexia worth the hassle?
One million dollars could get me out of the country right now and set me for life.
Set me for life, alone.
I loved her. Damn me but I loved the Blondie and she had my baby and worse, she was moving on with a mafia heir.
Ego and jealousy wring my neck. She still loves me. She’s always loved me and that was a character flaw on her side but to me?
Yeah, knowing she would love me forever was a reason to go on.
She was the one person I could count on when it came to love and if she loved another man was I still Rhett?
My keys jingle as I plunge one key to the lock of my apartment.
“Take the money and go, Rhett”, I slur pushing my door open.
My apartment is flogged by darkness and it takes a minute to find the lights and switch them on.
I hear movement in the darkness and as soon as I turn the lights on and turn around, my gun is already in my hands ready to shoot.
“Don’t shoot!”
“You are in my apartment, in my damn living room that earns you a bullet to the head. Forewarning though, I might be tipsy, buddy but I’m sure as hell a good aim.”
“Don’t shoot. You and me, Rhett. We have a common enemy. You are running from Christian Volkov, aren’t you?”
I chuckle, “Either this guy is Santa Claus or I’m just one lucky guy who everyone believes can beat this motherfucker. You look familiar, I’ve seen you around. Wait aren’t you the punk running for Senator in Chicago?”
“Dante Keaton, pleasure to meet you.”
“Rhett Kingston, I’m not interested in what you have to say. Get out of my house.”
He takes something out of his suit pocket and I aim my gun better between his eyes.
Removing the contents of the folder, a bunch of pictures lay splayed across my dingy coffee table.
“She is your woman, isn’t she?”
Pictures of Lexy kissing Christian Vitello litter my sight.
Not one kiss, not one scene, a ton of them.
The next pictures are of them in a park walking and the man? He is holding my baby, my fucking woman.
“I know Athena Pallis tracked you today, I know she offered you a better deal than what I’m about to offer but do you see them? That’s him taking your family away and you might not be a family man but there’s a code among us men.
We don’t let men like Christian Vitello steal what’s ours. He has my family too and I need your help to get them.”
My eyes zero in on Lexy. She’s pretty, sexier, happy but in his arms.
“Here we go again. What are you proposing Mr. Senator?”
“Our enemy is Christian Volkov. Athena Pallis might get him off your back for a while but you think the guy will stop chasing you, chasing us?
He’s one vengeful fucker if you’ve come to know which is why I say you get your woman and your child but we kill him first before we do so.”
“I don’t know if you’ve noticed but he is a mafia don, tons of security, tons of men willing to kill us if we so much as spit in his direction.”
“Believe me I know. I’ve been trying to get rid of him for eons. But look at those pictures, do you see what I see?”
My woman.
My child.
“Your family is now his weakness. That’s what we use to kill him.”
“They get to walk out alive.”
“Of course, Rhett. You are the one who’ll do it.”
“How much are you paying me for this?”
I won’t need money to get Lexy but a little insurance wouldn’t hurt.
I’m tired of running.
I’m tired of running solo. I’m going to get my family back.