“You killed Father Charlie,” I hissed out, twirling around the collapsed man to reach the other two—who were starting to realize I wasn’t just some girl who’d waltzed in off the streets. “And now you’re going to pay for it.”
I hit the second man right in the gut with the end of the pole, shoving him back onto the table he stood near, and then I went after the one who still clutched his gun. He couldn’t turn it on me fast enough. I spun the spoke so that the cross was near him, and then I whacked his hand with the metal, causing his gun to fly out of his hand and slide across the floor.
It was easy to lose yourself in the thick of it. Easy to snap and not see reason or sanity ever again. Sometimes it was like someone else was in control of me, and I was just along for the ride. This girl was not the innocent, pure girl in white. This girl was a devil in disguise, and she was about to wreak havoc upon these three poor, ugly men. Never again would they hurt anyone else. I didn’t fucking care if this started a war between my father and the Greenbacks. Let them fight. Let my father’s men annihilate these wannabe gangsters.
I didn’t fucking care anymore. The girl who cared was dead; she’d died three years ago.
The men didn’t know what hit them. I was at one with the pole in my hands, beating the shit out of them. I was faster than they were, and every time they went for their guns, I knocked them out of their hands. Each time the guy who’s balls I hit got up, I tripped him and knocked him back down again.
I didn’t stop with the cross until their faces bled, their cheeks cracked and bruised. Their lips and eyebrows were in much the same condition. One of them eventually grabbed the end of the pole, finally starting to think, but it was too late. The moment I’d seen him going for the pole, I’d released it, ducking and rolling. My fingers found the metal of the nearest gun on the floor, and I aimed, pulling the trigger shortly after.
Bang, bang, bang.
Unlike these fools, I didn’t waste any bullets. One I got in the chest, the other in the head. The third—the guy with the teardrop tattoo—I hit in the knee, causing him to collapse and cry out in agony. One of the most painful areas to get shot. I’d never been shot, so I guess I wouldn’t really know how true that saying was.
The other two men fell down in a heap, and I never tore my eyes off the teardrop man, getting to my feet slowly. He was trying to reach for his gun, but I stepped on it and kicked it away, letting the gun slide across the floor. I stepped on his hand after that, putting all my weight on it and hearing the bones crack. He cried out again.
“What the fuck,” he spat, glaring up at me with hatred in his eyes. “Who the fuck are you, bitch?”
“I’d ask who you are, but I already know thanks to that hideous badge on your arm. Did your boss send you here?” Atlas, the man with no face, was the leader of the Greenback Serpents. He’d been a thorn in my father’s side for years now. I didn’t know why my father didn’t just find out his identity and kill him.
The man didn’t answer, probably because he knew he was dead either way.
I aimed the gun at his head. “Why come here and kill the priest? There has to be better scores somewhere else!” My voice rose in desperation, but deep down I knew this man would give me no answers. And if he did, it wouldn’t make me feel better about any of this.
This was a shitty, shitty day. I hated it.
He opened his mouth, but I knew he was only going to curse at me more, so I pulled the trigger once again. The bullet soared through the air, splitting his skull straight through, his brains splattering all over the floor near his head. I could practically taste the metal in the air, the spilled blood, almost like an electric current.
His head lolled to the side, a big, ugly hole in it. I got to my knees beside him, setting down the gun as I searched his pockets. And, like I suspected, I found Father Charlie’s special golden cross shoved in his pants. I pulled it out, letting it shine in the dim light of the room. The chain had been broken when he’d pulled it off Father Charlie’s corpse, but I could fix that. No way in hell was I going to leave it here with them.
One of the men behind me inhaled and then started coughing. With one glance over my shoulder, I could see he was choking on his own blood. I’d shot him in the chest, not quite in his heart, but close enough. Definitely got a lung.
With the cross in one hand, I picked up the gun and got up, moving to the choking man. He looked up at me with wide eyes, one of his hands reaching up toward me, as if to ask me to spare him, to not kill him. I wondered if Father Charlie had done something similar, or if he’d accepted his fate the moment he saw the men. There were no bullet holes on the outside door of the confessional, so the door had been open. He’d seen the man who’d killed him.
I didn’t hesitate. I pulled the trigger one more time, sending the last bullet of the day into his neck, right where that important artery was. His lips sputtered blood, his gums coated in the stuff. He coughed, a steady stream of blood coming out of his neck at the fresh wound, and within a few more seconds, he was dead, his blood pooling into a halo around his head.
I tossed the gun to the side, not caring about fingerprints. I supposed I should’ve kept the gloves on, but then I’d have Father Charlie’s blood with me—and that just felt wrong. I had to abandon them, just like I had to abandon my coat. I needed to get home and burn these clothes. If I ever wore them again, the only thing I’d be able to think about would be what had transpired here.
Try as Father Charlie had, this place held no heroes. There was no redemption for people like the Greenbacks… or me. No, there could be no heroes here.
Only villains.
The day felt like it had happened years ago, but in reality, it’d only been a week. One week ago, I’d killed Father Charlie’s murderers and left their bodies for the police to find. Not that they did much; they were as corrupt as the rest of us. It’s why no one came knocking at our door, even though my gloves and my coat had been left there.
When I got home that day, my father had told me that we were moving immediately. The Black Hand of Cypress was looking for a new member, and he had passed the initial interview. The pool of possible members had been narrowed down. My father was so confident he would be the next member of the Black Hand that we left everything that night, packing only what was necessary. Anything else we’d need, we’d buy once we were moved into our new house.
It was nice, don’t get me wrong. Big, fancy, exactly the kind of house I’d grown up in. But it wasn’t home. It wasn’t filled with memories. Maybe that was a good thing though, because the kind of memories that tended to stick with me were not the ones you wanted to remember.
I was certain my father had heard what went on in that church, but he never asked me if I had anything to do with it. Maybe so he could have plausible deniability if the Greenbacks ever came to him, demanding retribution, but that was fine with me. If we didn’t talk about it, I didn’t have to recall how Father Charlie had looked, deader than a doornail.
The closest my father had gotten to speaking of it was suggesting I visit Cypress’s church. He knew how much I’d needed Father Charlie in the past, so I didn’t doubt he was trying to push me to whoever it was inside this particular church. I was pretty sure he’d mentioned the priest here was close to the Black Hand members, so it wasn’t like it was all for me.
No, everything my father did was calculated and planned. He was the opposite of a loving, caring father, and perhaps that was why I was as fucked up as I was.
Because I was. I wasn’t normal. Staring down at my gloved hands, remembering what it felt like to kill those men—not an ounce of guilt residing within me—wasn’t normal.
I dropped my hands to my sides, heaving a breath and pushing inside the church. As I walked in, I didn’t know what to expect. My father had looked up when confessionals were, so odds were the priest, whoever he was, was waiting for someone to go to him, to confess their sins and seek repentance.