I tutted in his ear. “What’s not right is you skimming profits from the firm that’s served you well.”
“I haven’t, I swear—”
I pushed him to the ground and looked around us. There was some rope in the corner. I towered over the fat piece of shit on the ground as the blood of his men crept closer to his sweaty skin. “Get the rope,” I said to Freddie. He did. I looked at Eric and Charlie. “Lift him up.” I pointed to the metal spindles on the bannister. “Tie his arms to the bottom of the spindles.”
Charlie and Eric carried Johnny to the staircase, and Freddie tied his wrists to a couple of the metal spindles. The wall was high, and when they moved back, the fucker just hung there like something out of the Tower of London. As my boys stepped back, wetness appeared on Johnny’s trousers.
“Aw, he’s pissing himself,” Charlie said, wiping his knives off on a white embossed handkerchief he took from his pocket. “Shame he wasn’t this scared when he thought it would be a good idea to rob us blind.”
“Undo his shirt,” I said to Eric.
Vinnie moved behind me, sitting down on the chair Johnny had been sat in earlier. His arms wrapped around the hallucination of my sister, and he was content to hold her and watch the show he knew was coming. I turned back to Johnny; his shirt had been ripped open, his torso bared. Taking my favourite knife from my pocket, the one my old man gave me for my thirteenth birthday, the one I’d used on my first kill, and every kill afterwards, I walked closer to Johnny.
“I’ll give it all back.” The whites of his eyes shone bright as fear bit at his flesh and bone. I licked along the metal of my blade. I savoured the metallic tinge it left on my tongue. “Artie, listen to me, boy.” He smiled at me—it didn’t quite reach his eyes. “I’ve known you since you were born. I’m your Uncle Johnny. I used to pick you up from school.” I stopped a foot before him and stared dead into his eyes. Silence filled the basement. “Let me speak to your old man. Get him on the phone. I can work this out with him.” He laughed, and it instantly boiled my piss. “You lot are still just kids. You shouldn’t be doing this yet. You should be out in the world sowing your oats, not doing your fathers’ dirty work.”
I fought a smirk. This fucker was there at my first kill. Gave me a slap on the back, a cig and a dram of whisky in congratulations. He didn’t care about me being a kid then.
“You stole from the firm.” I watched that fucking offensive smile slip from his face. I looked at Eric. “Hold his knees up.” Eric moved to Johnny and pushed his knees up like he was sitting on an invisible chair. I moved closer to Johnny, and I nodded to Freddie. He knew what I wanted. He brought over one of chairs from across the room and placed it under Johnny’s legs. Eric let go of his legs, and Johnny’s feet rested on the seat, knees still bent.
“What are you doing?” he asked, voice shaking. I looked down at his bare stomach. The arsehole had had one too many Sunday roasts. This would be like gutting a pig.
“You said you wanted my old man.” I met my “uncle’s” wide gaze. “You should do. Dad is a ‘kill them quick and get out of Dodge’ kind of man.” I pointed the knife at his face. “You know this. You stood by his side most of his life.” I nodded toward my boys. “Just like my brothers have done with me.”
“I fucked up, Artie. I’ve royally fucked up. Let me make it up to you.”
“Charlie?” I said, never taking my eyes off the piece of shit before me. “Would you betray me?”
“Never, cuz,” he said plainly.
“Eric?”
“Not in a million years.”
“Freddie?”
“Wouldn’t ever happen, Art.”
“Vinnie?”
“Never, never, never. Not for all the money in the world,” he sang. “It would hurt Pearl. I would never hurt my Pearlie.”
I cocked my head, looking at the lines on Johnny’s face. The pock marks and the burst capillaries. Our firm had done him well. Protected him. Gave him anything he wanted.
“Loyalty.” I pressed the tip of my knife into his fat cheek. “All we ask for in return is loyalty.” I pressed so hard that blood sprouted and ran down his face like a tear of crimson. “In the Adley firm, our word is our bond. You swore loyalty to my old man.” I pulled the knife away. “And you’ve broken your bond.” I put the handle of my knife between my teeth and rolled up my shirt sleeves to my elbows. I took hold of the knife again.
“You were right to want my old man to be your bondsman. He may be ruthless, but he’s quick and merciful.” A slow grin pulled on my lips. “I am anything but.”
“You’re insane,” Johnny spat, knowing he had no more cards left to play. “You always were a sadistic little fucker.” His eyes scanned over my boys. “You all were. All fucking insane.” He spat on the ground at my feet. “It’s beneath the Adley name, acting like this.” His nose screwed up like we were the worst-smelling fuckers in the world. “There’s dignity in being London gangsters. I was beside your old man when he created the firm. We lived by a code. We were gentlemen gangsters, not the fucking nutjob murderers you lot have become.”
“Nutjob murderers,” Charlie said, nodding. “That has a nice ring to it.”
“Is this the future of the Adley firm?” he sneered. “You lot?” He shook his head. “I’m better off being dead.”
“Glad we finally agree on something,” I said and, before he could even believe it, slashed my knife across his stomach, deep and in three directions. Johnny screamed. Blood oozed from the open cuts.
Inside, I grinned at the way he yelled. At the red on his face from the pain. I moved beside him, and his pain-filled gaze followed me. “Ever heard of disembowelment?” Johnny paled. I took that as a yes. I placed my foot on the side of the chair that was supporting his bent legs. “I’ve just cut your stomach in a way that the minute you drop your legs, your innards will spill from your body and crash onto the floor. You’ll die slowly. And it will be painful.”
Johnny’s breath was coming faster and faster. His body jerked as my foot rocked the chair beneath him.
“No, please,” he begged. I never moved my eyes from his stare. He must have realised he was going to die, as he said, “You’ll burn in hell one day, Artie.”
“You’re right,” I said. “But that day isn’t here yet, and until then …” I booted the chair from underneath him. The chair skidded across the room, and Johnny screamed as he held both legs in the air using only his strength.
“Bet you wish you’d hit the gym more instead of the pubs, hey, Johnny?” Charlie said, and my boys all stood beside me as we watched his legs lower, his core strength fading, and his slashes rip open.
On a final scream, his effort failed, and his legs fell until his toes scraped against the concrete of the basement floor. In seconds, the slashes I’d made tore open, and out spilled his bowels into a heap on the floor. Johnny’s eyes sought me out, and without another word, I walked for the stairs. I heard Freddie taking the pictures my old man would want to distribute to any other of our men who thought about fucking us over. Eric called for clean-up and the retrieval of the blow.