FLASHBACK
Hey, it's me. But of course, you already know that. Leave something good.
Bobbi's voice hummed in my ear via voicemail as lightning flashed brightly; illuminating the front door of her and Elijah's townhouse while thunder rumbled competitively with my loud hammering. "Bobbi, open up!"
Thanks to Sarge, I had to be away for a month on a job; promising we'd talk or do a video call everyday which she seemed to be fine with- Until she stopped answering me a week ago and the men I have watching her claim she hasn't recently gone anywhere.
Pouring rain drowned my eyes; fucking up my sight as I get her voicemail a fourth time and sigh with a combination of worry and annoyance.
I knew she'd be down after the break-up, so I've done my best to keep her mind from tipping over the edge, but maybe I left too soon. It's only been a few months since Elijah was leaked out of her life and maybe she was actually upset I had to go.
And me being an idiot, I didn't see past her faked smile well enough.
A string of curse words dropped from under my breath as I stuffed my phone back in my pocket and pulled out a bundle of keys.
Bobbi would kill me knowing I made a spare without her knowledge. But I've had a bad feeling about Elijah since he opened his mouth to introduce himself years ago. Something was off about him and having to keep my mouth shut about it proved to be the wrong move since loving him got her nothing but a broken heart.
My hands twitched with anticipation as I unlocked the door and a blanket of nerves hangs on my shoulders at the moment it opened with ease. Stepping into the foyer, I slam the door loudly in hopes she'd hear it. "Bobbi?"
Eerily dim, confusion choked my brain as I turned right and into the poorly lit kitchen where I accidentally kick over a stack of empty pizza boxes upon entry. "Shit."
Trying to stand them back up, the trail of wine bottles slows my efforts as guilt tightened even furthered around my neck. "Christ." I rise to my feet eyeing the conjoined collection of whiskey and rum bottles scattered about the floor and countertop.
It sets in then why Bobbi wouldn't let me come inside in the last few months. I assumed it was just for personal appearances, but- Nothing like this.
And with her being a bit of a neat freak; seeing her live like this tears my heart up even more.
Worry corroding my throat, my pocket buzzes then and for a moment I wonder if it's Bobbi before recalling it was my burner cell.
Pulling the device from my jeans and to my ear, I answer with a heavy sigh. "What?"
"Found her."
The air holds heavy momentarily. "What are you waiting for, Ace, a fucking parade? Tell me where she is."
"I will," He starts. "But you're not gonna like it."
"Just say it."
The line goes dead for a second.
"She's at the Strawberry Mansion with Lemon." He spits and I could practically hear his grinning. "She's been going there the entire month you were gone and she's been stayin' there for the past week."
"The entire-" My surroundings turn sideways. "Where the fuck were the two guys you recommended that I put on to watch her?" I nearly yell.
"Dismissed and about to have their tongues cut out for the lies on their reports." He sighs. "According to them, Bobbi threatened uh- Strong sexual charges to the police if they touched her."
Wanting to slam the phone to pieces, I only squeeze it. "Is she still there?"
"Yeah," He goes on. "But it's a house party you weren't invited to, bud. Only a 24hr tattoo of a lemon gets you the access."
"I don't care about any of that." Twisting around and exiting her apartment, I head back to my car. "And don't say a word about any of this to Sarge."
"I thought you might say all of that." He smacks a lump of gum on his end. "Shall I include a plus one? I got a great shipment of tear gas in the other day."
"Save the Rambo shit for another time and tell me if you traced the number that called me earlier." Storm going strong, I settle behind the wheel of my vehicle wet by the rain.
"Ah yes, the "Angelo Custode." He chuckles; mimicking an Italian accent. "Isn't it weird that he calls himself that?"
"Ace."
"Right, sorry. Yes, I looked into and... It was a dead end. Oh, but, as a huge and personal client of Lemon's and the mediator of families as the master of a shit-ton of weapons; I am to say this on behalf of Gabe; Lemon's boss." He clears his throat. "You can maim, but you cannot kill. Lemon's good for business and he won't lose him to a single girl. Regardless of where she ended up."
"He said that, hm?" With the streets clear under the dark sky, I steer towards the highway. "Then as a huge and personal part of Bobbi's life and someone who doesn't give a fuck about anything but her safety; relay a message back to him on behalf of my cock."
Speeding through the quiet night, I push past the grief in my voice to channel the rage. "Bobbi's at a vulnerable point in her life and we had a deal that he was to keep her away from any and all activities; and he failed. As a penalty for our break in business agreement, in one hour he's going to lose a house full of people. And in two, it'll be the entire goddamn city of Queens."
"Grim-"
Not wanting to hear a response, I lift the phone from my ear to speak into it directly. "And when he's in constant fear; living in a region he no longer controls and wondering why his shipments won't move, his cliental have gone down, and more than half his men no longer listen to him, you can remind him that for the scratch he made on that "single girl's" soul, the Reaper took half a million of his."
∴ ∵ ∴ || ∴ ∵ ∴
Spinning the wheel harshly, my car skids to a halt in front of the foreboding building that aside from the twinkling lights in the windows, and R&B music still going loudly; looked like it belonged in a horror movie with it's dark green paint job and black shutters.
Without wasting time, I drop my gun, wallet and switchblade into the passenger's seat and fish for a set of black rubber gloves and a small blue pouch in the glovebox. After strapping the miniature sack to my hip and tugging on my gloves, I round the back of my car and pop the truck to reach for my lucky baseball bat.
One that's never failed to help me get my point across.
Shutting the trunk closed and locking up my vehicle, I stuff the keys into my back pocket as I make my way towards the front door where a few people clumped around the entrance.
"Move." Pushing my way through, a few toss back remarks but they're ignored until a man in a navy-blue suit and cornrows puts a hand to my abdomen.
"Mr. Reaper." He tries. "I have strict orders not to let you in."
"Okay." Swirling the bat around in my hand, I raise it high behind my head and swing it fast; cracking it hard against his skull where he drops to the ground immediately.
"Oh my God!" A girl cries out amongst the stragglers around me that clamor on as I continue forward in search of Bobbi.
With the bat an extension of my right arm, I walk further inside past hanging pastel veils and lights that shine in all colors; revealing the tales of everyone's activities besides the ones grinding in front of me in a dance.
"Mr. Reaper."
Twisting towards whomever called me, two men dressed as annoyingly well as the other one approach me with hard frowns.
"Where's Lemon?" I ask, and they exchange looks before the one sporting a goatee opens his mouth up first.
"Mr. Reaper, you can't be here."
"He's with a girl of my interest who's been hanging around here for a week." I grip my bat tighter and take a step towards them. "Tell me where he is."
"The girl's fine." The other claims and my heart flickers. "She's in good hands, but you still can't be here."
Feeling done with being yanked around, I grab a drink off a nearby counter and toss the contents into his face; temporarily blinding him as I throw the now empty glass towards the face of his bearded partner.
Shattering across his eyes, others scream around him as his cries of agony ring out over everything and he drops to his knees. Happy to shut him up, I stuff the handle of my bat down his throat; pushing violently until I centered my hearing well enough to hear a pop and his struggles seize.
A series of shrill pitches echo out as party goers glimpse at his now kneeled, silent and wide-eyed position, but I don't have time to sit and admire my work as the other man wobbles towards me with outreached hands.
"Fucking stop!"
"Make me." I avoid his grasp and grip the side of his head to smash it down onto a steel tabletop beside us. He immediately falls to the floor in a heap when my uncaged rage takes over in a powerful holler. "Tell me where they are!"
Like a robot, it was the only request I could get out past my seething anger as I watch him raise a lone and bloody finger upward.
"Up...Stairs..." He manages.
Stepping over him bat in hand, I make a beeline for the staircase located across from us with eyes fueled with rage and blood boiling while climbing the stairs two at a time.
Reaching the top, I don't hear anything and there were too many doors and much less time to search them all individually.
"Hey!"
Too busy looking to my right, a set of arms instantly grab mine; pining both behind me, but that doesn't slow me as I spring my skull back; whacking whomever held me in the nose.
"Shit!"
Released and ready to crack their head open like an egg, with a quick step I turn to face a new man my size with my bat raised as a horizontal barrier against his sudden kick.
Stumbling backwards from his impact, he races forward and runs right into me with his full weight; throwing me off balance and into a wall where I'm rammed in the forehead by his own skull.
However, thankful for my toughness and the rush of adrenaline, I barely feel it as I drive my knee into his chest twice during our locked hold which gets him to back off with a wheeze.
"Fucker-"
Spotting an opening, I then take the chance to jab the bulb of my weapon into his teeth and with a stunned groan, he falls to his knees with hands to his bleeding mouth.
"Tell me what room they're in."
With a shake of his head, he drops his hands to display his cracked teeth and sticky red gums. "Don't... Worry..." He coughs. "Lemon... Got her..."
"Worry?"
Bobbi, nude and bruised skates across my mind and my breath hitches before my lips twist into a sneer.
On the brink of submerging myself into a pool of insanity, I step closer with a slight bent to get in his face. "That girl was kept from me for days without my knowledge and pumped full of God knows what until I got here. So, hear me clearly when I say that the only thing I'm worried about is the clean-up after I give in to my insatiable urge to gut you all like pigs in a slaughterhouse."
Twisting the handle of my baseball bat to the left, the bottom pulls out to reveal a sharp, medium-sized blade on the end of it.
A hidden feature I had put in years ago.
"Now, you shit-spewing swine," Resting a hand on his shoulder, in my other I switch the knife around until the blade pointed away from me. "Squeal for me."
Without hesitation, I repeatedly jam it into his stomach and chest until his shirt turned a fresh burgundy and his abrupt squeaks turned to gurgles of built up blood.
"Good piggy." I slide my blade out from his carcass and step back; watching him fall to the ground and pick up the other piece of my bat to slide the handle back into it as I twist it close.
A crashing then jolts me out of my stare.
"Hey! Come on you stupid- Wake up!"
Recognizing that spazzy voice, my feet start moving without my brain fully registering which door it's coming from; yet instinct leads me to a particular one that looks just as normal as the rest and biting the bullet, I leave my bat by the door, raise a heavy boot and kick it in.
"Hey, what the hell-!"
The bare torso of a skeleton with a bed of blonde curls atop brown eyes and a scraggily yellow beard topples off the bed. "Don't you know how to fucking knock you-" Eyes on me, they grow three times larger. "Oh, fuck."
Lemon picks himself off the ground as if to be on fire and grasps at his clothes from a pile beside him. "Hey- Uh, Grim- Look-"
Going deaf from sheer disbelief, I stood in the middle of the floor with feet rooted to the carpet and eyes that refuse to accept the image on his bed glaring back at me. "Bobbi?"
Was this supposed to be a joke?
Was I dreaming? Crazed? Or seeing some sick hallucination?
"Sweetheart?"
I didn't know how long I stood there. Seconds, minutes, an hour.
Time seemed to slow down as my eyes fell over the scene detailed by the ever-changing multi-colored lights glowing then dissolving into one another around Lemon's bedroom; and each color revealed something new.
Blue ignites the tangled sheets.
Yellow beams up the bottle of American Honey whiskey.
Green flashes over the pile of pills.
And red careens unforgivingly into Bobbi's sorrow-filled eyes disconnectedly fixed in my direction.