Fratelli: The Awakening (The Vampire Cartel #1)

7. What Do You Need Me For?

Chapter 7

What Do You Need Me For?

T he Wetlands

April 12, 2018

(That Night)

Swampy marshes, known locally as the wetlands, dotted the area around Baton Rouge. With the Mississippi River providing abundant runoff, Tristan had no trouble locating a secluded spot near enough for cover before dawn.

“Man, where the fuck are we?” asked Deshawn. “I’m sick of these fucking games!”

Deshawn emerged last from the SUV, circling the vehicle to face the Don. Tristan lingered to the left. He didn’t know if Lucio was riding dirty, but Deshawn sensed the possibility. Either way, he could bust on the motherfucker and be done with him. It was weird to Deshawn. He’d done his research and came up thin on the history of the Di Salvos.

In the day of social media, exposure was the norm, but not when you signed with DiSalvo. Every celebrity and business partner stood in front of them like a shield. The new artists were coached on how not to mention the Di Salvo brothers by name. They were given incentives to create social media drama and rap beefs to keep the focus on them and not the Di Salvos. None of it mattered at first because the payoff was sweet. Constant cash flow, no gimmicks that left them indebted or in financial jeopardy. That was how the noose slipped around their necks. They never saw it coming.

Deshawn drew his gun and paced, weapon in hand.

“Chill, bro,” Lamont said, his voice just above a whimper.

“None of this shit makes sense. This motherfucker calls himself a Don, how? Where the fuck are his people? That nigga over there? The driver? He ain’t no Mafia no more than you and me. It’s man-to-man. Business on business. Ya, feel me?”

Deshawn turned his attention to Lucio. “Were they at? Huh? The brothers we never, see? Fuck, were your soldiers, your capo, your consiglieri, your bitches? What the fuck kind of boss are you? I tell you who you are, motherfucker. A simp. A fucking leech. Sucking the talent you don’t have off my people and exploiting it. Yea. Yea. That’s who the fuck you are.”

“Bro, please. This shit ain’t cool,” Lamont warned.

Deshawn frowned. “What the fuck are you afraid of? I said he’s fucking with us, man. I heard that AC wanted to produce our last album. We got all the top producers reaching out. He’s shelving projects and keeping us doing this bullshit. College tours. He’s playing us to be stooges in the rap game. We’re a fucking joke…”

Lamont lowered his gaze. Deshawn lifted his gun and aimed it at the Don. He glanced at Tristan. He was going to blast them both if he could get off the shots. Hell, he’d use Lamont for cover if he had to. But the driver just stared at him while smoking a blunt. The arsenic smell of marijuana blew out into the night and mixed with the swamp air. It felt intentional.

The way Tristan stared. The way the Don stared seemed to mock him. As if they wanted him to do it. No talkback, no warnings. They just stared, covered by the shadows of the night.

Did they think he was bluffing?

Deshawn felt emboldened by the insult. He had the so-called Don where he wanted him. And he’d send a message to the industry. Who knows, he could probably get out in 20 years if he were lucky.

“Put the gun down, bro. Stop this shit. I’m serious,” Lamont said. “You don’t understand these people.”

“Understand what, nigga? That this fool is playin?—”

“You don’t understand what he is!” Lamont shouted at Deshawn.

Don Lucio’s head tilted slightly to the left as the moonlight faded, obscured by drifting clouds. More darkness seemed to cover the distance between Deshawn, the Don, and his driver. Now he saw more of a silhouette than their faces. Deshawn strained his eyes, trying to focus his vision, but it didn’t help. Was his mind playing tricks on him?

“We made a deal, bro, an unbreakable seal,” Lamont said. “Don’t you remember?”

“What seal? Do you mean our contract? Yea, well fuck that, we are about to renegotiate it. Right now.”

Lamont touched his friend’s raised arm. “Ain’t no negotiations. We—you should have read the fucking contract, bro.” Lamont looked over to Lucio, seeing, but not seeing him.

“I didn’t. So, fuck it, we waste him!” Deshawn fired his weapon. The gun’s muzzle flashed searing white light into the complete darkness before them. The response from Lucio was sudden. An eruption of chaos sent Deshawn reeling back, still firing into the night as something huge and dark swept in and seized him. The darkness threatened to collapse inward. It covered Lamont’s vision. He staggered back a few steps, unable to decipher what was happening before him.

The clip emptied as the gun fired from Deshawn’s death grip.

Lamont heard the agonizing screams from his friend. It mixed in with the snarls and crunching sounds of something feeding. Lamont was being eaten. The attack sprayed blood everywhere, like a fire hydrant from hell. He could hear this friend’s terror and torturous moans as he was chewed.

The agony Lamont heard from Deshawn would haunt him for the rest of his life. It reminded him of the nature shows he liked to watch when high on marijuana. How the pride of lionesses tore apart their prey, lapped up blood, and sucked on bone. There was one last gurgling plea for the attack to end, then a last scream before silence.

Lamont turned and ran for his life.

Darkness covered Lamont, but his fear sharpened his sight. He stumbled and ran through the tall, marshy grass, plunging deeper into the swamp. The terror of being next gnawed by the creature ate at his sanity. He tripped several times, weeping all the while. Dark laughter, more sinister than the night, echoed from all directions. The faster he ran, the more hopeless he felt. He dropped to his knees, wishing for a gun to end his own life. Better to die that way than run from the devil. He had known what the Di Salvo men were the day he saw the contract and read the tiny print. He’d always known. His gran had told him stories as a kid, warning him of the cursed four that haunted the swamps. He knew. He should have been honest with Deshawn and himself.

“You should have been honest,” Don Lucio’s dark voice filled his head. “ Eri avidu .”

Lamont was too scared to cry, too tired to run. He figured he was in shock, like the stories his uncles once talked about returning from Vietnam—soldiers coming back from war and going blank. His mind couldn’t process the horror of what he’d just witnessed. The Don emerged from the darkness, fully materialized. Blood dripped from the lower part of his mouth and chin. His hands were bloody as well.

“I don’t want to die. I don’t. Not like that,” Lamont pleaded.

“Most men don’t until they’re forced to live forever.” Don Lucio remarked. He stooped low and studied Lamont, who closed his eyes and shuddered while on his knees before the monster.

“Open your eyes. Let me see you,” Lucio spoke into Lamont’s thoughts.

“What?” Lamont asked. He shivered through his terror and obeyed.

“There you are. The crier, the worrier, the one who talks big, but sleeps with the lights on. You knew who I was. Didn’t you?”

Lamont shook his head no.

“You do know Deshawn would never work in my organization? I need a follower, not another bastard like me.”

“A fa-fal-follower?”

Don Lucio smiled.

“Yes. That’s you. Tonight, your musical career ends. They will find your boy in a car crash, body mangled and burned beyond recognition. You’ll be distraught. Broken. Unable to write another lyric or rap another bar. I’ll handle the press release. Get you an interview with some podcaster. And your boy? Hell, he’ll be the next Tupac. You know… the fame is the game.”

“Please don’t do this, man. I don’t want to die.”

“Shhh…,” said the Don.

Against his will, Lamont stopped crying and fell silent as if someone had put their hand over his mouth. His eyes stretched. He was locked in and under the Don’s control.

“You’ll be generous to Deshawn’s family, his children, his baby mamas. All the streaming money from your music will go straight to them. And I’ll take care of your family, don’t worry. Your Me-Ma, who just had her third diabetic surgery, will get the best medical attention—better than you’ve already paid for. Your brothers and sisters are set for life. They’ll miss you, but the money will comfort them. Do you know why?” asked the Don.

Lamont could not speak or even move his head. He just blinked.

“Because your ties to that life, your friends, your homies, your family, all that shit—ends tonight.”

“Why me?” He thought in his head. Instinctively, he knew the Don was reading his thoughts. “Why do this to me? For what? I don’t want to be like you?”

“You could never be me. And I’m not the devil. Though I know a few, I can introduce you too.”

He stood and walked away. In a blink, he was gone. The moon was back in the sky. The paralysis faded. He sat in the marsh and shivered. Still, he couldn’t cry. Not for his friend, not for the loss of his soul.

Don Lucio returned to his vehicle. Tristan zipped up the body bag with what was left of Deshawn.

“Had to find his head. You took it off.” Tristan passed his boss a black towel. The Don cleaned his face and his hands of the blood and tossed the towel back at his driver. He removed his phone.

“The information I wanted. Did you get it?” Lucio asked.

“Darlene Young, but her friends call her Dolly. Adopted. Birth mother is listed as Christina Brown,” Tristan said.

“Did I hear that correctly?” Lucio asked. “Brown?”

Tristan lifted the body bag and dropped it over his shoulder. “You heard me. Christina Brown. As in one of the missing descendants of Julia Brown.”

“Is Christina alive? Any information on her?”

“Nothing… cold as the trail has always been. She had a daughter and gave her up. To a Caucasian family, is what the adoptive pages claim. That agency was closed years ago, so the trail runs cold. Probably to keep you and your brothers from finding her.”

“I’ve made that mistake before, believing in false clues. Maybe she is the daughter of Christina Brown, maybe she isn’t. I’ll need to spend time with her to be sure.”

“If it is her, really her. Could this one help Don Vittorio?” Tristan asked.

“If she is a Brown, there is always a chance to lift his curse. There is a small chance to heal him. To do so she would have to be the Chosen.”

He walked off and away from the truck. “Find Lamont out in the swamps and clean him up. Have him readied for the triad at the Wal-Mart.”

“Where are you going?” Tristan asked.

“For a walk,” said Don Lucio. “I’ll meet the sun.”

Don Lucio merged with the night. Reaching Magnolia Street, he wandered and let his senses guide him. Far from Manchac and the old woman’s cabin, he still craved the memory of days when life was sweet with swamp water stew and her protective embrace. He stopped before a young woman’s townhome. Inside, she slept, vulnerable, uncovered.

Lucio closed his eyes and peered into her room through her mind. She wore thin panties that crept between the creases of her Butt cheeks when she turned. A half-shirt revealed large nipples, making him run his tongue over his incisors. He dove through her dreams into her life. She had a disabled brother whom she fiercely protected. Debt plagued her, breeding constant worry. Her poor eyesight was a source of fear, lest her secret be exposed. She was delicate, quintessentially human, and he was drawn to discover more. Her deep melanin skin sweetened her blood. And if her blood was from Julia Brown, it also provided healing properties master vampires could exploit.

Tristan arrived. He could hear the soft rumble of the engine purr behind him. He turned from the townhome and went to the waiting SUV. Tristan stood by the open door.

“It’s her,” Lucio said.

“What do you need me to do?” Tristan asked.

“The usual,” he said and got inside. The sun now rising fast in the sky, he slipped into the comfort of darkness when the door shut.