Chapter 1

Chapter 1

KYOMI POV

The sky had been a blanket of grey when I walked in, angry black clouds pregnant of rain hovering above the sad earth. A tell-tale of the angry splatters that hit the glass windows with sheer brutality. My mind drifted to my run-down cabbie, and I knew for a fact that by the time my shift ended, the front of the car would be so drenched I would have a hard time finding the paddles in the pool of water. I made a quick math in my head: a few dollar bills I'd managed to save plus this month's salary would be enough to run it by the mechanic. That’s if Kaizen wouldn’t run into some sort of shitty problem at his school that demanded me bail his ass out of jail.

But really, the little baby needed some TLC and it had been so long since she had received one.

“SEVEN MEGA PINTS FOR TABLE 12!” John shouted from the register, his loud voice booming over the loud music that played so loud even my heartbeat was in sync with the beat. Thankfully, his voice brought me back to reality and out of my head.

“COMING RIGHT UP,” I yelled back juggling the big cups and filling them up with golden liquor to the brim, causing the small bubbles to form and slosh over the rims.

One by one, I balanced each over my arm; a craft I had come to perfect over five years of juggling beer mugs and meat boards in this shitty ass pub.

But I didn’t complain; I couldn’t.

Life was not so fair on me and my brother when it yanked our parents before we were old enough and out of school. And being ping-ponged around the system in search of a better home for two little orphans also taught me a valuable lesson about life.

With that, I tightened my core before yanking the weight of beer mugs and went into the hive of it all. The air was sticky and mucky with sweat, the music making it harder to hear my own thoughts. But it was a norm.

And Friday nights were always crazy.

I shuffled through the crazy crowd and arrived at the table. The man on my right was kind enough to get on his feet and slowly help me unpile the mugs off my arms, while the other shit-faces he sat with took that moment to gawk and ogle at me like I was some scene out of a p**n movie.

I swear their ol’ limp cocks got a rise from that.

“A strong one, yeah?” The other one on the farthest end of the table called out. I feigned a smile on my face as I waited for my tip.

The kind man to my right once again proved to be human by handing the 10 dollar bill to my hand, while the pricks he sat with deemed it necessary to push them down my unbuttoned shirt and down my bra, while the other even went ahead as gripped my thigh from underneath the hem of my small dress.

I gritted my teeth and willed my mind to pay zero attention to all of that.

As long as they didn’t go further.

I repeated to myself and stayed there until they were all done.

I walked away from the table, squeezed myself between bodies of oldies that had nothing better to do on Friday night than slither around a pub and fuck around.

I got to the back of the pub and retrieved the bills everywhere they were stashed.

A small smile formed on my face when I counted a solid 90.

See? Not that bad. Just a long routine of juggling beer mugs, being groped here and there, and eye-fucked.

But 5 years in this field you grew an armor of steel that you wore and surrounded yourself with.

My brother and I were not so lucky that we made it to college, got our degrees, and landed some decent 9 to 5’s.

Heck. I barely made it out of high school before our parents died in a car crash and we were shuffled from one foster home to the other.

Until my aunt decided to be human enough and adopted us.

I would say staying at her house was all warm and welcoming, but three months in, I packed my brother’s bag and helped him out the window in the middle of the night. We never set foot in that place ever again.

The biting cold on the streets was much safer than his abusive ass.

The walk down memory lane was not a pleasant one, so I chucked the nasty thoughts down the old box and hid in the back of my mind, then hummed to the music as I tucked the tip in my bra and under my breast.

I had just finished smoothing over my shirt when loud gunfire rechoted throughout the entire building, sending panicked screams around the building. The loud thunder that boomed just in time didn’t help the situation, and panic leaked into my blood like molten lava from an active volcano.

My heart lunged into my throat as the music died, and a loud commanding voice filled the entire space.

“EVERYBODY GET DOWN!” I went without hesitation, burying myself down beside the metal table that held giant liquor dispensers.

I saw a small pocket just underneath it and made myself as small as a pea size, and fit myself right into it.

“WHAT IN THE BULLOCKS IS GOING ON? This is my club. And I command you lads to fuck off right now.” Tommy’s voice followed, no doubt standing on the front with his old hunter’s gun.

A few seconds went by before a smooth BANG! Filled the entire club. Horrified screams and whimpers followed, just before a bulk body hit the floor with a meaty thunk.

Old Tommy!

That had to be him.

A foreign curse filled the space, and if I hadn’t shrunk any smaller, this time I was thrice the size of a pea.

“She’s gotta be this side.” A familiar voice filled my ears, and an iron hand fisted my heart as my thoughts ran wild.

Please don’t let it be who I think it was….

The door to the back creaked open, and footsteps followed as they all piled into the back room.

“Nina?” Kaizen’s voice filled the silence, and without a second guess, I erupted from my hiding place only to come face to face with seven… Seven deadly men in black, guns cocked and laid casually by their sides. Except one.

One of them had that glint in the eye that told you he toasted to babies being murdered and his favorite TV show was watching bodies being flayed.

There was no denying the power he had because, with his soft stance, he managed to fill the entire space with his presence alone. The black suit made him look like a modern-day CEO, but the storm-grey eyes made him lethal, dangerous! The tattoos picking through at the top of his sleek black dress shirt didn’t do better with the situation.

My mouth dried, horror held me captive, and escaped out of me in the form of a small whimper as Kaizen crashed his weight against my body in a hug.

I found myself wondering what kind of a fuckster my brother landed himself into. My protective instincts kicked in, and I wrapped an arm around his shoulders.

At 18, he was fucking tall, bigger than I ever was. But he was my small baby. The only family I had left- not counting my aunt who was under her abusive husband’s thumb- and I would fucking move mountains for him. Even if it meant spending the last of my savings to save him from whatever shit he had managed to land himself into this time.

Just as I was searching for words to speak, he spun around in my hold and draped an arm around me, facing the men who looked like the horsemen of the apocalypse and their minions.

Especially the one with black hair and an expression so blank you’d think he was void of any emotions. He had this calm to him that only rattled me straight to the bone, his blank gaze chilling me right to the core of my soul.

I fisted my brother’s shirt and tried to bring him as close to me as humanly possible, shielding him from their offensive stares. Whatever it was, I would get him out of it; just like I had many times before.

But the next words he blabbered yanked the solid ground beneath my feet, shattering everything I had ever known in all my life.

“See? I wasn’t lying when I told you she’s a looker. She would be a perfect fit in Pandemonium.”