Excerpt:
“‘Can
you be so cruel?’
‘Yes,
I can be very cruel. I have been taught by masters.’”
-Paramount
Picture’s The Heiress (1949)
Prologue
The wolves are at the gate.
I count thirty police officers on my
security monitors, including SWAT, all armed to the gills led by him. I
always knew this day would come. It has been almost twenty years in the making,
but now it’s here…this must have been how Nero felt as he played that fiddle.
My Rome is burning. Soon my freedom will be gone and yet I could still manage a
tune. First things first.
Waverly, one of my loyal employees these
two years, runs into the study. His fear does not inspire confidence. “Sir,
what are we supposed to do? The police and—”
“Stop sniveling for one,” I say, taking a
sip of my Scotch. I will miss this.
“Did Grace—”
The bullet I put between his eyes stops the
rest of that sentence. I don’t have time to answer a million questions.
Company’s coming. I down the rest of my drink as I run the electromagnet over
my computer. Cleaner than the day I bought it. Must leave things tidy. I’ve
already set the timers in the file cabinets. Thirty more seconds before, like
Nero, all that remains of my empire is ashes.
The bombs detonate as I walk down the hall,
no louder than gunshots but still rocking the walls sprinkling dust on my
paintings. I wonder what will happen to my art. Probably sold for victim
reparations. The Degas alone will cover the cost of the library we destroyed
today. Smith and Rees are waiting in what is left of my living room. Just
looking at it, especially what’s left of Bradley under that bloody sheet, I
feel embarrassed for myself. I never lose control like that. I don’t know what
I was thinking. I suppose I’m paying the price now.
“Sir, where do you want us?” Smith, a five
year veteran of my service, asks.
I turn over the couch with a sigh.
“Gentlemen, I want to thank you both for your loyal service through the years.
You have both been invaluable. I wish things could have gone a different way. I
apologize.” I fire a single shot into Smith’s forehead. Poor Rees is too
shocked to even draw on me before he meets the same ending. The loose ends are
no more. The rest is in the hands of the fates.
The last of my security doors fall, the
sound of steel hitting marble echoing through the room. I cross my leg, wipe
the speckles of dust off my costume, and put a smile on my face. The bane of my
existence, the man I hate, who has consumed my life for years, super-speeds
into my living room as if he owns it. And the press calls me arrogant.
“Alkaline,”
he says beneath that dark mask.
“Justice,” I say with a nod. We stare at
each other for a few seconds, even now locked in battle. “Grace?”
“She’s safe. You can’t hurt her or anyone
else ever again.” He pauses for dramatic effect, or to savor his victory. “Will
this be easy or hard?”
For a moment, I consider an attack. It
always gives me almost orgasmic pleasure when my fist hits his body and he
cries out in pain. One last taste for the road? No, I quell this urge. My body
has not completely healed from our fight a few hours ago and quite frankly, I
need a break. Being the scourge of the city is exhausting. “You may take me to
jail now.”
As I’m led out past the frightened police
and gawking bystanders, I keep that smile on my face. Not because I’m arrogant,
not to save face, because…I may have lost this battle, but the war has just
begun.
Then Rome will truly burn.
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