Bullets rained down, denting the back and the side of the vehicle.

  “Do your men not have any regard for your life?” Malakie shouted.

  As he turned to look, he noticed the passenger in the closest car behind them wind down the window and stick out his firearm. His eyes widened.

  “Get down!” he screamed as he pushed Julius’s head down into the seat, just in the nick of time as bullets pierced through the back window, exploding glass over the floor and the back seat.

  Malakie kept Julius’s head down amidst the chaos, but instead of staying put and letting Derrick figure a way out of this one, he sprang back up and opened fire through the hole where the back window used to be.

  Shielding his face with only his forearm for protection, he emptied the whole clip. Shot after shot, bullets tore through the sky with evil intentions that never found their target—that was, until the final bullet kissed the car in front’s bonnet. It shot upward and punched through the windscreen mirror with laser precision, finding a home in the driver’s chest.

  The car swerved hard, veering off the road and ploughing through rubbish and trash cans before slamming into a fence.

  One car down. Five more to go.

  “Have you guys all taken a hit to the head?” a voice bellowed through the earpiece in every driver’s ear. “It’s like you’re all trying to kill the boss, or is it that you’re all just a bunch of incompetent morons? We can’t just be aiming aimlessly at the car. If we hit Julius, we are all going on a permanent vacation—and not the type with sunshine and rainbows. The type we never wake up from. So fix up. As you all can see, the boss isn’t in the front or the driver’s seat, so let’s take the driver out. Get this over and done with. Then bring the boss back home where he belongs… is that understood?”

  “Got you.”

  “Understood.”

  “Message received.”

  “Take out the driver.”

  The response from each car was telling. Their method had shifted. Fingers lay wrapped around the trigger, but the bullets had stopped raining down.

  “The chaos. The bloodshed. The violence. I love it,” Julius said, a dark grin spreading across his face. “We’re in Miami, boys. Every drug dealer, police officer, and politician is in our pocket or owes my family a favour that they wouldn’t even think of rescinding on. Hell… even the newly elected mayor, Eileen Higgins, is mayor because we put her there—and you thought you were going to get out of this one with your lives.”

  Malakie caught Derrick’s gaze through the hand mirror, both their eyes a reflection of the severity of the situation.

  Julius sat back up in his seat and caught the moment between the two.

  “Awwww, the look of realisation when you know it’s over,” Julius said. “I’ve seen that look too many times to count, boys.”

  Julius raised his hands out in front of him in a mocking fashion.

  “Hey… be proud that you made it this far. That is an accomplishment in itself. Squirm, beg for their lives as I stood over them with the cold metal pressed against their face—but you guys… you guys have fought to the end.”

  Julius began to snigger, switching glances between Derrick and Malakie.

  “But just like the ones before you, I will enjoy watching your soul leave your body,” he said, gently patting Malakie across the cheek with an open palm.

  Derrick, still looking through the rear-view mirror, noticed three of the cars turn right, breaking off from the other two.

  “Malakie, you seeing this?” Derrick said, causing Malakie to glance back. “Three of their cars are gone—given up. How many more mags you got back there?”

  “Two,” Malakie responded with a smile on his face. “What’s wrong, Julius? Where did that cocky smile of yours take a vacation to?”

  Julius raised his hands in the air.

  “Oh no, you’ve got me. What is the most feared man in Miami to do?” he said sarcastically. “I’ve been to war with the biggest mob bosses, killed the biggest hitters in Chicago, Atlanta, and LA. Yet you talk to me about where my smile went. Vacation? You know nothing about vacation, little boy. You think you’re a gangster because you push people around on a little street corner,” he sniggered.

  “A real gangster owns the city. A real gangster is the connect—not having to run to the connect to re-up. A real gangster has hitters all over the city, and when they have an enemy, you don’t even have to say the word… it’s done. So when you’re playing gangster with a reeeeeeeal gangster who has put their own in the ground, remember who you’re messing with.”

  Malakie, taking in everything Julius said, detached his clip from his gun.

  “Derrick,” he shouted as he slammed in the fresh mag. “I don’t trust this—keep an eye out.”

  Derrick nodded and continued to drive up the four-way system. As the lights turned red and people began to cross the zebra crossing, he noticed the three cars that had trailed off earlier coming from the left side of the intersection.

  And there came that wicked smile of Julius again.

  “Checkmate, boys,” he said. “I promise you I’ll make this quick and relatively painless.”

  This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

  As Julius sat there basking in what felt like a foregone conclusion, the car stopped, and mere metres behind them Julius’s men stopped and got out of their cars. Derrick began to pray for any type of miracle.

  And then the sound of screeching tyres sounded—the burning of rubber across concrete. When everyone looked back, a large silver van pulled up behind Julius’s men. They all turned toward the van as the door slid open—it was the Albanians. They opened fire, killing the men and leaving a bloodbath in their wake.

  Julius’s men from the left side of the intersection jumped out of their cars and tried to run to help, but as they did, another van pulled up from the intersection leading straight ahead. Julius’s men were sitting ducks. They were out in the open with no protection.

  The men slid open the doors and opened fire again. They tried to look for cover, but it was too late. Bullets tore through flesh and lodged in bone, leaving what looked like a cemetery of bodies scattered across the floor as all men met the same fate.

  Death.

  The Albanians wasted no time. They pulled back their van doors, and the driver spun the wheel, burning rubber as they quickly escaped from the scene.

  Derrick sat there stunned as he watched the whole thing unfold. He was frozen in fear; his body refused to obey his commands and move.

  It was chaos. Innocent bystanders were hit, injured in the melee as screams echoed throughout. People ran into nearby shops for help, calling the police in the process, while others pulled those who were hit out of the way to safety.

  “What are you waiting for, Derrick?” Malakie shouted. “Get us the hell out of here, now!”

  Derrick snapped from his trance and slammed his foot on the accelerator, storming forward as people jumped out of the way.

  As Derrick and Malakie arrived at the stone-grey underground car park, they both jumped out of the car, but Derrick was visibly shaken. At the other end of the multi-storey car park, Travis and D’Angelo stood in front of the battered maintenance truck, waiting. It was Travis who clocked the boys first.

  “Yo, D,” he said, slapping the back of his hand on his chest. “They’re here.”

  As D’Angelo looked up, he clocked them.

  “Alright, let’s go over.”

  D’Angelo started running first, then Travis followed close behind.

  As the pair reached Malakie and Derrick, Travis dapped up Malakie, but when D’Angelo went to dap up Derrick, his eyes landed on Julius sitting in the back seat. He was sitting there, smiling and waving.

  D’Angelo took a step back, then ushered the group to the side.

  “Are you kidding me?” D’Angelo whispered. “This was not part of the plan. What’s he doing here?”

  “Listen, when everything went left we had to improvise. How else were we meant to get out there alive?” Derrick said.

  Malakie’s phone began to vibrate in his pocket. When he reached down and pulled it out, Afra’s name was on the screen. He raised his phone to unlock it, then read the message.

  Finish the job.

  Malakie’s heart began to race, and his head dropped, triggering concern from every member in the group.

  “Malakie—Malakie,” Derrick called, but there was no response.

  “Malakie,” D’Angelo, then Travis—but their words couldn’t penetrate the trance he found himself in.

  As his head raised, he turned around slowly, walking past the men like a zombie. Then he stopped at the back window and turned to face Julius.

  Julius arrogantly wound down the window and stuck his head out, taunting Malakie.

  “Listen, if you’ve come to change your—”

  Before Julius could finish his sentence, Malakie pulled out his firearm and opened fire.

  Bang. Bang. Bang.

  Two in the chest. One to the head.

  Julius’s blood splattered up against the side of the car, then his body went limp.

  D’Angelo, Derrick, and Travis ran over toward Malakie, but before a word could be uttered from their mouths, Malakie raised his firearm toward them.

  Their mouths opened.

  “Wai—” Travis tried to blurt out.

  “N—”

  The sound caught in their mouth’s, useless, unable to enter the world before Malakie reacted.

  Two loud bangs echoed into the distance as bullets flew through the air.

  One to the head of Travis.

  One to D’Angelo.

  Their bodies dropped to the ground like a ton of bricks, blood spraying onto Derrick before he could blink. Their bodies slumped to the floor, blood pooling out of them, as Malakie stood over them, watching their lifeless eyes stare into nothingness.

  As Derrick’s eyes widened, he patted down his body, then let out a sigh of relief.

  “Are you crazy?” Derrick said. “You wanted the position of top guy that bad you had to kill your own men?”

  Malakie turned his back, and like clockwork, Derrick aimed his gun at Malakie.

  “So what… you’re just going to shoot me? Nah, you haven’t got it in you.”

  Derrick’s finger curled around the trigger as he pulled it back—but nothing happened. He tried again. And again. And again.

  Finally, he looked at his gun with nervous eyes.

  “You’re slipping, Derrick,” Malakie said. “You didn’t even notice the weight of your gun changed. I switched the guns over before we left the car… just in case.”

  “So what? This was your goal all along—to double-cross everyone?” Derrick’s head twisted to the side as he spat on the floor. “A snake in sheep’s clothing. I knew I should’ve cut my grass, but nowhere amongst the snakes did I ever think your head would pop out.”

  “Me—a snake?” Malakie said. “I gave everything to this game, Derrick. I gave everything to you. I put my life on the line every single day. I bleed—for you. How many times did you bang for me, Derrick? How many times were you on the front line getting busy, Derrick? And don’t talk about the hungry Derrick on his way up—talk to this Derrick standing in front of me.”

  “That’s how it goes, Malakie,” Derrick said. “I earned my stripes in the field already. I don’t need to put in no work—I’m the man, not you.”

  “Was, Derrick—was. You haven’t been the man for a long time now. Always paranoid. Always questioning people and treating your men like slaves. They checked out a long time ago; they just feared the name so much they carried on out of respect. And I gave you one last chance. I turned my back to you to see if I was wrong about you—if I was just overreacting, if you were really my homie. But turns out I was right.”

  “Well, the student becomes the master, huh?” Derrick said. “You have no reason to kill me. I’m out of here. New York’s yours.”

  “New York?” Malakie laughed. “Forget New York. I want the world. And Afra—he wants a word.”

  “Wait—wait,” Derrick begged. “You know what he’ll do to me if he gets his hands on me.”

  “Not my problem, Derrick.”

  “It all makes sense now,” Derrick said. “The Albanians coming just in the nick of time and killing Julius’s men—it was all just a staged massacre, and I was the gullible audience who didn’t know how it was going to end.”

  “Bravo—Derrick, you finally get it,” Malakie said as he aimed his firearm at Derrick.

  “Get in the back of the car,” he said as he walked over to Derrick, pushing him forward.

  As Malakie opened the door, he pushed Derrick in, then reached into his back pocket and pulled out handcuffs.

  “Cuff yourself,” Malakie screamed.

  “If I do that, I’m as good as dead.”

  Malakie, frustration building up, aimed his gun at Derrick and shot him in the leg.

  “Arghhh!” Derrick screamed. “Alright—alright, I’ll do it,” he said, grabbing hold of the handcuffs and cuffing himself.

  Malakie shut the door and began to drive.

  “So you’re just going to leave the money and the bodies here in an open car park?” Derrick asked.

  “Don’t worry about that—it’s sorted,” Malakie responded as the car shot out of the underground car park and toward Afra for one final showdown.