Chapter Twenty-five

It was exhilarating. Edward was having trouble breathing. Almost half of him wanted to get up out of his seat and run, but the other side of him�"winning majority by just a sliver�"wouldn’t leave if a hurricane was at the door. He had been planning for weeks. He had thought ahead to every possible outcome and had arranged everything so that he would come out on top in nearly every one. Of the thousand scenarios that he had planned for, there were another hundred that would most likely end in his death. Still, he wasn’t afraid. The bar that he sat in with all of his hidden preparations was his magnum opus. He relished the moments he had sitting in it.

The building he sat in was owned by a member of a rival gang that called themselves the Hell-Chasers. They were a group so small that the Spartans could wipe them all out in a day if they were so inclined. Luckily, they hadn’t been for some unknown reason. As far as Edward knew, the bar was the only property the Hell-Chasers owned, but it was still useful neutral territory. There was nobody else in the bar except for a bartender that paced back and forth in front of him who wouldn’t care what they said, given that the Hell-Chasers were anarchists. He didn’t seem to mind how long Edward had been sitting there. The bar was a small, archaic building with some sports flags displayed on the walls and litter thrown around. It didn’t have much going for it except a neatly furnished wooden front bar with an average selection of alcohols on display.

He faintly worried that when Aries came through the door that he wouldn’t recognize him. He had bleached and dyed his hair to light blond and started to grow a beard; he didn’t have one in the mugshot that was released to the public. That much disguise wouldn’t fool any members of the Spartans, but it lowered his chances of being found by some hapless civilian who saw his face in the paper. His back was hunched over the front bar rail with his head in his lap, staring at the time on his cell phone.

Edward turned as the door opened. It had opened a few times by accident when someone didn’t see the closed sign on the door, which was meant to keep out anyone without pull in the city.

Aries came in wearing a black t-shirt and jeans. His jacket was slung over his shoulder with the symbol on the back peeking out from under the folds. He took off his sunglasses and stuffed them in his shirt pocket. Just as Edward thought, it took a moment for Aries to recognize him. He scanned around the room for a few seconds before seeing him sitting at the front bar.

“Montgomery,” he said, sitting down a seat away from Edward. “You made it.”

“You said you’d buy me a drink sometime.” Four weeks before, Aries had left a statement in the news saying that he was going to be in that bar on that day of the week. He said that he wanted to talk about Comet, the man that Edward had sent to prison and indirectly killed. Aries knew that Edward would guess that he wanted to meet up. He couldn’t use Edward’s name or else the cops would meet them there. He knew that he was presenting Edward with an advantage that was too good to waste. Then, because he knew that Edward was determined enough to put up with it, Aries didn’t show up until two weeks after. It was the third Wednesday after the date he planned in hopes that Edward would exhaust his preparations on the first few days.

Edward was smart too. He knew just as much about strategy. They both had made plans and they both knew they weren’t meeting just for a conversation. Whatever was going to happen was unknown.

“Your phone?” Aries said, holding his hand out. “Forgive the suspicion. Hopefully you can understand.”

Edward waited until Aries started to pull out his own cell phone with his other hand. Edward held his phone out and had it pulled away by an even tighter grip. Aries stacked the two phones together and smashed them on the edge of the table in one quick, fierce throw. Sparks from the cracks flew outward and disintegrated in the air. Aries threw the two metal husks onto the table and slid forward on his seat, satisfied.

“I’ll get you a new one if you want.”

Edward nodded, raising his eyebrow. “So why did you want to meet?”

“I was intrigued,” Aries said. “You know that you’re all Fay talks about? I didn’t think I’d ever see her so determined.”

With a shrug and a twisted shake of his head, Edward turned to him, waiting for eye contact for a moment before giving up and turning back around. “I guess I know her better than you do.”

“If you’re trying to antagonize me, go ahead.” Aries raised a hand to the bartender at the other side of the stand, who came running over. “The vitriol isn’t reciprocated.”

Edward shook his head at the bartender when the man offered him a drink. He waited until Aries had gotten a shot of tequila and the bartender went out of earshot before speaking again. “I thought I sent your friend to prison.”

“And I got you back for it. We’re even. That’s what justice means to me.”

“Nice to hear you have a sense of justice.”

Aries chuckled, hunching forward and shutting his eyes for a moment. “You know, courts all over the world lock up innocent people under life sentences all the time. People like me run around free because for every law, there are a million ways to get around it. The Spartans are a lot simpler than that. If someone screws you over, you get vengeance. That’s that.”

“Want a medal?”

“Don’t need one,” Aries said, “I just wanted to get an idea of what my girlfriend is up against. You’re an intriguing guy.”

Edward nodded, putting his hands together on the table. “Fay told me that I broke into her house to shoot her father in the chest point-blank and leave. I’m assuming you told her that.”

“I did. It doesn’t really matter now. She would have hated you either way.”

That was a litmus test to see if Fay was hiding somewhere or waiting outside the door. Soon after, Edward realized its ineffectiveness. Aries and Fay could have planned out what he was going to say beforehand. There was practically no limit as to what they could have prepared.

Aries was testing Edward too. He could see it in the meticulous way the gangster was speaking, having to think about each word for a second before saying it. There was most likely an army of gang members waiting outside the door for Edward to make a move so that they could shoot him down. Even Fay was probably waiting in the parking lot with a shotgun, having heard that Scott was out of town and that she had no way of keeping the game going. As for Aries, he was most likely having fun thinking he had the advantage and seeing Edward’s patience thinning.

“Your gang gave her the drugs that landed her in prison and ruined her life,” Edward said. “You’re sure you love her?”

He answered that with a thin laugh. “Look at her, and then look at you. Whose life did we ruin? Speaking of which, you told Fay that she didn’t deserve any of the power and respect that she has, didn’t you? That every good thing in her life was handed to her on a silver platter?”

Edward nodded.

“Yeah, she told me. See, I disagree with that. Don’t tell her I told you this, but I think the one who gave her everything she has is you.”

“Me? You were the one that handed her the title.” Edward turned to him, making eye contact longer than a few seconds for the first time. There was in inseparable mixture in Aries’ eyes of belligerence and affability. If he squinted enough, he could pretend for a moment that they really were two old friends having a drink together.

“When you’re out of prison, you’re ostracized by society and you usually don’t have family or friends to go back to. The Spartans like to recruit people fresh out of prison for that reason. I wouldn’t have even known that Fay existed if not for you sending her to prison, and she would never have agreed to join the gang if not for you abandoning her and driving her to a point where she was desperate enough to put on a jacket to survive. Because of you, she spent three years in addict hell and six months begging for food on the street before I found her. You created the princess of the Spartans. What I want to know is if the opposite is true. Did she create Edward Montgomery? Why did you become a lawyer?”

Edward didn’t say anything. He refused to string those words into a comprehensible sentence, which was significantly more than the accusation deserved. The serial criminal sitting next to him was accusing him of something. It was almost laughable. Aries’ voice started to fade into a low purr, as if he suddenly cared if the bartender heard. Still, the joviality never left his face.

“Just so you know,” he said, “I have no opinion on you from anything other than what you’ve done to me. I don’t want to interfere in this game you two play. This is between you and her, and I respect that. That’s my kind of justice. You may not agree with it, but you have to admit it’s more persuasive than your antiquated laws. With that being said, I do love Fay. Once you hurt her, then you hurt me, and I will have to kill you.”

“Do you love her? I didn’t think you were capable.”

That made Aries laugh a little. “You know what�"you’re right. I should prove that I love her. When all of this is done, I’m going to tell her what really happened to her father. She deserves that.”

The sound of a car driving by was the electric shock that sent Aries back into himself. In the half-second after the screeching of tires burning the road, Edward could see the cordiality in his face dissolve into the sneer in the mugshot that he knew all too well. It was as if he were dealing playing cards when he leapt off the bar stool and pulled a black pistol from the pocket of his jeans to the space between Edward’s eyes.

Edward knew that the street surrounding the bar had been cordoned off by concrete roadblocks, so no ordinary people would be driving by. Any engine noises he heard would only signal Aries’ people coming. In preparation for that, he had kept a handgun under the bar and was waiting for the sound. It only stood to reason that both of them were waiting for the same signal. It all came down to who was faster, and of course it was the gang leader who was quicker on the draw. Edward wasn’t panicking. He had planned for that too.

“Just so you know,” Ares said, “Pluto originally was going to kill you, but Fay thought that was too kind.”

The front door exploded open and gang members started filing in, all aiming pistols and shotguns at him. It was nearly laughable how many guns they needed to have trained on him. Even as a wanted criminal, he intimidated them. It was a compliment, and an advantage he could use as an advantage later on, even as Aries began to circle around behind him with the gun so close to his head that he could feel the cold of the metal. The barrel of the gun grazed the hairs on the back of his head. From out of the corner of his eye, he saw the bartender running towards the back door and faintly made out what was most likely a member of the gang chasing after him.

Edward waited for Fay to come in and show her face, ready to give another cocky sneer from her high ground, but she wasn’t coming. He prepared himself for her appearance at the front and back of each group, but still�"nothing. He’d be able to name her the second she stepped in the room, but she never did. Everyone else was just visual white noise. He only resigned once the gang begun to back out the door and the gun was jerked against his head. He took his opportunity to stuff his hand in his pocket and attempt to press the button on his remote before the handle of the gun hit the top of his skull and a wave of mist bored through his body. The smooth plastic button just barely touched his finger before dissipating from possibility as his hand was wrenched out of his pocket and he was sent barreling to the ground.

“Don’t worry, you’re not going to die,” Aries said, grunting from the effort of keeping him on the floor. “Fay just wanted me to keep you busy while she plans some more fun for you.”

Edward could tell Aries was fumbling with something in his hands, but he couldn’t tell what. It didn’t matter. No matter what it was, he had planned for it. The syringe that was plunged into his neck felt like a thumb being jammed against his flesh hard enough to crack his spine. His sense of touch was the first to dissipate into the air, followed shortly by his eyesight. Everything was fading away into darkness as Spartans jeered and laughed. Aries’ grin was shot into him through the knee that was pressed into his back like an anvil. There was no escape and nowhere to go. He was entirely helpless, but somehow, completely in control.