Matheus takes after him, his own need for speed giving him a daredevil recklessness. But I’m the brother in control today.
Being with them out here reminds me of the afternoons when me and my twin would take backpacks full of ammunition and weapons into the forest to set up targets. We had fun together back then, in our own unorthodox way.
How else would the teenage sons of a gangster spend their free time? Those trips were short-lived after we had pulled the pins on a pair of grenades and blew the shit out of a dead guy's abandoned vehicle. Security had dumped the Toyota Hilux deep in the wilderness after his invitation had expired.
When Papá had heard the explosion, he thought the plantation was under attack––that his enemies were finally closing in on him. Paranoid fucker.
I smirk to myself at that. I could have used the chaos to my advantage and blown him up too. The idea had crossed my mind, but I remember arriving home afterward, how he’d planted Tomás close to his hip.
The older we got, the more he placed himself behind his sons when shit hit the fan.
Shaking my head, I glance at Tomás in his pristine suit pants and smart shirt. He’s not exactly dressed for this evening’s tour, but that's my eldest brother’s impeccable standards. He always dresses in tailored suits, while I wear combat pants with an arsenal of weapons next to me.
“Why are we out here, Gio?” he asks, aware of my staring.
“I’ve got something to show you, Tommy. Something we should have created years ago.”
I step away from them and hunker low, grabbing a hidden handle and heaving open a camouflaged metal door in the ground.
“What the fuck?” Matheus jogs over to me and looks into the black hole. “A bunker? Christ, you’re more like him than I thought.”
“It’s not a bunker.”
André and Tommy move closer, both of them assessing the fixed ladder and never-ending darkness. Raindrops pitter patter as a strong wind picks up.
“You think you can handle it?” I quirk a brow at André. “Or would you rather run back to Blackwater and have a nap? I mean, you must be exhausted after that beating I gave you.”
André chuckles under his breath. “Beating? I’ve had harder massages than that, brother.” He’s beside me in a few strides. “What’s down there?”
“Maybe you should askwhois down there.” I shrug, swinging low and stepping onto the first rung. “I’ve set up a kill team.” Climbing down, I add, “With one minor complication.”
Matheus is quick to follow as Tomás shouts after me. “Do you seriously expect me to jump into a fucking dark hole without knowing what the complication is?”
“I’ll tell you all about it when you follow me. Trust me, Tommy.”
“Trust you?” André laughs. “I think we’re all out of trust up here.”
I keep descending into the cave. “Fine. Stay up there in the rain, but you’d be safe and dry down here with me. Your choice.”
“Fuck’s sake,” Tomás mutters. “Come on, Dré.”
The temperature drops as all four of us drop into the man-made tunnel. I wait for André to finally hop off the ladder and dust his hands, then yank a handle to switch on the lights.
At the end of the passage there’s a dug-out cave where connecting tunnels cut through the rock like tentacles.
“What the fuck?” Matheus walks ahead. “I knew you had secrets, but an underground… uh, I don’t even know what to call this place.”
“And a kid?” André says next to me. “You didn’t tell me about Leo. I should be fucking hurt.”
“You are hurt,” Tomás points out. “And you’re pissed too, because you know why he didn’t tell us.”
“Papá.” Matheus says the name on all our minds. “We all kept secrets from him in the end.”
Tomás throws me a stern glare, a look that reminds me so much of our father. “You should have told me about the kid after I’d taken over from Papá. Is there anything else you need to come clean about? Like his parents?”
“They’re dead. I’m all he has.”
“Not anymore.” Tomás confirms. “He has us now too.”
