Chapter two

Bruce hated the sobbing son of a bitch holding his girlfriend’s hand and thanks to Charlie’s celebrity status among the populace, there were cameras everywhere, so Bruce would have to school his face. He was under constant, ridiculously heavy scrutiny at the place he wanted most to be gloating. Patrick’s funeral. If not for the media, Bruce could easily find ways to excuse himself to someplace secluded so he could cackle like the madman he felt like today.

Bruce had finally taught Charlie some fucking humility by killing Patrick. Bruce wanted to savor it, then wedge a push dagger into Charlie’s heart. Something with ornate scrimshaw on the handle, maybe depicting a glorious battle scene with one side, euphemistically Charlie’s side, falling under the merciless spears, swords, and cavalry of Bruce’s side. Something that would look appropriate covered in Charlie’s blood as Bruce ground the sucker in. Or maybe Bruce would use one of Charlie’s own coffin-handled bowies. One of the more expensive of his collection.

Although Bruce preferred his Para-Ordnance Tac-Four semi-automatic pistol, for Charlie’s death, Bruce would settle for nothing less than carnage. Sure, the Tac-Four used .45 ACP’s, but the gun couldn’t rip Charlie’s chest open to expose his heart’s oh-so-easily-extinguishable pumping. Nor could it eviscerate his gut to let the light of day shine on those organs that kept the repugnant bastard alive.

No, for such a “revealing” death, Bruce would have to resign his Tac-Four and adopt Alicia as his weapon-of-choice. All Bruce had to do was wait for the appropriate moment to present Alicia with his convincing false evidence placing Charlie at the scene of Patrick’s murder, and Alicia would make sure of her own accord that Charlie met a gruesome end.

Bruce couldn’t tell which was better: manipulating Alicia into killing the man she’d been planning to leave Bruce for, or Charlie dying at the hands of the woman he loved.

Bruce reached behind Alicia’s shoulders and gave Charlie a sympathetic pat on the back. Soon all Charlie’s tense muscles would be loose with death. Bruce’s composure slipped. He had to look down and cover his face with his free hand to disguise the grin threatening to split his face open. He could not allow himself to laugh. Bruce’s mind raced for something solemn to concentrate on.

Not being able to kill Charlie himself sobered him. Alicia loving Charlie and not him locked Bruce’s mental composition in place.

Bruce knew his shortcomings. He knew he wasn’t kind and witty like Patrick had been, nor suave and popular like Charlie. He definitely wasn’t humble and supplicating like Travis.

No, Bruce was ruthless, just like Alicia. They were both slaves to their passions and loved it. Alicia’s passion was the human form and becoming as intimately knowledgeable of it as possible. Bruce’s passion was control. He would run Louisiana’s underground at any cost. He would be liked and obeyed by those he employed, if only because of his ruthless dedication to securing and protecting his assets.

During Bruce’s first attempts to build his reputation in New Orleans’ underground hierarchy, Charlie’s position as a trusted buyer had proven a difficult hurdle. The dealers would rather have had Bruce be a liaison to Charlie beginning a drug enterprise than to work with Bruce. He would have revealed himself as a member of The Quintet, but thought it hasty, and so had decided to work on The Quintet avenue of his rise to dominion. He began by trying to assert himself as the new “middleman,” so to speak, for The Quintet, but it again became evident that Charlie was an obstacle. Charlie would not have himself replaced when it came to dealing with clientele. He wanted to handle the deals himself, and the others supported this enough so that Bruce was thwarted in making something more of himself yet again because of Charlie.

To fight against the majority opinion, Bruce began sabotaging Charlie’s public persona. He’d made it look as if Charlie was trying to steal Alicia from him, not knowing at the time that he really was. It was this media endeavor that brought the truth about Alicia’s and Charlie’s feelings for each other to the surface, for once Bruce had sent his falsified pictures to the press, exposés flared. Incriminating photographs that weren’t Bruce’s were being published, many of them current. Charlie was being tailed at all times by undercover photographers. The amount of time he spent at Alicia’s was questionable, as were their hand-holding and semi-romantic dinners together. Bruce had asked Travis what he thought of the two, and Travis had choked over his words at being asked.

It was answer enough. Alicia was not his anymore.

Bruce’s and Alicia’s conviction to fulfill what their passions cried for was what tied them together. It was why they’d been an item since high school. Seven years and counting. If Bruce hadn’t already been lanning on killing Charlie for standing in his way, he would have for stealing Alicia’s affections from him. For ruining Bruce’s plans with Alicia. For stealing her heart from it’s true keeper.

Just as Bruce’s passion was control, Charlie’s passion seemed to be taking it from Bruce, to make a mockery of him. No matter how sound Bruce’s opinions were, Charlie’s ass-backwards ones always won favor. In the beginning of their careers, Bruce felt that, as assassins leading double lives, they should stay out of the media and draw as little attention to themselves as possible. Their parents and their lineages drew enough. Each of The Quintet were fifth to seventh generation New Orleansers and heirs to substantial fortunes. Their parents were attention whores as it was, and had farmed their children off to any media event they could gain entry to. They’d been casual public celebrities since they were born. They were already under the media’s surveillance as it were.

Predictably, Charlie felt just the opposite: that they should pander themselves to the media. Charlie figured the more empty gossip they provided the less likely the media would dig for the truly juicy stuff. Attention would be given to their social lives and stop there.

Charlie began throwing parties, going to social galas, and did his best to drag his friends into the spot light with him. The media bought it, and Charlie’s life in the spotlight actually drew attention away from the other four. He’d been right. Although Patrick was commonly spoken of, he and the rest had been downgraded by the media to Charlie’s friends, his entourage of not-so-gossip-worthy heirs.

Bruce had his privacy, but it was thanks to Charlie. Bruce loathed Charlie, first for being right about the media, and secondly for owing his privacy to him. And then there were the situations like these, when Bruce wanted privacy outside of his home but would not be allowed it.

To add insult to injury, Charlie made fun of Bruce’s sour demeanor. Charlie likened Bruce to Val Kilmer as Bruce Wayne: mopy and lame as a cripple when it came to a social life. Bruce saw himself as the Joker, and he’d prove it by playing everyone around him, especially Charlie. Bruce saw Charlie as Harley Quinn: a joke and an antagonist in Bruce’s life.

Latin cooed through the alcoves of the church, breaking Bruce’s reverie periodically. Charlie had gotten control of himself but Alicia was still holding his hand. Bruce rubbed the middle of her back, trying to be affectionate, if only to get her to belong to him.

The thick walls of the church of the church resonated with the chorus’ singing, the sound strikingly similar to the funeral in which they’d dispatched the Brussels mob. Bruce realized with a jolt that this church was almost a replica of the one that had housed the Brussels massacre. Its thick walls, Patrick’s precautions, and silencers had afforded Alicia enough time to fuck Alicia in all her gory angelic glory amidst the bodies long before the police arrived at the scene.

Bruce knew he didn’t love Alicia in the classical sense, he’d never sacrifice himself for her well-being, but he did love her. Like a trophy hunter loves his rifle. Like a wine connoisseur loves good wine.

In a way, Bruce had loved killing Patrick more than he loved Alicia, if only for the fact that Patrick’s death was a stepping stone towards Charlie’s death and Bruce’s rise to dominion over Louisiana. It was a delightful irony that Patrick had been the one to introduce Bruce to the group, his own kindness leading to his death, Bruce having introduced Patrick to Death.

And now that everyone was unhinged, he’d keep them that way until they hinged themselves around him. After Charlie’s death, Bruce would lead what remained of their assassination team, he’d keep the press at bay, he’d entertain the underground and be allowed to start the drug empire Charlie had refused. Bruce would replace Charlie and show the world Charlie’s shortcomings through his own brilliance. Charlie’s death would allow Bruce to tear the universe apart and shape it around himself, the way things should have been to begin with.

Chapter One

Charlie was lost in reverie. One of their best assignments had been in a church similar to the one his friend’s casket was now resting in. Charlie, Patrick, Alicia, Bruce, and Travis were the best assassination quintet the states could offer. Now they would be a quartet due to Patrick’s murder.

Charlie pushed the thought of death away, wanting to think back upon the better memories he had. He submerged himself in the memory of the church assignment.

For those two weeks, all they’d known were their targets: a wealthy mob is Brussels. Their employers left it to them to decide how, when, and where, so long as everything was done within two weeks.

Alicia had proposed they do their own rendition of the death of Giuliano de’ Medici. In this version, they would kill a member of the mob, and then massacre the rest of the mob at his funeral. The only other difference was that there would be no survivors to become a Cosimo. For the quintet, nothing was cooler than a church assassination.

Patrick had handled back-up, as usual, and supplanted all their security measures with his own hired help trained specifically to mimic the codetalk the Brussels mob would use. It’s not like any of the quintet knew german fluently. Patrick’s final position was with the chorus, on a pier above and behind the casket. Bruce, Travis, and Charlie were among the inner security closest to the exits, so as to block the escape of any of their targets. Alicia put herself closest to what she loved the best: the dead. She was inside the casket, on top of the first member killed. She’d broken into the church on several occasions so as to practice her exact movements. Her position would give her a clear shot at the top five, who would be sitting in the first pew. That day she’d popped up, looking like an angel; blonde hair, blue eyes, halo and all, and begun the massacre. In all, they’d killed forty-one people, although they’d only been hired to kill fifteen.

Their extra efforts were why they were the best. They’d done their own reconnaissance and had made sure that the Brussels mob’s highest aficionados, backers, and any family member that could possibly vie for revenge had attended the funeral. Their conditions for their employer’s were simple: pay for housing, food, supplies, and $500,000 per assigned person, and they would make sure all their employer’s problems were solved. Charlie’s friends naturally covered their employer’s tracks, so that no connection could be made with him and his friends. They had an international network of former employers who were eager to refer them to friends in need.
At first, their tactics of murdering more than their employer’s agreed targets was shunned, but once Charlie and his friends had demonstrated the benefits of their way and the completeness with which they covered all traces of interaction, they’d had to buy an agenda to organize their years.

Charlie smiled to himself absently, remembering Patrick’s initial reaction to Alicia’s and Bruce’s “assassination squad” proposal. Patrick had loved the opportunity for all the inside jokes their adventures could offer. “Gentle Patrick, Never A Patsy” was the inscription for his tombstone under the cypress trees in Alicia’s swampy backyard. It described Patrick to a T.

Alicia had protested that Patrick was too kind to be treated by the government’s unceremonious burial regulations. His body dug through, sewn up, then buried only to be encased in a cement tomb. She’d felt that that version of decomposition, without worms and critters to recycle the body, was the most heinous and inhumane act the government supported. This, regardless of the fact that she had an entire room in her house accommodating her collection of preserved body parts.

Charlie fought to not lose himself to the thought of Patrick decomposing. The image was like a push dagger ground into his heart.

In the beginning, “the gang” had been Charlie, Alicia, and Patrick. A trio, not a quintet. Patrick eventually introduced Bruce to the group, and Bruce introduced Travis. By fifth grade, “the gang” was a quintet. The five of them had grown up together in the same Catholic school. They’d all abhorred the place and done their best to insure every sacrilegious act imaginable occurred within its walls. Although, they hadn’t needed much help because majority of their peers desecrated the place with the rambunctious actions hormones brought them to enact.

The quintet’s last great effort to ditch the school was in the eighth grade and only managed to screw them over tenfold. They’d each begged their respective parents to pull them from the school and give them private tutors, disguising their motive of escape as a cry for better education. Their parents were enraged at the thought that their money was being wasted. Their parents had approached the headmaster and presented an ultimatum for the school: either raise the school’s standards and hire better teachers or they’d use their clout as seventh generation New Orleans-ians to ruin the school.
Soon after, the quintet’s reason for hating the school was curriculum, though their loathing of Christianity never faltered. Alicia would joke that they were the ones being crucified. Patrick furthered their diatribe with his epiphany that Jesus said backwards sounded like sausage. The joke spread to anything associated with sandwich, especially meats. Before long, the quintet had a cacophony of meat-based gods and slang. A deli pantheon arose.

Charlie realized that he would never again be privy to one of Patrick’s deli-cide sermons. Patrick would never shout “Bologna be saved!” or “Gouda bless you” again. The push dagger of comprehension wedged into his heart further, grinding towards his spine. Charlie’s sang-froid collapsed. He sobbed like the shmuck he was, ignorant to the cameras flashing.

He felt Alicia take his hand and was brought to the memory of the night he and Alicia had heard of Patrick’s death. They’d been in her cypress grove playing chess with the set that Alicia’s grandfather had carved himself out of cypress knees. When they’d heard, she’d looked up at the night sky and repeated one of Patrick’s favorite metaphors for death. “Stars are just salt in the salami of space, just like we’re just pepper in time’s nose. We’ve all gotta be sneezed out at some point.” Charlie had wanted to hold her, but Bruce was the one who’d delivered the news, and so she’d had her boyfriend to hold her. Patrick had never said anything worse than that. He’d never been unkind, but also never a pushover. Gentle, but never a patsy. Life would be better if he’d stayed.

Charlie had responded the only way he could that night. He’d wished his friend farewell. “So long and good night.”

Charlie must have said it aloud again because Alicia tightened his grip and said “So long and good night.”

They swore with the unspoken malice in their eyes that they would annihilate anyone involved with Patrick’s murder.