CHAPTER TWO
983 Words
The car cut through Bangkok and rolled through the Theerakul gates forty minutes later. Two black Rolls-Royces sat in the circular driveway like accusations. Not theirs.
“These are Than Phu Yai Vichai's cars,” Saen said.
They got out. The front steps were wrong. Theerakul men in black suits were scattered across the marble like broken pieces of a chessboard. Some groaning. Most unconscious. Blood traced thin lines between the tiles.
Not a m******e.
A message.
Saen was at the nearest guard in three strides. The man was conscious, barely, his breath rattling. Saen dropped to one knee. His hands were gentle as they checked the man’s pulse, as he tilted his head to clear his airway. But his voice was not. “What happened?”
“Than Phu Yai. The Don’s men,” the guard rasped, blood on his teeth. “Came in fast. No warning. The family—inside. Guns. They—” He coughed. Saen steadied his head, thumb brushing blood from the corner of his mouth with care he never used on words.
“Defenseless, Khun Saen.”
Kirin’s hands curled into fists. This was not how the Panjamitr held meetings. The Don ruled Thailand, yes, but he did not bleed his allies on their own doorsteps. Not without a reason. Not without a war.
“Khun Kirin,” Saen said, rising. No softness now. Just command.
“Don’t,” Kirin said, already moving. “I know what you're going to say, and the answer is no. If you think I'm gonna my family alone with that man in their, you can forget about it. I'm not running.”
Saen did not argue. He never did when Kirin used that tone. It was the same tone Anurak used before he signed blood contracts. “Still remember your training?”
Kirin lit up with a rare bloodthirsty smile. The one that only appeared when someone threatened his one. "You'd never let me forget."
Saen drew a Sig Sauer from his shoulder holster and pressed it into Kirin’s palm. The weight was familiar. Unwelcome, but familiar. Kirin checked the chamber out of habit, then looked up. “Dagger.”
Saen did not ask why. He slid a six-inch blade from the sheath at his ankle and handed it over. Kirin flipped it once, feeling the balance settle. It had been two years since he last touched one in practice, but his hands remembered.
Years of training. Muscle memory. Between guns and knives, the latter had always been his favorite.
They hit the front doors side by side.
The foyer was a painting in the middle of being ruined. Don Vichai stood in the center, his gun pressed to Anurak’s temple. Sirin, Ren, and Pakin were on their knees, Don’s men behind each of them with barrels to the backs of their heads.
The air smelled like gunpowder, polished wood, and something hotter. Rage, maybe.
No one had heard them come in.
Saen moved first. He was a blur of black and precision. An elbow to a throat sent one man choking to the floor. A shot took another in the knee before he could turn, the sound cracking like a bone. The third reached for his weapon and found Saen’s boot in his sternum, followed by the cold kiss of a barrel under his chin. The man went down, gasping.
Kirin went the other way. He ducked under a grabbing arm, used the man’s momentum to drive him into the wall with a thud that rattled the portraits. The dagger flashed, not to kill, just to open the man’s hand. A gun clattered to the floor. Another man swung. Kirin stepped inside his guard, slammed the butt of the Sig into his temple, and kept moving. It was not graceful. It was not clean. It was fast, brutal, and exactly what years of pretending to be harmless let people think he couldn't do.
In the space of ten seconds, Saen had Chai — the Don’s right hand, a wall of a man — on his knees with a gun to the base of his skull.
And Kirin had crossed the marble, slid past the last man standing, in his vicinity, and stopped with his knife against the Don’s throat and his gun trained on the man directly in front of him.
The room went still.
Vichai’s eyes narrowed, just a fraction. “Little prince, I see you've returned,” he said, voice level, almost pleased. “Your father might have proved to be a traitor, but Anurak raised you with sharp teeth. He taught you well.”
“Order your mem to stand down,” Kirin said. His voice did not shake. It had no right to. “Weapons on the floor. Now.”
Vichai tested the pressure of the blade against his skin, then gave a low chuckle. “You and your mutt are outnumbered, boy. I could have my men paint these walls with your family before you manage to draw blood.”
“Then you better be ready to see hell from the inside,” Kirin said, calm as a Sunday. “I am sure your heir can run the Vongsawat estate just fine without you. Rakkhan, is it? I have heard he is quite competent.”
Something cold flickered in the Don’s eyes. He opened his mouth, probably to call his bluff, and Kirin let the dagger bite. A thin line of red welled up against steel.
Around them, the Don’s men shifted. One took half a step forward.
“I wouldn't do that if I were you,” Kirin said, not looking away from Vichai. “Unless you want to explain to Khun Chai Rakkhan why his father bled out on my dad’s floor. Your choice.”
A beat.
Two.
The only sound was Sirin’s breathing, too fast, and the drip of blood on marble.
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