Blood And Loyalty

5: Coat Of Many Colors

Scarlet’s POV.

The air was damp with a faint tang of piss and gasoline, but I barely noticed. My focus was on the four cocky idiots strutting up the street like they owned it, oblivious to the fact they were about to get a lesson in ownership. This wasn’t their block. This was Black Lotus territory.

The one in the red cap caught my eye first, his swagger a cheap knock-off of confidence. He’d get it the worst. Had to make an example tonight; too many little nobodies out here trying to push trash drugs without our say-so. My fists clenched in my gloves, the steel inside itching to break something.

I glanced at my crew. Jin was already to my left, gripping the baseball bat he loved too much, the barbed wire wrapped tight around the barrel. Behind me, Kiera had a blade glinting in the streetlight, her grin wide, feral.

Nik was on point with the shotgun slung over his shoulder, calm as ever. That’s what made us dangerous—we weren’t just a gang. We were a crew, a family. We moved together, bled together, handled s**t together. And tonight, I was leading the charge. Courtesy of my Father.

The thugs finally noticed us. Red Cap’s steps faltered, his cocky grin slipping into something nervous. “Yo, who the hell are—”

I didn’t wait for him to finish. A mistake on my part would’ve been listening to whatever excuse he thought could save him. My feet moved before his sentence could. I lunged, closing the space in a breath, my fist slamming into his jaw. The crunch of bone was satisfying. He crumpled like a cheap paper bag, groaning as his gold teeth scattered onto the wet asphalt.

“Didn’t ask for your name,” I muttered, stepping over him and locking eyes with the next fool still standing.

“You—you don’t have to—” he stammered, his hands raised like that’d make me stop.

“You’re right,” I interrupted, grinning as Kiera slipped past me and kicked him in the stomach hard enough to send him sprawling.

Chaos broke out in a flash after that. Jin’s bat whistled through the air, landing with a sickening thud on another guy’s ribs. A gun went off somewhere—I didn’t flinch. Nik was taking care of business with his usual quiet efficiency.

As if the heavens were on our side, it began raining as lightning struck at every corner, giving off a dark aura that made us appear even more dangerous than we already are.

Me? I grabbed the last thug still upright by the collar and slammed him against the wall, his head bouncing off the bricks.

“Who gave you the green light to push on our block?” I hissed, my breath hot against his face. He stank of cheap vodka and regret.

“N-no one!” he stammered. “I swear—”

A sharp right to his stomach shut him up. His knees buckled, and I let him fall, standing over him like a shadow of death. “Start talking, or the next thing hitting the floor will be your teeth. Understand?”

Tonight wasn’t about casualties. It was about control. But with the wrong answer, bodies were always an option.

The punk was gasping like a fish on dry land, clutching his stomach as he wheezed out weak little whimpers. I crouched down, grabbing his chin and yanking his face up to meet mine. He tried to look away, but I wasn’t in the mood for games.

“I’m running out of patience,” I hissed, my fingers digging into his jaw. “You don’t get to die quick unless you start talking. Who gave you the product?”

“I…I can’t,” he stuttered, his voice cracking. His eyes darted to his buddies—one of them already out cold on the ground, another groaning while Kiera toyed with her knife over his face like she was deciding where to start. Jin wasn’t as subtle. His bat thudded against the last guy’s ribs again, drawing a sharp scream.

“You sure about that?” I growled. “Because I’ve got three people here who’d love to convince you otherwise.”

The guy started shaking, his lips trembling as he mumbled something. I leaned closer. “What was that?”

“L-Lopez,” he gasped out finally. “The Lopez brothers!”

I froze for half a second, my grip tightening on his face. The Lopez brothers? They’d been circling the edges of the city for months now, dealing their dirty little concoctions like they were untouchable.

Rumor was they were cooking up some kind of super-charged stimulant—pure adrenaline bottled in powder form, addictive as hell and lethal in the wrong hands. And now they were using our block to distribute?

“You’re telling me they sold you that trash?” I asked, my voice low and dangerous.

He nodded rapidly, tears starting to leak from his eyes. “Yeah, yeah—they said Black Lotus wasn’t running this side anymore! Said we could push here if we moved their product instead!”

I laughed, short and cold, letting go of his face so he slumped back to the ground. “They told you that, huh? And you were stupid enough to believe it.”

I stood up, turning my back on him as my brain started firing on all cylinders. The Lopez brothers didn’t just challenge us—they crossed a damn line. Stealing territory, fine. Everyone tried that once. But lying about our presence? Using our streets like we’d already been erased?

Nik came up beside me, shotgun in hand. “What do you want to do with them?” he asked, nodding toward the groaning mess of bodies at our feet.

I glanced back at Red Cap and his crew. “Leave them,” I said, my tone clipped. “They’re walking warning signs now. Word will spread faster if their busted faces are seen limping out of here alive.”

“And the brothers?” Nik pressed, his voice calm but his grip tightening on the shotgun.

I let the question hang in the air for a second, the faint whimpering of the thugs filling the silence.

“The Lopez brothers can’t be doing this without any backup. They must be working with someone, gangsters—ones with power.” I said, my lips curling into a grin. “Let’s see if the Lopez brothers want to explain themselves to my face.”

“So what say you, Scarlet?” Kiera grinned, standing up from the body that was now unrecognizable.

“We hunt. We hunt them all.” I walk away in my black coat, into the dark night.