Motown Showdown

Copyright © 2015 K.S. ADKINS

Published by K.S. Adkins

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form, including electronic or mechanical, without written permission from the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

This book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This book may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person you share it with. If you are reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then you should return it to the seller and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the author’s work.

Published: K.S. Adkins 2015

Other works by K.S. Adkins:

The Detroit After Dark Series: Available now!

Brutal

Brawler

Berserk

Ballistic

8 Mile & Rion

Convincing Bet

Motown Throwdown (Motown Down #1)

Kill a man, and you are an assassin. Kill millions of men, and you are a conqueror. Kill everyone, and you are a god. ~Beilby Porteus

The couple moaning one stool over didn’t bother me. In fact, I was enjoying watching them make out (and believe me I
was
watching) wishing I had someone to exchange saliva with. The intoxicated chica threw back vodka sodas like she was going to wake up dead tomorrow.
If she only knew death was waiting…PS, I’m death
. The older gentleman giving her a tongue bath loved his Guiness, laundering money and her fake tits. Yuk.

I envied these two, truly. In a crowded bar, they said the hell with it and got down to business. To forget your surroundings, any looming responsibilities and let your pheromones rule sounded heavenly to me. Sadly, I didn’t have those luxuries and in about oh, five minutes neither would she.

She was a job, nothing more. They all were. A job. Remember I said that.

Breaking the kiss to take a piss, she gives him a saucy smile and makes her way to the bathroom. Exiting my stool, I follow silently entering the bathroom behind her. As soon as she closes the stall, she makes a phone call to who I assume was her husband. Personally, I didn’t really give a shit and seriously hoped she wasn’t planning on taking one because my stomach wouldn’t tolerate it. Checking my watch, I wait for her to flush, tighten the suppressor on the end of my 9mm before climbing up on the toilet and balancing on the toilet paper dispenser.
Short girl problems
…Raising my right arm up and over, I take aim and fire one round directly into the top of her head.

Quick. Painless. Efficient.

Quietly she sunk to the floor and sprawled out peacefully. Careful not slip and get my boots wet (been there), I exit the bathroom and the bar through the back like a phantom knowing, I won’t be remembered. Confirming the kill via text (because smartphones are an assassin’s best friend) I haul ass to where
he
is.

His call name is Gadget, and he’s my purpose.

Okay fine, he’s the guy I’ve been in love with since I saved his tight ass six years ago, but whatever. If you asked him, I was a nuisance, a pest and a royal pain in his tight ass. Personally, I don’t dispute any of those claims but nothing short of death would stop me from protecting him. Gadget has my heart and doesn’t even know it. I mean how could he? Considering we’ve never actually met in person.

In my line of work, hitters stay out of each other’s way for a reason. Rub us wrong, piss in our territory and we will straight kill you (We’re assholes like that). The way this works is, in essence, hitters are independent contractors but are ‘handled’ by another. We call this person a ‘handler’. All that meant was a job came in, he would field it for you, get you the intel and pay you when it was finished. Over the years though, hitters didn’t like having handlers, did not appreciate getting handled, it took two hitters getting cocky that changed the game. In this business, we cannot afford rogue activity. So in an effort to control the situation, I created the wire. In a nutshell, an online network for hitters and their handlers to communicate.

Once the kinks were ironed out, and they saw the benefits of listening to their handlers, the wire became a hitter’s hotspot. So when word came down that a handler wanted his own teammate terminated, the wire went electric. None of the members knew what to think. If a handler could order a mark on his own guy, none of us was safe. This order caused a splinter effect. Who would break away and take the hit? Would hitters team up? Who could be trusted? We have few rules in the game, but the biggest was, you don’t kill your own.

So my next mark wasn’t a mark at all, it was saving Gadget’s life from his own handler, call name Pilgrim.

Hitters make good money, or most of us wouldn’t even consider being a part of something like this. But when big money’s involved there are always a few that will. My handler wanted Gadget killing for our side. I wanted him killing
by
my side.
For as long as we both shall live…

You should have died when I killed you. ~John LeCarre

The woman was a force to be reckoned with, always has been.

Her call name was Camo and every hitter,
if
he was worth a shit, has heard of her. In this business not fearing her would be a mistake you only made once. Because if you were her target, you were already dead.

Six years ago, my partner and I got in on the game. Both of us wanted to make a difference, each of us had different reasons why. Pilgrim, my partner, was injured in an op overseas. While his head was in the game, his body wouldn’t allow him to be a player. I met the guy when I was getting out of college and him the military. We got to talking at the bar, one thing led to another, and we found ourselves looking for an investor. We found one, linked up with others in the game and shit took off. Pilgrim was the brains; I was the hired gun. We found out fast that word spreads. Our results spoke for us. We both agreed that hits weren’t enough so through our investor we expanded our reach. Services offered ranged from missing children, abducted women and even PI work. If it paid well and we believed in it, we took it. Money wasn’t an issue for us; we weren’t cheap and overhead was low.

However, to stay alive in this business you trusted your partner with your life.

I couldn’t prove it, but I had a feeling mine was trying to get me killed.

Shit isn’t adding up. Actually, for the last few months it really hasn’t been but I’ve had jobs to complete leaving me no time to approach him or investigate. Pilgrim was sending me out on jobs that were not our usual. Another problem was I hated computers and did not possess the patience to sit behind one. Then she showed up while worry for my sister and doubting my partner divided my attention. When Camo is near I lose focus because my focus is
her
. But she’s been on my ass for eight days and has yet to approach.

If she wanted to kill me she would have, hell she
could
have. Honestly, when she first found me, I assumed it was to kill me. It was no secret I didn’t exactly follow the rules. I played the game my own way, followed my own code. As jobs came in, and she followed to watch from a distance, I realized she wasn’t going to kill me. Instead, we formed a bond that was impossible to explain. The two of us shared a link, we both felt it, knew it existed, neither could explain it. This sparked our unconventional relationship. In reality, it’s not really a relationship at all, more like a bear watching over her cub. No man wants to be the cub in a relationship but I was, and Camo was a mean momma bear. Since the day she saved my ass I’ve been hooked on her and I didn’t even know what she looked like.

She was the best in the business, the hitter each of us aspired to be and from day one she’s looked out for me. Why? No fucking idea, she just did. She’s even killed for me and again, I didn’t know why. Hitters are competitive, loners and out of necessity, paranoid. But Camo wasn’t like us, she was…
more
.

Because of our nature, hitters give each other a wide berth.

Face it, to kill people for pay there is something wrong with you. We all know it and stay out of each other’s way because of it. Although her identity has always been a mystery no one can solve, I have the ability to sense her. When she’s close by I feel the buzz in my veins, recognize our connection, and I love it as much as I hate it. Where I had the ability to get lost in the shadows, she had the ability to blend into her environment.

Hence the name,
Camo
.

Every hitter has a way, a unique style and hers; I was never able to get a lock on. Word on the wire (when I used it and seldom did) was Camo had been a hunter since she was a kid. If that was to be believed, then she was taking jobs while breaking in a training bra.

If I was keen on listening to bullshit (which I wasn’t), I would not have bought into her first kill(s) being at the ripe old age of thirteen. A thirteen-year-old girl liked makeup, boy bands, and gossip. Okay fuck, that’s not exactly true either because my sister was never into any of that shit. But no matter how hard I tried, I could not picture a pubescent girl taking human life.
You’ve seen her work, you know what she’s capable of
… Yeah, and denial wasn’t just a river in Egypt.