He smirks darkly before he nods at my face, which is still covered by my mask.
“You know, I do know a thing or two about masked vigilantism myself, Kratos.”
Yes. Yes, he does. I’ve looked into Lukas. His “methods”. His savagery. His complete lack of mercy when it comes to the type of men I just killed. Really, you could call me an admirer of his work. A student of it. He might know this.
I might not care if he does.
“Look, Kratos, what you’re doing is admirable. You know I have nothing bad to say about anything you do that aligns with our own mission. But we’ve got resources, man. Sure, I used to do it solo, too. But we’ve got a whole organization now. Teams that can help.”
I know where this is going. It goes here every single time he and I cross paths.
He wants me to come work for the Free Them Foundation. Not sitting behind a desk and attending board meetings, either.
He wants me to be a hunter for them.
It’s not that I have anything against Lukas, or Lizbet, or their organization. Not at all. But that’s just not me.
“Why don’t I save you the breath,” I growl quietly.
“Kratos—”
“I don’t do team sports, Lukas,” I shrug. “Sorry.”
Behind him, I catch a glimpse of some of his people putting up some temporary cloth backdrops. Past them, a beautiful and powerful-looking woman who I know is his wife, Lizbet, smiles warmly and cautiously as she slowly approaches the now-unlocked cage full of terrified girls.
I don’t like calling what I did tonight “rescuing” anyone. I merely curb-stomped evil. Besides, it’s hard to sell it as a selfless act when it was at least half about calming my beast.
It’s Lukas, Lizbet, and their organization who’ll do the “saving” tonight. They’ll remove the girls from here, and either find their original homes or make sure they get good, loving new ones. They’ll also take care of the therapy and the healing these girls will need.
I’m not the savior. Just the weapon.
Lukas exhales slowly. “The darkness catches up to you, Kratos. The darkness is the house. And you know as well as I do that the house always wins.” His eyes lock with mine. “You have to know when it’s time to take your chips and go home.”
I stay silent. Because the thing is, the darkness is home to me. This is where I breathe. Where I live. Where I feel alive.
Lukas shakes his head. “Okay, I’m done pitching you.”
“Sure, for now,” I growl.
He smiles quietly. “Yes.” He turns to nod his chin at the bodies. “Let me guess, former Carveli soldiers?”
I nod.
With the Carveli family now leaderless and in shambles, the whole organization is slowly breaking apart. And as that happens, there’s been more and more foulness concerning that family emerging from the shadows. Foulness like this shit.
The five major Italian mafia families in the States have a sort of “United Nations”-style agreement between them. Not a treaty or anything—more like a code of conduct that allows all ships to rise with the tide without infighting and bickering.
One of the hard and fast rules they set up was a ban on prostitution and trafficking. Say what you will about the Italian Mob, at least they don’t pimp girls anymore.
Or rather, they’re not supposed to.
Except it turns out there were a few little groups of people within the Carveli family who were. And I’m damned sure Massimo Carveli himself was getting kickbacks from it. Now that the whole organization is shattering into little fiefdoms, some of those groups are trying to make a go of it on their own. Groups like these dead assholes, or the two fucks I killed the other night.
The ones who tried to attack her.
I’ll be watching you, prinkípissa.
It wasn’t a threat.
It was a promise. And I never, ever break a promise.
I clear my throat and nod at Lukas. “Yep.”
“Same as the two assholes who got their throats cut way out in Brooklyn the other night?
I raise an eyebrow at him. He arches one back.
“Not like I don’t recognize your handiwork at this point, Kratos.”
I sniff. “I’m sure I have no idea what you’re referring to.”
He shakes his head, looking away. “Look, I know you’ve got this whole lone wolf thing going on. But if you ever change your mind—”
“Something you might not know about me, Lukas,” I growl, “is that I’m a stubborn bastard. The day I change my mind, you can go ahead and bring ice skates to hell.”
He nods, a small smirk on his lips.
“Your people got this from here?”
