Chapter 8

OLIVIA

“Do you wanna talk about it?”

“Jules, I’m fine.”

“You’ve been signing contracts day in day out with no rest and without grieving.”

“Grieving won’t bring anyone back.”

My baby’s gone. There’s no coming back after that.

“But managing all this will bring everyone back?”

My best friend doesn’t get a word out of me because my office door squeaks open and the ever-slick William Sterling walks inside.

“We’ll talk later, Jules.”

She huffs, throws an assuring smile my way before she walks to the door and exits my office.

I’ve been in my new office, Montefalco industries picking up where my grandfather left off. Truth of the matter is, I don’t understand anything nor do I know how to handle thousands of employees all waiting for my direction on how to take the company forward.

William settles in one of the seats throwing a blue file on my desk.

I take it and open it.

I know what it is.

After all I didn’t visit Ryat Winchester in his glass mansion for nothing.

I warned the bastard. I told him I would take him down and he took the bait.

“Ryat’s assistant sent the contract this morning. He wants an alliance between his company and yours. Not that Montefalco needs anyone’s help but this could be good, for you and taking down the Winchesters. With their company close, you can learn the in and the out, their weaknesses, destroy them from the inside.”

I look at the file then I cross my hands together my eyes back on the pretentious chatty lawyer.

“You hate the Winchesters. I hate them too and I have a lot of reasons to do so but what are your reasons, William?”

“Gisell Winchester and her sons nearly ruined my career. That’s enough reason to want to end them.”

There’s more but I don’t question him.

“You have tried to destroy them too, haven’t you? And judging from where I’m seated you failed miserably because either you had less power or those sons of a gun are unbeatable. Who did you try to ask for help when you were trying to destroy the Winchesters, William?”

He smiles, his watch glinting in the sunlight before he wriggles in his seat, “None of them were ready to help me. Why do you want to know, ma’am?”

“The enemy of my enemy is my friend. Why were they not ready to help you?”

“One of them was a spoilt rich princess, she had a vendetta against one of the Winchester brothers, Sinnett Winchester, but she didn’t want to get her hands dirty with vengeance.

The second guy I asked for help…well he’s a psychopath and he didn’t have time to hear me out.”

“This psychopath. How much power does he have? How far does his hate go? What would he be willing to do to the Winchesters if I approached him with my plan?”

“Ma’am, if you think Ryat Winchester is a monster, then this guy makes Ryat look like a saint. He either listens to your plan or he kills you right there. There’s no in between.”

I could work with someone like that.

I’ve killed someone too and I’m not above doing it again.

“What’s his name? I can take care of myself, William. What. Is. His. Name?”

“Drako. Drako Torrance.

First man in Manhattan to become CEO at the age of eighteen. Vicious, ruthless, rumored to have ties with the mafia. The guy works alone and it’s hard to get an audience with him. He hates the Winchesters too, no idea why. All I know is, he works alone and he’s the last person you should work with.”

CEO? That’s better.

That means he can also help me in figuring out part of this business world I haven’t figured out yet.

“Take me to him.”

“Miss Olivia with all due respect Drako Torrance isn’t a man you can work with. I don’t think the concept of teamwork exists in his brain either.”

“He managed to get a CEO position when he was eighteen? That sounds like the kind of man I would want to help me out.”

“He got the position because his father died. His father died right in front of him, they say poison killed him but you know what I think? I think Drako poisoned his father.”

“Take me to him or I find him myself.”

William shakes his head with frustration but that doesn’t mean he won’t take me.

I sign his paychecks from now on. The man will bark if I so much as tell him to.

Half an hour later, my driver stops at on old dilapidated building that looks like it hasn’t been occupied for decades.

“He’s in there?” I ask, clutching my Louis Vuitton handbag.

William nods.

The bodyguard behind me who’s charged to protect me at all times steps forward but I give him a reassuring smile telling him to stay.

William is a wimp; he wouldn’t protect me if things went wrong which is why I’m carrying a gun in my purse and I’ve been training on how to use it.

Locking my arm with William’s, we walk into the building filled with darkness in the middle of day, looking like it also hasn’t been occupied for centuries.

We take the elevator down.

I’m so on guard asking myself why we are walking inside an empty building to even question why there’s only one elevator and on top of that it’s working like it’s brand new.

“You should be prepared. Drako, like I said is a mad man. He thinks differently than the rest. He gets thrilled in seeing people squirm under him. I told you he wouldn’t help me.

What I failed to add is I walked out with a broken jaw from my meeting with him.”

“This Drako Torrance, hit you?” I ask.

“It’s the only way I could get close to talk to him.”

William’s cryptic words sound like a distant echo once the elevator doors open and the noise from the other side of the room assaults our ears.

I expected a lot. Maybe something terrifying but this… this can only be described by chaos.

We are in an underground fighting ring.

The main ring where two fighters are fighting almost to their deaths is surrounded by a cage as men shout and raise their beers like lunatics chanting for someone to get killed.

“Drako Torrance owns all of these?” I shout asking William.

“No. He’s merely the-.”

“AND WE HAVE A WINNER! Our reigning champion keeps his title as the one, the only, the magnanimous Drako!! Now as always and as your amiable host, if there’s anyone with the guts to fight our brute of a champion come on down, pursue your opportunity.

After all America was built on pursuing opportunity. Do we have anyone in the crowd willing to take the champ on? Anyone? Come on lads, don’t be wussies”, the host jibes from his microphone and the men and women alike go wild with laughter.

Sweat, alcohol, the stench of testosterone wild in the air, I turn to William for answers.

“He fights here and he carries his appointments here too. The only way you talk to him is get in that cage and fight him.”

“What?”

I can’t even see the guy due to how loud people are jumping up and down cheering him on and I’m supposed to fight him?

“I told you this was a bad idea. There are other ways to get back on-.”

“I’ll fight him”, I state looking at the cage that acts as a fighting ring.

“That’s suicide for you.”

“You didn’t die when you confronted him so I’m pretty sure I won’t die too, William.”

“I admitted defeat before he could maul me to death”, William exhales rubbing his forehead stressfully.

“And I’ll do the same once I’m done talking to him.”

“Ma’am, please-.”

By the time William tries to put reason in my head, I make my way past the throngs of people my hand in mid-air as I shout, ‘I’ll fight him’.

The spotlight lands on me a few seconds later and the host shouts in his mic,”It seems we have a challenger.

Now I would be worried if a pretty woman like her wanted to get in a ring with a champ but since we don’t have any rules let the damsel fight the brute. It’s good entertainment! Come on gents, help the gal get inside the ring.”

I don’t know how I get close to the ring.

I don’t even know how I’m surrounded by two men who look concerned for me.

“Do you want boxing gloves? Or new clothes before you start the fight?” one of them asks.

I’m in a summer dress and pumps coupled by a louis Vuitton bag. I’m literally not dressed for this.

“Can I go in with my bag?” I ask sweetly.

The other man scoffs, “As if a thousand-dollar bag will save you from losing a few teeth.”

The door to the cage lifts and I’m pushed inside before the door is closed again.

The first thing I see is blood on the floor.

The second thing I see is the six feet two man at the other side of the ring with dark hair covering his forehead, his chest and sculptured abs riddled with sweat and his knuckled fists hungering for more blood than the one staining the bandages on said fists.

“This isn’t the place for you, sugar tits”, Drako Torrance growls then he starts moving.

My hands get in my purse fast and I take out my gun pointing it at him.

“I need your help, Mr. Torrance.”