Chapter Three

THE DUCHESS

“Duchess,” Blaze’s voice appeared behind me again.

I turned on my bar stool, an unimpressed look on my face as I met Blaze’s eyes.

“This is Speed, my second, and Blow, my third.”

“Speed and Blow,” I chuckled. “Not sure I want to know where those names came from. Hopefully it’s nice to meet you both.” I motioned towards Karma. “This is Karma, my second.” She gave her best overly-cute smile. The one that if you knew her and what she’s capable of, made her seem even more psychotic than normal.

“Now, as I said to your boss, none of you carry weapons on my premises if you don’t want to die, got it?”

They all nodded quickly.

“Good. Enjoy the party.” 

I watched them all turn and walk away, heading for an empty booth in the corner. Karma passed me a joint whilst I watched them intently. “I don’t like this, Karma. Something stinks.”

“I agree, boss.”

“I need them watched closely. We’ll get a handful of newbies on it. Pick whoever flirts well.”

Karma nodded. 

“Once that’s done, Karma, enjoy yourself. Have some fun. But please remember, my room is next door to yours.”

“Could say the same to you, boss!” she smirked as she turned to walk away, lighting her own joint as she went. We did grow bloody good weed.

BLAZE

The Duchess had always been a bit of an enigma.

I knew she worked closely with my brother before he was killed. They had a good working relationship and supported each other’s trades.

Personally, I could never see why he chose to work with her. The Valkyrie was a small outfit with only a handful of patched members, I easily had four times their numbers. They were a small fish in a very big pond.

I hated needing to buy guns from the Valkyrie… but needs must. I’d lost an entire shipment of cocaine, so I was down a lot of money. Recent problems meant I didn’t have the firepower to deal with this sort of shitshow.

The Duchess, on the other hand… well. She bought and moved guns from the Russians, who happen to be very good at what they do. Between them all, we happen to know they move quite a lot of weapons with a lot of profit.

Me having to borrow the money would only increase her bottom line too.

“She’s the Duchess, boss?” Speed asked.

I nodded, still watching where she and Karma stood.

“She looks so… harmless?”

I snorted. “I wouldn’t say that where she can hear you, Speed. Not if you like your head being attached to your body.”

“There’s no way the Valkyrie can be that much of a threat, boss,” he continued.

“They’re a small fish trying to play in a very big pond, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t dangerous.”

At that, I noticed Karma’s eyes on me, her face tense. It was a calculating scowl that sent shivers down my spine. 

“What did you find out about Karma before we came, Blow?” I asked him, tearing my eyes away from Karma.

“She’s  the Duchess’ second in command, and I heard she does all the Duchess’ dirty work.”

I snorted. “No way is Karma her Sergeant at Arms.”

“Can only give you what we’ve heard, boss.”

My phone rang, and I stepped outside to answer it. He was the boss of the London charter of the Henchmen. “Blaze, how are you doing, mate?”

Rogue’s voice was low, growling, like he’d smoked fifty a day for life. Of course, he pretty much had.

“Rogue, good to hear from you.”

“I hear you’re having some trouble?”

“Nothing I can’t handle.”

“Sure. Is that why you’re working with the Valkyrie?”

I snorted. “I’m just buying weapons from them.”

“Weapons that you can’t pay for, Blaze.”

“What’s the Duchess going to do about that? Have you met them? It’s a tiny outfit, I don’t know why my brother ever bothered.”

Rogue laughed, and hard. “Blaze… where do you think I get my guns from? Trust me, the Valkyrie are dangerous. The Duchess is incredibly good at what she does, and her second is… well. I lost five guys to Karma years ago before the Duchess and I hashed out a treaty. Fuck her over, and she’ll take over your little club. I’ve seen her do it before.”

“She doesn’t have the manpower to do that.”

“If that’s what you believe, Blaze, you’ll come to regret that. There’s a reason I have a very conclusive peace treaty with her.”

I heard footsteps behind me, and turned to see the Duchess standing behind me, a gun in her hand and a very pissed off look on her face. Karma was behind her with a gun against Speed’s head.

“Well, Blaze. You should really watch who you hire more. Blow was far too easy to get to.” She tilted her head to one side. “If you know what’s good for you, you’ll follow me and not put up a fight. Put up a fight, and a bullet is going in Speed’s head.”

Rogue was shouting down the phone, “what the fuck have you done, Blaze? I have a treaty with her, if you’ve done something stupid, I cannot bail you out.”

I didn’t reply and just scowled at the Duchess, before swearing under my breath when I noticed the blood splatters on Karma’s clothes. Speed looked fine, so that must have been Blow’s blood.

“Is that Rogue you’re talking to?” she asked, holding out her hand for the phone. I handed it over when I felt a gun pressed into the back of my head.

“Rogue, it’s been too long,” she said once she had the phone.

I couldn’t hear what he was saying in response, but I’m sure it wasn’t good for me.

“Don’t worry, Rogue. I won’t hold Blaze’s fuck ups against you, our treaty still stands.”

More muffled conversation.

“Yeah, of course. I’ll get Fishnet to get hold of you tomorrow to set it up. Get us a list and we’ll go from there.”

A brief moment of silence…

“How much faster?” Rogue apparently wanted his guns in a hurry. “Plus ten percent and it’s done.”

“Thanks, Rogue. It’s good doing business with you as always.”

She hung up the call, slipping my phone into her back pocket.

“Come along then, Blaze. Let’s go reunite you with Blow.”

KARMA

Beating the crap out of a guy wasn’t how I wanted my Friday night to go, but hey, what can you do?

Blow wasn’t difficult to break. The newbies found out that Blaze was having financial trouble and not likely to be able to pay up whilst just flirting with the guy over a game of pool, and from there, a few well placed kicks and punches from yours truly, and we were golden. We had Blaze hook, line and sinker.

It might not have been my plan for the night, but now I was kinda hoping the Duchess would let me kick Blaze around a bit… because fuck me, the guy is an ass.

She didn’t let me. Instead, she insisted on leaving the three of them locked up in cells in the basement to stew until tomorrow. By the time that was all done, two hours had passed since I'd beaten up Blow.

“Don’t worry, Karma,” she said, voice jubilant. “You can kick his ass tomorrow, which means tonight, you can still go enjoy the party.”

That was true…