Wild Side (Dark Side Series: Book 2)

Interlude I:

Dark nights in dark neighborhoods were all the same. That is to say, they were quiet, always quiet, except for stray bursts of action when a soul was deemed out of line and, often, out of time. Tonight's featured wheelhouse of mischief and tragedy, the grand city of whatever in the state with a dumbshit nickname, was no different. It was warmer than those chilled back alley shadows of the northern states his bride mistakenly called home, but the air was still filled with the leaden volume of silence, and the city lights still flickered now and then and the bugs pinged stupidly off the hot glass here as they did everywhere. 

Hammy paws jangling a sagging fence, square-headed dogs snapped and barked as a man rattled a stick across their territory's perimeter. He was whistling, soft and light. He was, in that otherwise quiet night in the well-known bad area that every city comes to possess given enough criminally-inclined minds, incredibly noisy. 

He was a predator on patrol, not a hunter, but a surveyor. A man with a unique investment opportunity for just the right type of wrong. 

He paused a few dirt yards beyond the snarling dogs, past yellowed curtains and the occasional face tucked behind. There was a mirror on the side of the road, propped against a green plastic can dragged to the curb for garbage night. Much of the frame was smashed, but there were enough pieces held in spidery black seams for him to stoop and adjust his tie and fix his pinstripe suit sleeves. 

The man straightened only to be flanked by a pair of dark figures.

"Hey," one of them said, bouncing on his heels with as much energy and as sharp of a grin as the dogs. "Give your Uber driver the wrong address?"

His partner, larger, softer on his feet than one might expect from six and a half feet of bearish muscle, nodded beneath a stained hoodie. "Lucky you stumbled on us and not some of the shit on these sidewalks. We can take ya back out somewhere a suit like yours ain't bound to get dirty."

"I believe," the man said slowly, turning with his long hands lifted in facetious surrender. "I believe traveling anywhere with you two gentlemen would be mighty unwise."

"Listen, man," said the first, hands thrust inside his coats pockets as he leaned in. "We ain't causing no trouble. Just getting you out before you get shot."

"Or worse," the muscle agreed, glancing over his shoulder. The dogs had stopped barking. Stranger than that, they were huddled underneath the porch, baleful eyes glaring out at the barren yard. He hadn't seen them huddled like that since the hurricane had thrown the oak tree through the living room roof. 

"Exactly," his companion continued, oblivious to the quieted canines. "We ain't asking for anything, though a charitable donation would be kind of you, sir."

"Gentlemen, I assure you I am quite alright alone in the dark."

"If you could afford an Uber, I'm sure you'd be able to—"

The man in the pinstripe suit frowned. Just a couple of store brand idiots. They weren't right, even if he only needed one of 'em anyway. But they would serve a purpose. So, very slowly, the man in the suit set a hand on his hip, pushed back his coat to reveal a ticking silver watch. "Darius Reginald Archer, you and," here he paused to regard the muscle. "Prince? Not even a last name? Well, not the worst I've collected but not exactly living up to your namesake, are you? Barely three hundred dollars to your name this evening."

"Well, that's not counting you," Prince blustered, reaching for the back of his pants.

Darius, a few steps ahead of his friend mentally, had already taken the first physical step behind the larger man. "You know us?"