Victor: Her Ruthless Crush by Theodora Taylor (beach read book TXT) 📕

After the prayer came a listing of the Boston snakehead’s crimes. It was a short list. Stealing, and therefore serving his triad with the ultimate disrespect.

After that, it was finally time for the part the snakehead had probably been dreading the most while pissing and shitting himself the entire way to Tokyo.

From what Victor had seen, this next bit was even worse than the death that would follow it.

First, Phantom brought out a switchblade, lifted his hand, and cut off the fingers of the snakehead’s right hand.

Quickly and efficiently. The ritual was meant to be a bit of a show (and a warning) for those who weren’t participating. But it was also crucial that everyone perform their part of the betrayer ceremony as quickly as possible. The show would be rather anticlimactic if the betrayer bled out before the ritual was completed.

Still, Phantom was awarded for his efforts with a nice spray of blood across his white suit. So was Han when he stepped forward to cut the fingers off the man’s left hand. Good thing they had duct-taped his mouth. The snakehead’s muffled screams would have been heard for blocks if they had been allowed to come out unfettered.

Now it was his father’s turn.

Raymond stepped forward with a scalpel held tight in one hand. Meanwhile, Phantom grabbed the sobbing snakehead by the back of his neck so that he couldn’t move his head, despite his abject pain.

It was an impressive display of Phantom’s strength. The man was screaming now and thrashing wildly below his neck to escape what came next. But Phantom made sure the guy’s head did not move as Victor's father raised the scalpel and brought it down for one precise slice.

Phantom’s expression barely changed as blood from the man's sliced-off nose sprayed across Raymond’s crisp white suit.

After Victor's father was done, Phantom finally let the snakehead go.

This was no mercy. The severely deformed man thrashed like a dying fish upon the garage’s concrete floor, blooding oozing from his face and hands.

Luckily, he’d been muffled. Otherwise, they wouldn’t have been able to hear Raymond when he turned to the other Red Diamond, waiting in the shadows, and yelled out, “Betrayer!” in Cantonese.

“Betrayer!” they called back in unison as Victor stepped forward with his gun.

Strange, after what happened to him, Victor had wondered if he would feel any reservations before taking part in this first ceremonial transfer of power.

But he raised the gun without a second thought. His was a role finally played out on stage after a lifetime of rehearsal. There were no doubts in his head as he pulled the trigger. Only intent.

He wanted to be the new Red Diamond snakehead for Boston. And this man was the only thing that stood in his way.

So he had to be removed. Simple as that. Victor emptied the gun in him without a moment of hesitation.

And he smiled when the man finally stopped thrashing, his eyes glazed over with the loss of life.

He turned around with the gun raised high, and he was rewarded the other Red Diamond awarded him with a long round of applause.

“Successor!” his father called out. “Successor!” the rest of the Red Diamond called back.

It was done.

There was nothing left to do in the ceremony, save for his father's announcement of him as the new snakehead of Boston. Then first thing tomorrow, he would receive his tattoo, the same as Phantom.

But the clapping abruptly died, and everyone, including his father, turned to look at something in the distance, over Victor’s left shoulder.

Victor lowered his gun arm, and a bad feeling came over him, even before he turned around to look in the same direction.

His heart sank as soon as he saw what the others did.

Phantom was walking back into the garage, his hand wrapped around the arm of a new prisoner.

Dawn. It was Dawn. And from the terrified look on her face, she had seen everything.

“Look who decided to drop by unannounced,” Phantom called out in the silence that greeted their arrival. “Again.”

17

DAWN

I had no intention of witnessing a murder. But there’s a reason that saying “curiosity killed the cat” is a thing, and I found out why that night.

This wasn’t how it was supposed to go. I’d caught a glimpse of Victor and an older guy, rounding the corner of his apartment building as I was approaching it. I recognized the older guy as the one who’d talked to my dad that night at the club, and I figured he must be Victor’s father. He was shorter but had the same broad shoulders and confident way of walking.

When I followed them, it wasn’t with any creeping intention. But I wasn’t sure how much Victor had told the guy who seemed to control his entire life about me. So, I hung back since I no longer had a phone to send Victor a discreet text.

I was still debating about what to do when the super narrow conversion van that the Japanese used pulled into the other side of the open-air garage.

I thought it was a delivery van filled with something his father and Victor would have to carry. I was honest to God, going to ask if they needed my help. That seemed like a nice, low-key way to introduce myself.

But my voice jammed in my throat when instead of a delivery man, Phantom jumped out…and handed Victor a dark object that looked like a gun.

Everything only got worse after that. So much worse.

At first, I wasn’t sure what I was seeing when Phantom pulled a writhing man out of the back of the van.

Then, I just plain didn’t believe what I was seeing when they started slicing him up.

Looking back at it, I think I was half-rooted to the spot in horror, half-hoping that this was a nightmare that I would wake up from any minute.

Either way, I held my breath for Victor’s innocence.

Even after Phantom and Han cut off all