Partners in crime

I.

The only light in the room was emitted by a small laptop, constantly raided by moths. The quiet rustle of their silky wings made Hester's blood boil, but she watched them patiently, just like a cat waiting for its prey to make a move. When the right time came, she abruptly closed the laptop, crushing all of the bothersome bugs, pleased by how effectively she got rid of the vermin.

Her quiet moment of amusement was soon interrupted by loud knocking. A loud sigh escaped her mouth before she called out: "What is it?"

"The saboteur started talking." It was Arachne, one of Hester's most trusted capos, specialising in weapon trafficking. However good she was in hiding gun parts in tyres and avoiding controls, she still didn't understand people the same way that she understood steel and gunpowder. Maybe that was one of the reasons she couldn't find out that one of her people was doing everything in his power to impair their stocks until he blew one of their storage cabinets up.

"That isn't too surprising, hungry dogs are never loyal. Did he say anything interesting?"

"We didn't start the real interrogation yet. I thought you'd want to be present."

"No need to. Call Bea if necessary and let me know if he says something of value."

Arachne opened her mouth to disagree, but soon realised that she was on thin ice already. Hester still made sure to reproach her for the spying accident anytime she's got the chance and Arachne could be considered lucky to haven't been punished in any way.

As she was about to leave, Hester said: "Wait." She was not the kind of woman to sit back and do nothing and currently, there wasn't anything that required her attention. Old habits die slowly and having spare time filled her with a feeling of dread. She hoped a bit of bloodshed would make her day better.

They walked towards one of the rooms, originally used for storage, now serving multiple purposes, one of them holding prisoners until their loyalties began to shift. The imprisoned man bled down onto the dirty floor, beaten up, his face twisting into a grimace. He kept wailing and begging, but his captors stared at him mercilessly, not doing anything to hurt or help him, until Hester arrived. Upon seeing her, the man tried to back away. She was terrifying, not only with her threatening appearance, consisting of piercings, tattoos, scars and entirely black wardrobe, her eyes looked like they didn't belong in this world, full of flames of well-hidden anger.

"You're going to answer some questions now, Smokey." Her voice, reminding him of a low growl, was oddly casual, as if this all was just another evening for her. "Who do you work for? Don't even bother talking out of your neck, I can see right through you."

"I'm not telling ya anything. I'm a dead man anyways, ain't I?"

She let out a small groan and her voice hardened. "Let's say it like this. You've got yourself a really nice, pretty wife, though I have no idea what she sees in a guy like you. Let's imagine you tell us nothing. What are we going to do? That's right, have a little talk with her. And you know how our talks usually end, don't you? Or perhaps we could ask your lovely daughter. Little Amelie's going to be seven soon, sure she overheard some of her daddy's dirty secrets."

His face whitened as he tried to swallow the lump forming in his throat. "H-how did y-"

"I know many things, Michael Simmons."

He wanted to argue, try to conceal his and his family's identity, but the words didn't seem to escape his throat. He gave up. "Nevermore. They sent me."

"And why exactly did they do that?"

"I-I don't know, they didn't tell me anything, I have n-no idea, I just needed the money, please, leave my family alone, that's all I can think of," he blurted out, his tongue blurring the words together and stuttering.