Don't Stand By Me (COMPLETE)

INTERLUDE ONE

A few hours ago...

Charles rolled his eyes as he exhaled, blowing the smoke up above his head, watching it spiral and cluster at the ceiling. The room stank of cigars and middle aged men and booze, so much goddamn booze that it made his head spin.

"You could at least pretend to look interested, you know."

"I'm listening, father." Charles said dryly, "Massive drug shipment on the sixth, I know."

His father, Richard, sighed heavily, leaning back in his desk chair and offering his colleagues a shrug and a wan smile in a way that said kids. As if Charles wasn't a grown man with near as many kills under his belt as his father.

"How is Pearl doing, Marcus?" Richard asked, offering the man a fresh cigar.

"She is very excited for their trip to Cabo next week, once Charles here is all settled and ready to go. She hasn't stopped talking about it."

"Ah, Cabo." Richard smirked, "That's where I proposed to his mother, you know."

The men in the room all made various mocking noises towards Charles, who remained slumped in his seat with a scowl on his face. It had never been his idea to marry Pearl - he hated the girl. She was shallow and clingy and so goddamn annoying. She never ever stopped talking. But Marcus and Richard were as close to best friends as mobsters got, and a marriage between their two children? Would be invaluable. It had been their dream ever since Pearl had started her transition when they were thirteen.

They had been close as children, roughhousing and all that usual stuff but then one day Charles blinked and there was a girl in front of him he was to be married to without a choice. He just wanted his friend back, not the selfish brat she had become. They had remained friends with this looming over them until about five years ago, when his father sat him down and told him it was time to think about the future of their dynasty. And that had been that.

He had enjoyed dating her, at first. She was funny and had a lot to say so he could just sit back and observe her without having to put much thought into it. And more than that, she was still his best friend, the person he told everything to and understood him better than anyone else. But as the years passed he just grew...bored. And once it was obvious he was bored, Pearl went crazy, bordering on obsessive. The things he had once loved about her that had drawn him to her became the things that bothered him the most. But he would never be able to break up with her - his father would murder him, as would hers. And deep down he didn't want to lose her; she had been a staple in his life since he had been born. Since he couldn't break up with her, he just had to become...creative. So along came Samantha, then Kara then Luna, then -

You get the picture.

Pearl had managed to find out about each one of them and kick his ass once she did, but it never deterred him. His phone buzzed in his pocket and he pulled it out, glancing at the notifications glaring back at him.

Pearl: babyyyy are u done yet? I'm bored

Miss u

Wanda: you free hot stuff?

Olivia: fancy a repeat x

He smirked, thumb hovering over the screen before landing on Olivia, tapping out a few words and sending it off.

"Charles!" His father snapped, slamming his hand down on the desktop, "Have some manners! We have guests!"

"Sorry." He muttered, sliding his phone back into his pocket and frowning as it buzzed again, "I'm listening."

"I was asking since you clearly have had enough...could you drive Gregory here home?" Richard gave his son a knowing look, "You can take the cadillac."

Charles raised an eyebrow at his father, who simply nodded, unknowingly sealing Gregory's fate. Charles hadn't taken any notice of the other men in the room, bar his father and Marcus, all of them caught up in their own convoluted conversations with their heads up each other's asses. He didn't know what Gregory had done to justify his upcoming murder, but Charles didn't really care. The quicker he got this over with, the quicker he would be on his way to Olivia.

"Don't forget son, be here on the sixth by seven am. We need as much manpower as we can for this shipment."

It was how it had always worked, his father and Marcus, two keys for a double lock. Marcus knew the location of the shipment while his father knew the password and payment for the sellers. The deal could not be complete without the pair of them together. You couldn't trust anyone apparently, even your closest associate of three decades.

"Yes father." Charles nodded, "Marcus."

Marcus tilted his tumbler towards him in goodbye, turning back to Richard and falling back into hushed conversation. Charles took the keys from his father's desk and left the room without glancing towards the man he was meant to 'transport'.

"Oh and Charles?" Richard called as Charles stood in the doorway, "Don't forget to fill the tank."

Charles froze, hand on the door jamb and staring outside. He inhaled deeply and nodded, walking outside.

He would never forget one of his father's codes, especially when it meant he was about to get into the car with a mole.