Payback

Just my Luck

The rest of my shift was thankfully uneventful. I eventually got my strength back and was able to pull off my first ten-hour shift at the restaurant. At exactly 2am I saw Taehyung walk through the door that I had come from earlier with Yoongi. I quickly washed my hands in the bathroom before heading out of the restaurant with Taehyung. On my way back I noticed that the large foyer was empty of all of the women that were there earlier. I only caught a glimpse of a man walking out of one of the rooms on the top floor before I continued down the hallway to the gambling room. I had to hold my breath as I walked through the gambling room because the heavy smoke in the room almost took my breath away.

As soon as I got outside I took a couple deep breaths of the cool city air before I was ushered into the passenger seat of the black car that was parked outside. Taehyung got into the driver's seat and he drove out of the alley. I stayed quiet, knowing now that whenever I open my mouth I cause trouble. I waited to see if Taehyung was going to say anything to me. I didn't have to wait too long.

"The building you work in is one of the few buildings Namjoon's family owns. Yoongi runs that building. Jungkook runs another building a couple of blocks away. That building has a nightclub and lounge, and some uh... sleeping quarters like what you saw at Yoongi's building. Yoongi's building caters more toward an older crowd while Jungkook's place caters more toward younger crowds."

Taehyung drove down a street and pointed to the large building that stood on a street full of other bars and nightclubs. The nightclub had a line of people going out the door. I noticed the sign hanging above the door that read "The Black Rose Club". Next to the nightclub, I saw a door with a sign that read "Dahlia Lounge". The building had three stories, so my guess was that at least one of those floors held the illegal brothel.

"Tomorrow you don't have to clean the house like you did today. You'll only be cleaning that much one a week. Just clean the kitchen after breakfast and then one of us will take you there tomorrow. We're considering having you work in both places on the days that you don't have to clean the entire house."

I nodded as we turned a corner and the building disappeared from my sight. I wondered what kind of work they would make me do there. After what happened a little while ago, I was afraid to do anything else.

A phone rang in the car, and with a press of a button on the steering wheel, Taehyung answered the call. He answered in a foreign language, and the caller also spoke back in the same language. I had no clue what they said, but I glanced over at Taehyung to see a frustrated look on his face. He hung up on the caller and then with a quick sharp turn of the car, we headed down a street away from the house.

"We have to go someplace first. There's been a shooting."

A shooting? I wanted to ask what happened, but I knew better than to ask right now. It's none of my damn business. I just sat in the passenger's seat quietly as Taehyung drove to another part of the city. He pulled up to a run-down building in a more sketchy area than where we were before.

"Come with me. I need to keep my eyes on you, but don't say anything. Got it?" Taehyung said as he turned off the car and opened the door. I got out of the car and followed Taehyung to the door. There were no police cars despite the fact that a shooting had taken place.

Taehyung knocked on the door and a few seconds later a man yelled something from the other side of the door. Taehyung yelled back in the foreign language and a second later the door opened. I quickly followed him in, hearing a few words being exchanged in the foreign language. Taehyung and I were led to a large room in the back of the building where the shooting took place. There were stacks of packages wrapped in plastic piled into large crates that lined the walls of the room. Drugs.

But that's not what caught my attention. About half a dozen men lay on the concrete floor covered in a pool of their own blood. I gasped at the sight and covered my mouth to keep myself from letting out any other noises. A man with bleached blonde hair that was combed to the side approached us. He wore a pair of black jeans and a white tank top that was smeared with blood. He looked angry, and I could tell that he had been crying.

"Jackson." Taehyung said as he approached the blonde-haired man.

"Tae." He said in a raspy voice. He held out his hand and the two of them shook hands.

Jackson looked at me and then back at Taehyung with a curious expression.

"She's the one I told you about." Taehyung whispered, but I could still hear him.

Jackson nodded and then turned toward where the bodies were. "Sorry this happened. They forced one of our own to let them in. They stole a crate of drugs in the process. Three are wounded, and six are dead. That doesn't include the guys that came to steal the drugs. We got two of them and we're holding one of them hostage."

Taehyung sighed and patted Jackson on the back. "I'll make some calls. You did good, Jackson. Take the hostage to the hospital. They'll know what to do."

Jackson bowed slightly to Taehyung before looking back at me and then turning to walk back to where he came from.

Taehyung took out his phone and he made a few calls. While he did that, I stood just a few feet from one of the dead bodies. It was hard for me to take my eyes off of the sight of a dead body lying right there in front of me. It's such a shock for me, I didn't know what to do. Taehyung's voice calling out my name snapped me out of my thoughts. Jackson was standing next to him.

"Follow Jackson to the car. I'll be out in a few."

I nodded and followed Jackson out of the room full of bodies. Once we got to the car he opened the car door for me and I got into the back seat. He got in on the other side and locked the doors once he closed the door.

"Does this happen a lot?" I asked in a quiet voice. I couldn't hold back my words. I needed to say something.

Jackson nodded. "There are competing gangs in the area trying to bring down Namjoon's family. The sellers are usually the ones that get killed, but it's never as bad as this. This is an act of war."

Jackson's voice sounded dark and angry.

"I don't know anything about the underground world, but why are you taking the guy to a hospital?" I asked. "Won't they call the police or something?"

Jackson looked down at his hands that had dried blood on them. "It's not a regular hospital. It's an underground hospital." He explained. "We have real doctors and nurses that take care of our wounded so that we don't have to risk going to a real hospital. We also have sadistic doctors that specialize in torture. If we need information out of someone we take them there. It's gruesome, but it helps us get the information we need to stay on top of the other gangs trying to bring us down."

The thought of being tortured by a doctor made me shudder. Those doctors were probably kicked out of medical school or fired from hospitals because of their sadism, but in the underground world, their skills are valued. I hated hospitals, to begin with, so being in an underground hospital made me cringe even more.

"Sorry I asked." I murmured to myself rather than to Jackson.

I heard Jackson let out a wry chuckle. "You're still new. These things won't bother you a few weeks from now."

I shrugged. I don't want to get used to it. I wanted out.

Taehyung came back a few moments later and opened the door to the driver's side after Jackson unlocked the doors. Taehyung followed a large white van down a few streets until we reached what looked like an old grocery store. It looks run-down and abandoned on the outside, but as we pulled around the back of the building I saw a group of nurses waiting on a loading dock with a gurney.

The car stopped and Jackson got out of the car. I heard him thank Taehyung before he walked over to where the nurses waited. I didn't get a chance to see what happened next as Taehyung began driving away.

"We have to come back here tomorrow. Consider it another part of the tour." Taehyung said as we got back onto the road.

"Shit." I murmured. "Just my luck."