Perfect Evil Read online

  Perfect Evil

  Loki Renard

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Thank you for reading!

  1

  He was prey.

  Why did he look so much like a predator?

  Mark had been staring at the monitor for hours, waiting for this man. It was the first time he had ever laid eyes on Angelo Vitali in anything other than a picture and it was an experience he’d never forget.

  His breath caught in his throat as the powerfully built Sicilian man came down the stone stairs, followed by a younger, slimmer man with jet black hair and an arrogant gaze. They were breathtakingly similar in a way that was difficult to quantify. It wasn’t that they looked the same, but there was a definite familiarity which wasn’t quite physical. It was like seeing one soul in two bodies.

  Mark rubbed his eyes and blinked them several times to break the spell. He wasn’t supposed to be coming up with poetic descriptions of these men. He was supposed to be observing them for any hint of behavior that might give their plans away.

  Angelo Vitali scanned the street like a hawk surveying his territory. He looked dead at the van and Mark’s heart beat just that little bit faster.

  Angelo was in his late forties, but he was still stronger than most men in their twenties. His salt and pepper hair was starting to be more salt than pepper especially around the temples, but it didn’t take anything away from him. He looked like a Roman senator, Mark mused in another moment of inappropriate poetic description. Stern. Strong. Those dark eyes seemed to see so much more than other men saw.

  “He’s on to us,” Mark said to his supervisor, who was knuckle deep in a donut. Powdered sugar covered Gareth’s polyester pants and he had a bit of jam in his mustache. Not exactly an imposing sight compared to the lean criminal mere feet away from them.

  “He’s not on to us,” Gareth said. “We changed this van out yesterday. There’s no way he can be on to us.”

  Mark pushed the uncomfortable anxiety away. Gareth had almost thirty years experience in the field. Mark only had three months. He wasn’t in a position to be second guessing his superiors, even though he’d had a bad feeling about Angelo Vitali from the moment he’d laid eyes on the surveillance pictures.

  Angelo was handsome, but that alone wasn’t noteworthy. There were handsome men everywhere, especially in the FBI. Angelo he carried an air of easy, natural menace. He didn’t try to look tough. He didn’t try to impress those around him in any particular way, he just was a naturally impressive specimen and everyone around him reacted appropriately.

  His much younger lover, Robert Vitali, was also a piece of work. Son of Polish immigrants, he had made a name for himself as Bobby Cornoli before throwing his lot in with Angelo and becoming his partner. How that had happened precisely was a bit of a mystery. There were rumors on the streets that it had been a hostile takeover, but there wasn’t any sign of that now. Robert and Angelo weren’t overtly physical in a PDA sense, but there was an easy intimacy between them that spoke to a close connection.

  As Mark watched, Angelo brushed a non existent speck off Robert’s lapel and together they got into one of the black BMWs they liked to use. They rarely had the same license plate two days in a row.

  “Are we following?” Mark asked Gary.

  “Too obvious. We’ll hang back, pick them up later.”

  Mark felt a pang as the dark vehicle swept into the street and headed toward upper Manhattan. His gut twisted. Nerves. He hated nerves. He needed another pill, but he had to wait until they got out of the truck to take one. Gareth was an old school guy. The kind that didn’t believe in mental health medications. His idea of self care was a bottle of Scotch and a whore.

  “I need some air,” Gareth said. “Stay here and run that tape again. See if we got anything.”

  They didn’t have squat. A month of surveillance and all they knew was that Angelo preferred linguine and Robert thought that the Mets were going to win the World Series. The apartment they shared in Manhattan was a total dead zone, swept for bugs almost constantly. Mark had watched the agents do their best to get tags and taps on, but they never lasted more than a few minutes - and after the first few had been found, they’d had to stop trying temporarily. Finding a bug was like a big FBI calling card letting the Vitali men know they were under surveillance.

  Something about this felt off. Mark tried to push the paranoia away. He had next to no experience. How would he know if something was off? How would he know if something was on? He watched as Gary got up, brushed half-heartedly at his donut adorned belly, farted, and stepped out of the truck, leaving Mark to marinate in a stew of methane and candy. The second he could, Mark reached into his pocket, pulled out the bottle which contained his little lifelines, slammed a pill, and swallowed it down with some cold coffee.

  He felt better right away - sooner than the pill could have actually worked, but just knowing it was inside him, blocking his betas or whatever, made it better. Then he did as he was told, scanning through the footage of Bobby and Angelo frame by frame. It could have been a shoot for a modeling catalog, they were both so perfectly presented.

  Gareth came back about fifteen minutes later with a fresh donut and more coffee. “I’ve called a few of the other guys on this case,” he said, stuffing the custard filled thing into his mouth. “Let’s get back to the office.”

  2

  Their office was on an unmarked floor of a mid town building. Mark loved the place because it didn’t look like what it was. The sign on the door proclaimed it to be a paper supply company.

  Gary dragged him into a meeting right away. Mark could tell his boss was getting impatient. If they didn’t build a case against Angelo Vitali soon, they’d probably have to shelve it. Resources were needed elsewhere. The FBI didn’t have the time, the money, or the manpower to chase him endlessly.

  “Okay,” Gary said. “One last push. We have to have something on this asshole. Something we can use. A fucking parking violation. Anything! Work with me here.”

  Mark shuffled through paper, as he’d done a hundred times before. There was nothing. Angelo Vitali kept his public persona squeaky clean. Hadn’t even been late to return a library book.

  Part way through a few more agents joined in to consult. Mark gave up his chair for one of the more senior guys and ended up standing with his back against the wall.

  By then the discussion had been going on a while and frustration was starting to show in the tones and expressions of the more experienced agents. Mark got the impression that most targets were easier to take down than Angelo Vitali was. Getting in any way close to the man was almost impossible. He didn’t socialize outside a very small circle of people he knew very well, and he had a habit of dropping off the radar entirely for weeks, or even months at a time.

  “Is that his son or his lover?” One of the newer agents asked the question innocently.

  “Same thing,” Gary snarked.

  The agents laughed and made comments about how sick Angelo and Bobby were. Mark stood uncomfortably by with a half smile that didn’t let on that he shared that same sickness. It wasn’t a secret that he was gay. Gary definitely knew. Had found out in the intake interview when he asked about a wife or girlfrien
d. It hadn’t been a big deal since then for the most part. None of the men present would have called themselves homophobic, but that didn’t stop them throwing around gay slurs about Angelo and Robert Vitali.

  Mark spent so much time schooling his features into an expression that pretended he didn’t care that he didn’t hear the formative steps that lead to their final plan.

  “Okay, that’s it,” Gary said, slapping the table with his palm. “We’ve got one shot, as I see it. He’s a confirmed guest at the Belli Hotel tomorrow afternoon for one of Anton Levoir’s gatherings. Levoir always hires male eye candy for the event. I say we send one of our pretty boys in. Angelo has a weakness for younger men. It’s about the only weakness he has. It’s about time we exploited it.”

  Mark nodded along naively, until he realized everybody in the room was turning to look at him.

  “What? Me?”

  “You, pretty boy.”

  Mark frowned. He was not exactly a pretty boy. At least, he didn’t think of himself that way. When he looked in the mirror he saw a fairly standard guy. Blue eyes, dark blond hair, a general sort of face that was more or less operational. He was built too big to be some cute twink escort. His features were too hard, his body too broad.

  “I don’t think I really fit the pretty boy mold.”

  “You’re pretty, Mark. You’ve got a pretty face.”

  “Thanks,” he said. “But I really don’t.”

  “Shut up, you’re gorgeous, and you’re going in.”

  There wasn’t really a choice, and Mark knew it.

  “What am I going in as? I can’t just show up and say ‘Hi, I’m gorgeous, tell me about your crimes,’ can I?”

  “All you need to do is get close enough to listen. Get in their orbit. You don’t have to get to know them. It’s better if you don’t speak to them at all right away. Vitali has to be finessed, seduced. You get that, right?”

  “Uhm.”

  “Take your shirt off.”

  “What? Why?”

  “We need to make you an online profile just in case they look you up. We want you to be searchable.”

  “You think Angelo Vitali would look me up?”

  “You wish,” someone snorted.

  This was not what Mark had signed up for. Not even close. He’d figured undercover assignments would involve posing as a criminal of some kind - not as a man who slept with other men for money.

  “I’m not comfortable with this.”

  “Shirt. Off.”

  He could refuse. Of course he could refuse. Then he could find his ass slung back to some paper pushing job and he’d never see a field assignment again. First impressions were absolutely everything. This was a test, and he was going to pass it.

  Agent Dupris let out a wolf whistle as Mark pulled his shirt off. He was in good shape, of course. Working out and eating clean was pretty much all he did when he wasn’t working. You didn’t make it in the agency by being anything less than obsessive, especially as a rookie.

  “Alright, get up against that wall and look sexy for me,” Gary said, picking up his phone and turning it to the camera function.

  “How?”

  “Shit, I don’t know. Work those pecs or something, stick your ass out. Imagine you wanna get paid for it.”

  3

  “Shouldn’t I have more backup?”

  Mark’s nerves had been getting the better of him until he medicated them away. It was a lot easier to think about walking into a room full of mobsters when it was chemically impossible to be afraid. He was still concerned, though. They’d taken his gun from him, left him defenseless, and there wouldn’t be any other agents around. He was on his own.

  “We have men a block away, but this is a cold op. No weapons. No danger. You just need to float around looking pretty and hope that one of the Vitali men takes an interest in you. If they don’t today, we’ll try again later on. Might take them some time to warm up to you. Just go have fun, darling,” Gary said, putting on an extravagant gay voice which was borderline offensive.

  Mark creaked. He was wearing leather pants which were far too tight and a mesh shirt that made him feel like an extra out of an 80’s Goth kid movie. Apparently that was what all the hot gigolos were wearing these days. Mark had his doubts about that, but Gary and the others had been insistent and he was worried about pissing them off, so he went along with it.

  “Now get in there, hot stuff.” Gary slapped his ass and sent him out of the van and in through the back door of the hotel. Mark was greeted near reception by a smiling woman who conducted him to a room that was probably usually used for conferences and MLM meetings, but at that moment was filled with the best and brightest of the underworld.

  All eyes turned to Mark as he entered the room. Fuck. Gary had gotten it completely wrong. Mark was the only one dressed like he was looking for Neo in the Matrix. Everyone else was wearing business casual. There were a few dozen men, mostly of the balding and paunchy type, milling about with Prosecco and Chianti. If there were other escorts present, they were doing a much better job of blending in than he was. The younger men didn’t look like the ‘in search of sugar daddy’ types for sure, unlike Mark, who was dressed like a walking daddy issue. Fuck. Had he been set up?

  “Well hello there, darling.” A man Mark didn’t recognize took him by the arm almost immediately. “Aren’t you a treat?”

  Mark scanned the room, ignoring the guy. He didn’t see either of the Vitali men. Fuck. Were they even here? Was this some kind of shitty hazing prank from Gary and the guys?

  A hand cupped Mark’s ass. He turned around to see yet another man smiling at him. Shit. Hell. God. He put on his best professional smile and moved through the room, wondering what it was escorts did when they felt awkward and out of place.

  “Benito has outdone himself this time,” someone murmured nearby. “Look at that beef.”

  There wasn’t any food. Mark was the beef.

  Goddamit. This couldn’t possibly get any worse. He thought about just leaving, but if he left before his assignment was over, he’d probably get in deep shit. Angelo Vitali was nowhere to be seen. Nor was Bobby. Maybe they were in one of the rooms marked ‘private’? Mark sauntered his way across the room past grabby hand after grabby hand to get a better look.

  BLAM! BLAM! BLAM!

  The world exploded. Glass shattered and loud bangs jolted his nervous system as screams filled the air. Someone was shooting. He didn’t know who and he didn’t know where. Everyone was running back and forth, diving and shouting, trying to get to exits that just weren’t fucking there.

  “Shots fired! I repeat! Shots fired!” Mark shouted the words out of military habit, but nobody was listening. He wasn’t even wearing any communication equipment. He’d asked for a com unit, but Gary had insisted someone as smart as Angelo would spot it right away and he’d be sprung before he got anywhere. Maybe Gary was right, but in that moment Mark could really have used some way to communicate the fact that death was raining through the crowd.

  He started to run, head down, reaching reflexively for a gun that wasn’t there. The room was in utter chaos. Several people were down already. He paused to try to help one of them, but as he bent down a bullet came whizzing through the air and planted itself in his left arm, the momentum spinning him around. He ended up face down on the floor, groaning to himself. It wasn’t the first time he’d been shot, but the impact of hot lead on flesh never got any easier to take.

  The shots seemed to have stopped. Mark wasn’t sure why. Had the shooters got who they wanted? Or had they been run off? He heard sirens in the distance. Perhaps that had scared the attackers away. The entire incident had lasted all of maybe thirty seconds, but that was all it took to destroy lives.

  Mark checked his status without moving. Best to stay down for the moment. His arm was aching, but not bleeding that much comparatively speaking. Bullet must have lodged in his muscle. Probably a ricochet. He would have been panicking more if not for the beta block
ers. They made getting shot a whole lot easier.

  BLAM! BLAM! BLAM!

  The shooting started again. Fuck. They hadn’t stopped. They’d just been reloading. This was goddamn massacre. He could feel something warm and wet soaking under his stomach. It was blood. Not his, someone else’s seeping through the old green carpet.

  “Get up.”

  Accented but stern tones came from somewhere above Mark’s head. He didn’t know who it was. He just knew someone strong had him by the back of his pants and was yanking him to his feet.

  “Move!”

  He started moving, following orders instinctively. After a brief moment of confusion, he realized he was probably being saved. If this was one of the shooters, he’d have a bullet in his skull right now. Either way, his time in the military had made him susceptible to following orders barked at him in that particular way. Under fire, his brain reverted to a grunt mode of survival submission.

  He was half-helped, half-shoved out of the room, down the hall, out the exit door and into a waiting blacked out SUV. He hit the seat hard and was tossed around when the car took off a second later with a fuckload of tire squeal and smoke.

  “Get some pressure on that,” the voice insisted, a hand holding out a thick wad of white material to use as a bandage.

  “Thank y…” Mark turned toward the hand and looked into his rescuer’s face.

  It was Angelo Vitali.

  Up close, Angelo was even more impressive and handsome. His deep brown eyes were like two pools of pure darkness. His features were perfectly sculpted, Romanesque and menacing in every line and curve. Seeing him close up, it was apparent to Mark that this man had been designed by nature to be a predator. It was like looking into the visage of a lion. This was a man to whom life meant nothing - and yet, Angelo had just saved him. He was life and he was death. He was all things. Mark was utterly frozen in awe, his stressed brain flooded with cortisol as he had a nearly religious experience looking into the eyes of his savior.