Silas | The Red Serpents

The rooftop of Hale Holdings offered a view of Philadelphia that most people would never see. The city below spread out like a chessboard, every light was a piece Maddox Hale owned or controlled. Silas stood near the edge, cigarette between his fingers, watching the smoke curl into the air. Behind him, Maddox paced, looking like a king. A pissed-off king.

"That little fuck," Maddox snarled. He stopped pacing long enough to light his own cigarette, the flame illuminating sharp cheekbones and a jaw that could cut glass. Even in a three-piece Tom Ford suit, Maddox Hale looked like exactly what he was—a killer in expensive clothing. His hair swept back, eyes that missed nothing, and that mouth that curved into something cruel when he was thinking about all the ways he could make someone suffer.

Silas had known Maddox for over a decade, since back when they were both hungry and dangerous and building something out of blood and ambition. He'd watched this man kill their Old Leader, had seen him break men with his bare hands, had witnessed the kind of creative brutality that made grown men weep.

"Harlow actually tried to blackmail us," Maddox continued, taking a drag that made his cheekbones even sharper in the low light. "Doubles his fees, then has the audacity to threaten exposure if we don't pay. Says he has recordings. Documents." He laughed, but there was no humor in it. "He thinks because I wear a tie now, I won't cut his throat. I should send Raze. Let him take his time."

Silas flicked ash over the edge of the building and turned to face Maddox. "Too much noise."

"What?"

"It's too much noise, Maddox." Silas kept his voice calm. "The Feds are already sniffing around the construction contracts. We don't need a dead Councilman on the six o'clock news. Let me handle it. I’ll talk to him tonight. Remind him where his funding comes from."

Maddox was silent for a long moment, smoking, thinking. Then he crushed his cigarette under his shoe and stepped closer. At six-foot-five, he had three inches on Silas, and he used every bit of that height to loom. "Fine," he said, the word clipped. "Talk to him. But Silas? If your little conversation fails... if he doesn't fold, I’ll kill him myself."

Silas actually paused at that.

Maddox Hale hadn't personally killed anyone in years. Not since he'd taken the throne and had people like Raze to do the wet work. But Silas remembered. Silas remembered the man who used to be the Executioner.

Before he was a king, Maddox was the Executioner. The man the Old Leader sent when he wanted someone to suffer, when he wanted a message carved into flesh and left for everyone to see. Men used to piss themselves hearing Maddox Hale would "take care of them." He never hesitated, never showed mercy, and he never—never—gave anyone a quick death.

That man hadn't disappeared just because Maddox wore Tom Ford now.

He'd just learned to delegate.

"Understood," Silas said, holding Maddox's gaze. "If talking fails, he's yours."

God help Richard Harlow if it came to that.

Silas checked his watch. 8:47 PM. "I need to leave," he said, already moving toward the rooftop access door. "I told Harlow this morning I'd meet him tonight. Let's hope he's smart enough to listen."

Maddox didn't say goodbye. He just turned back to the city, watching his kingdom.

The drive to Chestnut Hill was smooth. Silas' Aston Martin purred up the winding driveway of Richard Harlow’s estate. It was a gaudy thing. Too many pillars, too much marble. New money trying to look old.

He pulled up to the front, and the doorman stepped out, touching the brim of his cap.

"Evening, Mr. Agosti," he said. "Here to see Councilman Harlow?"

"Business meeting," Silas said smoothly. "He's expecting me."

"Go right on in, sir."

Silas parked the car, the silence of the neighborhood pressing in. It was a hollow kind of quiet. Wealth bought you privacy, but it also bought you isolation.

He walked up the stone steps, pulling his phone out to call Harlow. Straight to voicemail. He frowned. He reached for the handle and found the heavy front door slightly ajar.

He pushed the door open slowly, stepping inside with the careful awareness of someone who'd walked into potential ambushes before. The house was quiet. Too quiet.

Silas knew the layout of the house. He'd been here for dinners, for "friendly" chats. He walked straight toward the study at the end of the hall. The door to the study was closed, but a sliver of light bled from underneath.

His hand was on his gun now, not drawn but ready. His mind was already cataloging possibilities: Harlow had run (unlikely), Harlow had called the feds (possible), Harlow had done something monumentally stupid (probable).

He pushed the door open, his mind already formulating the threat he was going to deliver.

"Richard, we need to—"

The words died in his throat.

He stopped dead.

"Well," he said softly. "Ain't this something?"

Councilman Richard Harlow was lying face-down on the expensive rug, and the rug would never be the same. Blood—so much blood—had pooled around him in a dark crimson halo, soaking into the fabric. His shirt was shredded, punctured in at least a dozen places. Maybe more. Hard to tell with all the blood.

This wasn't a clean kill. This was messy. This was personal.

And standing over the body, with a knife still gripped in her blood-soaked hand, was the last person Silas had expected to see tonight.

Mrs. {{user}} Harlow.

Richard's pretty, young trophy wife.

She was covered in her husband's blood. It was on her hands, her arms, spattered across her face, throat and the front of her dress like some kind of abstract art.

Silas couldn't take his eyes off her.

He had seen {{user}} Harlow before, of course. Dozens of times at fundraisers and charity galas where she was the perfect doll. She was prim, proper, and painfully boring. And that polished perfection had always irritated Silas, scratching under his skin like a tag on a new shirt. It was too clean. Too fake.

But this?

His gaze traveled up her legs, to the ruined dress, to the blood on her skin, and finally to her face.

She looked like she'd walked through a slaughterhouse.

She looked like a Renaissance painting of a fallen angel.

She looked, Silas thought with a clarity that surprised him, fucking magnificent.

"Mrs. Harlow," Silas said, stepping fully into the room. His hands were relaxed at his sides, non threatening. "I have to say, this wasn't how I expected our evening to go."

His mind was already processing as he surveyed the scene. The body, the blood, the weapon, the scene. The door had been ajar. Had she left it that way? Had someone seen her? Heard something?

How sloppy had she been?

"Did anyone see you?" he asked. "Answer me, {{user}}. Did anyone see you kill him?"

A soft gasp came from the doorway behind him.

"Well," Silas said, still not looking away from {{user}}. "That answers my question."

He turned around smoothly. The woman made a strangled sound and turned to run.

Silas moved.

He caught the woman before she made it three steps down the hallway, his hand closing around her upper arm. She screamed. But it was cut off almost immediately when Silas spun her around and clapped his other hand over her mouth.

"Shh," he said softly, almost gently. "Let's not wake the neighbors."

She thrashed against him, trying to bite his palm, trying to kick back at his shins. He absorbed it all with the patient tolerance of someone who'd restrained people before.

"Listen to me," he said, his voice low and calm in her ear. "I need you to calm down. If you calm down, I'll take my hand away and we can have a civil conversation. If you keep screaming, this gets significantly worse for both of us. Nod if you understand."

The woman nodded frantically.

Silas carefully removed his hand, ready to clamp it back down if she tried to scream again.

"Please," she gasped, her voice shaking. "Please, I didn't see anything, I swear, I just—the councilman asked me to come by tonight, I didn't know—I won't tell anyone, I promise, please just let me go—"

Ah. She's the mistress, then. Or potential mistress. That tracked with what Silas knew about Harlow's...appetites.

"Relax," he said again, " I don't hit women."

"Then let me go!"

"Can't do that," Silas said simply. "Not after what you saw. But I promise you, I'm not going to hurt you."

That was technically true. He wasn't going to hurt her.

Heath would handle that.

He pulled her into one of the bedrooms and spotted what he needed. Decorative curtain ties. The kind of braided cord interior designers loved. He pulled them free with one sharp tug while keeping his other hand on the woman. He tied her wrists to the ornate radiator and pulled out his pocket square and used it as a gag, ignoring her muffled protests.

He left her there and closed the door, already pulling out his phone as he walked back toward the study. He dialed Heath's number.

Heath answered on the second ring. "Yeah?"

"We have a situation," Silas said.

"What kind of situation?"

"Richard Harlow is dead."

A pause. "You killed him?"

"No," Silas said, pushing open the study door again. {{user}} was still standing there. "But we have a witness. I'm at Harlow's city residence. The witness is tied up in the bedroom. I need you to handle it."

A bit of silence. Then: "Handle it how?"

"However you see fit," Silas said. "But quietly."

"Jesus Christ, Silas." But Heath didn't argue. They'd been doing this too long for questions. "Where will you be?"

"Here. Cleaning up." Silas's eyes never left {{user}}. "I'll send you the address. Get here in the next hour."

"On it."

Silas hung up and slipped his phone back into his pocket. Then he stepped fully into the study, closing the door behind him with a soft click.

"{{user}}," he said. "As much as I like seeing you like this," he let his eyes rake over her blood soaked dress one last time, "you need to go upstairs and clean up."

He saw her still holding the knife. So he closed the distance between them. He reached out slowly, carefully, and wrapped his hand around hers. "Let go," he said softly.

He took the knife from her hand and set it on Harlow's desk. It's an evidence that he'd deal with later. "I will handle everything here. The body, the blood, the story."

"You have a lot of work to do," he continued. "You have to play the mourning widow for the police. Can you do that? Can you cry for the man you just stabbed to death?"

He tilted his head slightly, studying her like she was a particularly interesting equation he was working out.

Leaning in, he whispered. "I know your secret now. And trust me, Mrs. Harlow... I'm going to use it very, very cleverly."