Chapter Twenty-Four:Carter.

"Have mercy, boss. I didn't steal your money. The deal was loose in the first place and…" 

An injured man whose mouth was filled with blood, begged but the landing of the baseball bat on his back sent him flying face flat to the floor, pain taking over his body as it was really difficult for him to speak when he couldn't nearly keep his eyes open.

His face was really damaged, it was all bruised and swollen and that is the handwork of the gangsters, who had sight him out and brought him to meet their boss. The leader of the ruling gang in the arena, the Red cross.

"Boss, we should finish him." One of the thugs asked, trying to move forward but the silhouette of the man, who was the leader of the crew raised his hand, halting the movement of anyone towards the man, who was barely conscious on the floor.

Carter Brown, a notorious gangster in the city who the cops had been hot on his tails since after he took over the affairs of the underworld, around the town, but then as a smart man that he was, he had a legit business that he uses to cover up the illegal work going on in New York.

He owes a loan company, to which the outsiders who fall prey to borrow money from him, always end up paying up one way or the other with their life, sometimes with the lives of their family members when they don't keep to their agreement.

Carter owns a club where he uses it's night busy to smuggle in drugs, sells out to the other gangs and his business partner's while using the casino as nothing but a normal night club. To cut the story short, he was rich, arrogant and a nightmare to the villagers who lived around the area he called his lair.

He walked up and squatted down as he examined the man lying on the floor, with his blunt in between his fingers, he dragged the man up by his hair as he hissed a bit still barely managed to sit up.

"I don't usually do this, Tom, but we all know that you don't run away with my money. I'm a hardworking man with policies which you failed to keep. So, to avoid going against that, where is it while am still asking nicely?" He asked, as the poor man gulped when his eyes met Carter's cruel ones.

A scar ran across his cheeks, and rumors have it that it's as a result of tough childhood who had sculpted him into the kind of man he was today. No one really knew if he had a family or not, but then he chose to keep his private life private to protect the only family he had, his sister.

"B..boss, I…" The man on the floor tried giving him the same answer, but he got tired of his words and pushed him to the floor, before turning to his men.

"Take care of him, then search for any of his family, a girl who might work hard to pay off his debt." Carter said, as his second in command, Ricardo understood what he meant. He runs a prostitution ring that also was kept away from the public and the cops except for the exclusive members of his club, who were also involved in his dirty business.

With him looking at the busy streets of New York, he was deep in thoughts but was suddenly interrupted when his door was opened and in walked a vexed Joanna, with one of his men, who had a scared look on their face because they knew better than to interrupt him with a visitor as stubborn as Joanna.

"Boss, I tried…"

"It's okay." He interrupted him, before he left, leaving him and Joanna, who threw her bag angrily to the couch beside him as he watched her.

"Hey, it's okay. It's okay, Jo. What's wrong?" He asked coming closer to where she was to hug her, as she cried on his chest.

Joanna  is the only family he has since after their parents died in a fire. He had taken up the responsibility to take care of her since he was ten and she's six. Having had to live a cruel life to ensure that she had a perfect life  and now seeing her like this hurt him, and he's eager to know what and who exactly did this to her, the motherfucker won't live to see another day.

"It hurts, Carter. It hurts." She cried on his shoulder.

"Look at me," Carter said, cupping her cheeks to clean the tears on her face as she refused to look at him." Look at me, goddammit!" He yelled, this time she had no option but to do as he instructed.

When he saw the imprint of a slap on her face, he snapped, moving away from her to take his gun." He's a dead man, how dare he raise his hands on you?!"

"Carter, no! Don't hurt him, please." She cried,crying to stop him but he grabbed her by her arm.

"Do you have a death wish? Since when did this start? Were you keeping this away from me, for how long, Joanna?" He roared, but she refused to let him go and hurt Micheal.

He might be an abuser, but it's over for her if he does right now. Especially when she doesn't know where exactly Diego's stand was in that family yet.

"No, you wouldn't kill him, Carter. I can't ruin Diego's future."

"I don't care, he's better off without that stupid family anyway, I will take care of the rest…"

"No!!" Joanna pushed at his chest." You will do no such thing, Micheal is mine. If you truly cared about Diego you should have made sure you killed Giovanni years back and not try to complicate things for me right now!" She yelled.

Carter sighed, moving away from her since this was the one task he wasn't able to pull off, before Giovanni left the country six years ago.

"Joanna, listen to me. It was  risking my cover that's why i couldn't entirely end him then, someone saved him back then. But i promise to fix things back the way they should be but first with Micheal…"

"Oh! Shut up, Carter. You have no right to do anything to my family, I'm fine. It's useless coming here anyway." She says, taking her purse from his couch and tried leaving but he dragged her back.

"Okay, I'm sorry. I won't do anything to him yet." He apologized, pecking her temple as a smile graced her face." I have missed you Jo, Luxury looks good on you." He complimented her.

"Which is why i have to make sure that luxury continues to be mine. But first to do that, I need you to do something for me." She said, with a cruel smile on her face as she thought of the perfect person to scare.

"Who is it? Tell me, I'm willing to do anything for you and Diego, Jo." Carter asked, as she scoffed at his words.

"Actually, it's three. I'm pregnant.''Joanna said proudly, as he gasped before placing his hand on her protruding stomach.

"I'm betting it's another firecracker like you." The brother said, as he looked down at his sister in love, the only person who he would move heaven down to earth just to ensure her happiness.