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[edgtf_highlight background_color=”#3f963f” color=”#FFFFFF”]  “BEG FOR MERCY”  [/edgtf_highlight]

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[edgtf_highlight background_color=”#1c1c1c” color=”#FFFFFF”]  “CHAPTER I  [/edgtf_highlight]

[edgtf_highlight background_color=”#3f963f” color=”#FFFFFF”]  “EIGHTY DOLLARS”  [/edgtf_highlight]

Three men were lying dead in the alley, but it wasn’t his fault.

They should have listened. They should have paid attention. He asked them not to rob him. He specifically said, “Unfortunately, gentlemen, this little cardboard shack is all I’ve got to my good name. If you try to take it, or what’s inside of it from me, I’ll be forced to fight all three of you until either I am dead, or you are.”

They should have listened.

Instead, they all found the sharp end of a cane shoved into their guts and ripped upwards towards their abdomen.

It was a true shame. There was a time when he could’ve employed them, mentored them, showed them what it meant to have a work ethic, showed them what it takes to take money.

Because Berkshire knew better than anyone that making money and taking money were the exact same thing. Which is why, when he stabbed them and ended their pathetic lives, he took their wallets.

These days, the police treated him like any other piece of shit homeless person roaming the streets. No longer were the police a shield for him, no longer was he free from the scrutiny of an officer’s glare. If they found he killed them, he would be treated like anyone else. Sentenced to life in prison.

The sad thing was, the thought of prison had become damn near appealing.

The streets he walked were cold and windy. The social structure of the homeless was impossible for a man of culture to navigate. At least in prison, there was structure. At least in prison, there was a hierarchy to climb.

Not in the streets of Hell’s Kitchen.

Not in the home of the Slaughterhouse.

Berkshire dug through their wallets as he walked, shielding himself from any peering eyes near burning barrels and tents and heroin needles. He took their ID’s, if only to make it harder to identify the bodies. He took their credit cards, and he took their cash — all eighty dollars shared between the three of them.

Eighty dollars. The thought of it made Berkshire smile to himself. Not that long ago he wiped his ass with eighty dollars. And now?

Well, now he felt like he was on top of the world again. Wealthy. Eighty dollars richer.

Every empire has to start somewhere.

And eighty dollars was eighty dollars more than he had.

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[edgtf_highlight background_color=”#1c1c1c” color=”#FFFFFF”]  “CHAPTER II  [/edgtf_highlight]

[edgtf_highlight background_color=”#3f963f” color=”#FFFFFF”]  “FIONA”  [/edgtf_highlight]

There was a woman that he liked to watch from time to time as she walked her dog in the park. He liked the way her hips moved, her buttcheeks shooks, and her big titties bounced. The longer he went without sex, the more Berkshire thought about it. And even though he no longer had a cent in the bank, she made near-daily deposits into his spank bank just by walking past him.

Sadly, she was the only thing he looked forward to when he woke up. Sadder, she had no idea, and if she did, she would be repulsed. He had not bathed in months. He had not brushed his teeth or shaved or had his once pristine suit dry cleaned.

On this particular day, he had expected her and she had not shown up. Her habits were clockwork. It wasn’t like her to be inconsistent. Worried, he spent the eighty dollars in his pocket on a taxi all the way across town to her apartment.

…Yes. Berkshire knew where her apartment was. He had, at times, followed her. From a distance of course. He knew what her building was, and he knew which apartment was hers.

God, he could smell her couldn’t he? All the way in the parking lot of her building.

He watched through her window, from a distance, so as to cause no alarm. He saw a man in there with her. He thought, at first, they were putting on a show for him. He was grabbing her by her blonde hair, and choking her. Right before Berkshire slid his hand down into his pants to play with the ol’ boy, however, he noticed she was struggling to free herself. He watched the man punch her in the eye, and shake her by the neck.

The next thing Berkshire knew, his cane had broken that window and he was climbing through shards of glass still in the frame. The woman’s big titties bounced even when she screamed, and when the man charged at Berkshire, he wasn’t sure if he had a stiff member because of her, or the violence that was to unfold.

One good punch. The man got one in, Berkshire had to admit, as he damn near fell right back out of the window as he stumbled backwards, but the man missed wildly with his second punch.

“Sir,” Berkshire said, shoving the blade of his cane deep into the man’s neck. The man sputtered blood from his lips, fell to his knees. “I am not a defenseless woman. You lack the accuracy to survive a fight with a man like me.”

“Please,” the man spat, blood coating his every syllable. “Please.”

The sound of a man begging for mercy.

Well, now he was rock hard.

Berkshire withdrew the knife. He left the man lying there, bleeding.

The woman was, somehow, serene in that moment. None of the hysterics Berkshire expected from a woman. Even more surprisingly, the look on her face was damn near thankful.

She just… stared at him.

“What’s your name?” He asked. “And would you like to make love with me?”

“Fiona,” she replied. A smile spread across her face, just as the man’s blood spread across her apartment floor.

Berkshire smiled back. Finally, a cunt as crazy as he was.

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[edgtf_highlight background_color=”#1c1c1c” color=”#FFFFFF”]  “CHAPTER III  [/edgtf_highlight]

[edgtf_highlight background_color=”#3f963f” color=”#FFFFFF”]  “THE SUN”  [/edgtf_highlight]

Berkshire lived with Fiona for three months, and he had begun to feel like some kind of modern day concubine. Her job provided everything they could want or need, both of them. She worked for her father, selling yachts to rich pricks like him — well, like who he used to be. Which was precisely why he turned down the job she wanted to get him.

He had not told her who he was. Like the body of her husband, they let a lot of things stay buried from the very first night they truly met. Berk didn’t mind, really. The sex was wild. It was even better knowing that all of this could, at any moment of any day, fall apart, if she ever bothered to find out who he really was.

“I want you to meet my father,” she said, over a dinner of mutton and wine.

“Absolutely not,” he replied.

“Why?”

“I’m afraid he won’t like me,” Berkshire said.

“He will,” Fiona replied. “He’ll love you. Because I love you.”

It was the first time she ever said the words.

Berkshire smiled and said, “You make me happy.”

Which was true. And he made himself a promise, and though he had broken every promise he had ever made to himself, he trusted himself with this one. He promised to never lie to her, at least not directly.

Therefore, he had no excuse.

It was at a brunch in the Hamptons where they met with her father. Berkshire almost ducked in the taxi when they drove past his childhood home, now with a big real estate sign in the yard. “For Sale.” Big fucking deal, he thought. Everything was for sale.

The estate was lovely and Berkshire felt very at home. A finely tailored suit she had rented for him to wear. She had coached him on how to present himself with class, how to make polite conversation, and the code of wealth more broadly. He allowed her to do so, even if he knew it better than she ever could.

It was, shall we say, unfortunate, that her father recognized Berkshire immediately.

“Fiona,” her father said. “Do you have any idea who the man on your arm is?”

“Berk,” she replied. “Berk Green.”

Her father looked Berk up and down, a wry smile on his face. “You lost every bit of it, didn’t you, you scoundrel?”

Berkshire sneered and replied, “I could get it all back today if I wanted to.”

After a very pregnant pause, her father said, “Do you remember me?”

Berkshire nodded. “You sold me a vessel two years ago.”

Her father smiled, “What was it called again?”

“Fiona,” Berkshire replied, looking at the woman on his arm. He watched her mind putting the puzzle together, connecting links.

“It’s like you’ve risen from the dead,” her father said.

“I’m like the Sun,” Berkshire replied. “I will always rise.”

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[edgtf_highlight background_color=”#1c1c1c” color=”#FFFFFF”]  “CHAPTER IV  [/edgtf_highlight]

[edgtf_highlight background_color=”#3f963f” color=”#FFFFFF”]  “THE MONEY SAID ONE THING”  [/edgtf_highlight]

It was the day before his wedding.

He had made Fiona’s father, Dan, a fucking fortune.

…and to be completely honest, he felt like he deserved every last penny he made the son of a bitch.

The walls were closing in on him. Berkshire Ellison Green did not want to be married. Berkshire Ellison Green did not love Fiona. He hated working for Dan, and if anything, Dan should’ve been working for him. Six months in the man’s business and Berkshire had the place turning yachts left and right, internationally as well as stateside.

Berkshire had sold yachts to sheiks, to princes and to presidents, to CEO’s, top shareholders and everyone in between.

Where was his yacht? Huh? Where was the yacht that he was supposed to have?

BEG felt like the whole fucking world was trying to change him.

Problem was, he was finally starting to feel like himself, and the last thing he wanted to do was change.

So the fork in the road was laid bare.

He could marry Fiona, make her a Green, and have millions in the bank.

Or he could fuck over Dan, steal his business out from under him, and have billions in the bank.

See, the choice wasn’t a choice at all for a man like BEG.

He broke into Dan’s office. He forged all the necessary documents to sign the business over to Berkshire Ellison Green.

The real trick of it all was paying off everyone at Dan’s level. All of his so-called friends. All of his so-called business partners. They were in on it.

Every last one of them. They wanted to make more money, and Dan had, as Berkshire argued, plateaued. He didn’t know if they all agreed with his reasoning. But they ended up agreeing with the money.

And the money said one thing.

Dan was fucked.

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[edgtf_highlight background_color=”#1c1c1c” color=”#FFFFFF”]  “CHAPTER V  [/edgtf_highlight]

[edgtf_highlight background_color=”#3f963f” color=”#FFFFFF”]  “BEG FOR MERCY”  [/edgtf_highlight]

The real estate sign that said “For Sale” in the yard of BEG’s family home had been removed, and he had moved in. For months straight, the place was filled with bitches, booze, and every sort of debauchery imaginable.

Paradise.

BEG was back. But he was also older. And after a while, the partying got old and he sent everyone home.

He found himself drawn to the cupboard. It still had “BERK” carved into it. The place his mom would tell him to hide, when she had over a friend, or a couple of friends, or when his father had too many drinks. Something inside of him told him, “Go in there. Something bad is happening. Hide. HIDE!!”

But he ignored it.

…which was a real shame.

Because Dan had told him. “Berkshire, if you try to take my business from me, I’ll be forced to fight you until either I am dead, or you are.”

“Well Dan,” Berkshire said, blowing a thick ring of smoke in Dan’s face. “It’s not your business. It’s mine.”

Dan had left the meeting with his tail between his legs. Which was fine with BEG. That’s how a man should leave when he has everything taken from him. That’s how he left OSW, after all.

Berkshire barely heard the glass shatter. He almost didn’t feel it at first. But he did hear it. A loud bang, and then his ears rang like church bells. There was a strange sensation in his stomach, but when he put his hand on it, it felt wet. He looked down and saw his intestines falling from stomach. He picked them up and tried to place them back where they belonged.

He looked towards the window just in time to see her.

Fiona.

“Please,” he said. “Please.”

She smiled. She liked it when he begged for mercy.

Then she squeezed the trigger.