No Good Deed Goes Unpunished! Ch 18

No Good Deed Goes Unpunished! Ch 18

Also known as: "There is a First Time for Everything!" NGD-18

by Sextified

©2010

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They. That was the problem. The traditional run around of 'He said - She said' was a wonderful thing to raise reasonable doubts in a courtroom. Or at the conference table, when buying people's silence. But the thing on the counter said that it was already too late.

Miriam wasn't going to wait for any such legal retribution.

She had a much greater punishment in mind... and escaping that kind of justice was almost unheard of... especially with such close, almost family-like ties involved.

But how had that traditional warning gotten here so damn fast?

He'd done this to himself. Sent her husband overseas to Japan. Over and over. Made him almost a part of the family. THAT family! Miyoko's grandfather had made it almost his last act, warning him off from interfering with the Trust ever again. Sending him a message that still terrified him years and years after the old man's death.

< "Leave the rightful heir, and his side of the family alone, or else!" >

The object that had accompanied the messenger was still locked up safely in his bank deposit box. Or was it? Looking down at the palm of his hand, in the dark he needed to keep his skull from splitting open, was the best he could manage to verify that they were identical in every way.

This was the day from fucking hell!

First he had failed to catch more than the glimpse of the new redhead in his cousin's life at the restaurant. Then he had tripped and fallen into the faux stream arguing with Gerald. His latest removal of company funds would be discovered by Monday afternoon, at the latest. Then he lied to the police and told them Gerald had pushed him into the water. Now this! Years, if not decades of planning gone to waste! For worse than nothing! All because he'd had a little too damn much to drink?

No!

He'd gotten it all wrong! He must have! What was still sitting coldly in his left hand was a mistake! How could it be here already? They weren't magicians! Or sorcerers! Things like this took time! They were still human, if oddly civilised savages. Unless they had already been here watching him! Waiting to strike, before what ever mischief he had planned could stop the Trust from getting signed.

The light blinded him as he turned it back on. Anthony's whole arm shook bringing his closed fist close to his face. As his fingers began opening, he knew it wasn't brass or copper. Only gold shined like this. The darkly etched runes, hand dug into it's surface, were just as he had remembered it.

Not that he could read a single damn word of Japanese.

But it meant death. His death. In the same manner of his offenses. Least to greatest. It would take a long damn time for him to die, if they even knew half of what he had done in his life.

A repeat of the noise downstairs wasn't a mistake.

He KNEW that sound as well as anyone in his family did.

Someone was down there alright. Waiting. The guns kept in the drawers would be gone. Taken when the missive of death had been left on the bathroom counter. They couldn't be bought off with cash, especially not with what little he had left. But there had to be something they wanted? Right?

Everyone had their price... his reputation had been built for using that fact in business... and for abusing it for decades.

If Miriam took back her accusations, what would Miyoko's family do? They couldn't be as stubborn as the old tyrant that had helped ruin his half of the family. Could they?

Like a dead man, Anthony was already at the top of the stairs, before he realized he'd even taken a single step. The huge ornate staircase cast weird shadows in the confusing tangle of lights coming from the front door. They made no sense.

Even given the huge mirror helping them to act so strangely, it didn't seem natural.

But the tall shadow cast over the entry way tiles was out of his worst nightmare. Two guns looked perfectly at home in those killer's hands. Anthony had made it only half way down, when the words he dreaded to hear, coldly rang out in the huge foyer.

He'd had them translated years ago, and had hoped to never hear them again. The ancient phrases hadn't changed in a thousand years.

The ceremonial bullet slipped thru his fingers first... and clattered loudly down the steps ahead of him... just seconds before he passed out and followed it all the way to the bottom.

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There would be no other response tonight or tomorrow. The fast food trash was ready to be thrown away, and he swung the older car around in the parking lot to toss it out. Soon he would be getting his graduation present, but good automotive habits were important no matter what he drove.

As he turned onto the cross street... and headed for the highway to go back the way he'd come... it was all he could do to not speed to make sure his mother was safe.

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The usually slightly bully-ish man, at least in his kitchens well away from his nagging wife, cringed backwards another half step. He tried to answer her back in the Japanese already chosen for this long overdue confrontation.

She snapped the rest of the way, even as the hated tears spoiled the effect.

Then her legs lost all of their strength, and Miyoki sank down right there in the middle of her own borrowed doorway. Sobbing her heart out embarrassingly, in a conflicting and bewildering sense of emotions, was all she could manage to do anymore. To his credit, her host sat down beside her and carefully pulled her back upright.

Then held on to her tightly... like her father always should have been able to do... until the worst of her tears and shaking were gone.

When she gave out one last final sniffle, and sat up under her own power, he very quietly released her and shocked her by saying just the right few words.

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