The Under Broker: Part One

Portia De Tegeré walked up the steps to the manor house on the outskirts of Birmingham, the second party in tow behind her. She looked around at the intricate masonry work, wrought iron fences, the beautifully curated gardens that surrounded today’s venue.

Shame, it may all be rubble before the sun sets.

Nicholas Dodson, a pudgy man of unremarkable description and more so personality, lumbered behind her huffing and puffing up the naught half-dozen steps.

Irritated, Portia canted her head to the side, “Christ and Mary, man, are you going to be able to keep it together? These people, they can sense weakness, you know. If you wish to have any hope of your daughter’s safe return, you may comport yourself in a manner more decorous to one in your position.”

“I—I’ll be, be fine,” Mr. Dodson huffed, though the flushness of his face indicated otherwise. Reaching the top of the steps, he drew a handkerchief to wipe the sweat from his brow, “Don’t suppose I know how a man who had his daughter kidnapped ought to act, though, do I?”

“No, I suppose you don’t.”

Taking one last breath before entering the manor, Portia admired the beauty of the sun reflective of the lawn, it was peaceful, serene, nothing like what was surely bound to go down inside.

No, I need to focus.

Firming her resolve, she heaved open the great oak door and strode into the manor.

Darkness.

Portia paused, barely two steps into the old building, waiting, listening. It took a few moments for her eyes to adjust to the sparsely lit room.

Why murderers, ruffians and delinquents feel the need to operate in such oppressive darkness, I will never understand.

Eight men stood around the foyer, backs pressed against the walls. Two on either side of the door they just came through, two more perched at the top of the stairs, and the other four positioned near each of the ground-floor windows.

Portia stifled a groan of annoyance.

Not going to be easy to make a break for it if things take a turn for the worse.

This group of criminals seemed more organized than she anticipated, but not so organized to be a problem, at least she hoped.

“Gentlemen,” Portia had long since perfected the calm, yet assertive tone of voice needed for dealing with a hostage negotiation.

“Who’s this, then?” A gruff voice came from one of the men at the top of the staircase; Portia couldn’t see which.

“I represent Mr. Dodson’s banking house as his solicitor.”

“Solicitor?” Another man echoed.

“What’s he brought a lady of the night for? Don’t think it’ll help you much.”

No one answered the man, who Portia now saw was the other man at the top of the steps, clearly the brawn, not the brains of the operation.

“Search ’em,” came the gruff voice opposite the simpleton. Portia determined that he was in charge, at least of the henchmen. She didn’t suspect him to be the orchestrator of the whole operation, though, just a smarter-than-average street-level thug.

The simpleton loped down the stairs, confusion writ on his face, and began to pat down Mr. Dodson. He was clean. Of course he was, Portia had made sure of it.

“Open the case,” he pointed to the briefcase Mr. Dodson was clutching, giving him an inpatient glare.

Mr. Dodson complied, revealing the stack of freshly minted bills and no hidden weapons.

“They brought the money, no weapons,” The man called back to his boss atop the stairs.

“And the lady?”

“Oh, right,” The simpleton moved to approach Portia, looking weary at first. Patting down a lady and all wasn’t exactly the most respectable thing to be doing. But then again, neither was being part of organized crime. Carefully, the man started his search for Portia.

“Pardon me,” he patted down towards her ribs.

“I will not.”

The man made a half-grunting, half-choking sound, and continued his search.

Near the small of her back he found the first of her weapons,“What have we got here?” a look of genuine surprise as he pulled a small stiletto out from her belt.

Freida was a quaint lady, forged of the finest steel; her wit and judgement were sharp as could be. A lady’s best friend. The stiletto had been given to her by her Gran on her fourteenth birthday.

“Always, always, pack at least two spare knives,” her Gran used to say, “never know when a lady will need to prick a fella.”

The simpleton scowled, and tossed the blade aside. Shortly after, he found Moyra.

Iustitia deficit, nox praevalet, was engraved along Moyra’s hilt, “Justice fails, night prevails.” It was her late husband’s family motto, and the blade had been forged for Portia on her nineteenth birthday, when she officially entered the family business.

“Got another one,” the simpleton called out, “anything else hidden,” he asked Portia.

“You’ve found them all,” Portia replied, though the man had in fact, not found them all.

They had missed Jasper, Portia’s sly fallback. Jasper was a small lad, nowhere near the height and stature of his two older sisters, yet when push came to shove, he was always ready. A miniature stiletto, kept always by Portia in her hair, disguised as a pin. He had been discovered only once. Back on a job in Naples, a far-too-polite drug trafficker had a woman search Portia during a hostage exchange. It was the only time Portia had ever had a courtesy shown to her by one of the parties involved in a trade, and the only time she had been searched by a woman. A woman who had thought her hairpin looked a tad suspicious.

Fortunately, this wasn’t a regular courtesy shown by criminals, and today, like almost every other day,Jasper went by undetected. He stayed safely tucked away, bound in locks of black, waiting for her call of need.

“All clear,” the simpleton announced as he motioned for them to go up the stairs.

Cresting the rise, Portia got her first good look at the man barking orders from the shadows. Tall, cleanly dressed, freshly shaven, he almost had the air of nobility about him. This wasn’t a completely abnormal thing, but in Portia’s experience, the nobility tended to hide behind several layers of middlemen, thugs, or patsies. The only thing about his appearance that would have marked him as a criminal was a long, jagged scar running across his left cheek.

The man had a warm look about him, one that comes from being in control of a situation; it gave him a relaxed demeanor. He nodded at the simpleton and motioned Portia and Mr. Dodson to follow him down a darker still hallway, heading towards the back of the manor.

“May I have the pleasure of knowing the name of the person with whom I deal today?” Portia was starting to suspect she knew who this man was.

The well-dressed man raised an eyebrow, “You may call me Everton, Mrs. Solicitor,” and gave her a wry smile, a disguised jab at her own lack of introduction.

“Well, Mr. Everton, I shall need to see that the girl is unharmed and in good health before we release the funds to you.”

“Release?” Mr. Everton chuckled, “Should’ve thought about that a tad more before you came in here, and found yourself without weapons and surrounded by armed men.” His smile faded, “Don’t you worry, the girl’s fine, you’ll see shortly.”

“Mm,” Portia didn’t like how confident this man was; he was too suave, too calm, too composed. Sure, it was just Portia and the fat banker, and the criminals were at least ten strong in force—Portia had spied two in the tree line on her way in—but something was beginning to make Portia’s gut feel queasy.

“Here we are,” Everton approached a door with light creeping out from under the threshold, and what sounded to Portia like music playing inside.

Peculiar.

Portia’s unease grew; she readied her left hand to reach for Jasper at a moment’s notice.

“I’ve come back with gifts, darling,” Everton swung the door open.

Inside a lavishly furnished room, music was indeed playing, and the girl, the banker’s daughter, Julia, was dancing in the middle of it on a great fur carpet, with a glass of red wine in hand.

“Sweetums, you’re back,” Julia squealed, and flung herself into Everton’s arms.

Initially, Portia was confused, then realization struck. Julia, this twenty-something spoiled brat, was in on it. Portia sighed; she had been here before. She had even suspected it when the ransom note the banker had brought was written in a peculiarly feminine script.

I fucking hate family jobs. I should have listened to Amos; he told me this was one of ‘those’ situations, but no, I didn’t listen.

Mr. Dodson’s face displayed several emotions in rapid succession: relief, confusion, and then rage. “Julia,” he stopped into the room, seeming to forget where he was, “what is the meaning of this? I demand to know at once!” His jowls shook as he issued the command, which only heightened the ridiculousness of the situation.

Portia tried unsuccessfully to relax her jaw and posture, “What is it you really want, Mr. Everton?”

“You’re a quick one,” he stopped twirling the kidnapped girl about, “we want the business and all of it’s holdings, of course.”

“That’s right,” Julia said with a huff of disdain, “Father is such a miser, he doesn’t even give me money to go to the ball.” Julia eyed Mr. Dodson, who was now cherry-faced with rage. “How’s a girl supposed to live on such a paltry allowance?”

“You aren’t my dear,” Mr. Everton twirled her back into his arms, “you deserve so much more.”

Julia seemed to remember something, “Oh, look, Father, I even got the correct forms for you,all you need to do is sign them!” She pointed at a desk by the window at the back of the room, “You love forms, don’t you?”

“I—I will,” Mr. Dodson made a series of chortling sounds that could only be described as an overweight cow with colic, “not be signing any such form.” He stopped his foot down to show that he was serious, or maybe as a resulting habit from having to deny his daughter’s ball gown money so often.

“Father,” Julia’s brown eyes grew more fierce-looking, “please sign the form. I don’t want Evy to hurt you; you don’t want to, right, Evy?” She looked up at Mr. Everton, who gave her a pitying expression.

“No, of course not.” He looked back up at Mr. Dodson. “If you will,” he motioned to the desk again, “the forms.”

Portia could sense men behind her. Two, she suspected. Though not born with any supernatural ability, one develops a sixth sense for these types of things after enough years spent dealing in shady business with even shadier company involved. She began to assess the situation more carefully, seeing that things were indeed about to go south.

One.

She spotted the man’s shadow peaking out behind the door.

Two and three.

Behind them, coming up slowly from the hall.

Four.

Mr. Everton might put up a fight himself.

Half.

She didn’t want to completely discredit Julia as a threat, but figured it best to include her in the threat assessment.

Four and a half then.

Four and a half bodies, Jasper should be able to handle them. As for escape…

Portia’s planning was interrupted as she realized Mr. Dodson and his daughter had started screaming furiously at each other.

“I will not give up my life’s work to a spoiled brat. Your mother would roll over in her grave if she saw how you were acting. I will be leaving at once!”

“I don’t think so, ‘Father’, if I can even call you that! What father is so stingy with their daughter—”

“You may not!” Wobbling jowls, cherry faces, bratty children, things were getting a touch out of hand.

At an impasse, the argument between the incensed father and his exceptionally entitled daughter had deteriorated into attacking each other’s personal character flaws, instead of trying to talk about the actual problem.

The actual problem, as far as Portia could see, was that this lunatic brat, who had staged her own kidnapping in an attempt to take over her father’s bank, then presumably rob it, needed some sense knocked into her.

Still, Portia thought, it’s best to use logic and reasoning when dealing with these matters.

This had all the makings of a powder keg, ready to go off; it just needed a little nudge.

The nudge, as it happened, came rather swiftly, both in a literal and figurative sense.

Portia had been about to interject, seeing that Mr. Everton was losing patience, and not wanting to incite a bloodbath, when Julia’s wine glass rocketed through the room and cracked into Portia’s forehead.

In a truly remarkable show of athleticism for a man of his girth, Mr. Dodson had managed to duck out of the way of the decanted projectile. This caused the brimming glass of cabernet to strike Portia instead.

Had she not been busy calculating, trying to find a way to end this that didn’t involve most parties ending up dead, she would have seen it too.

The room fell silent.

Portia looked down; her elegant cream-colored dress had a large red patch now adoring it, starting from the bust and ending mid-stomach.

The silence drew on, as Portia’s eyes remained fixed on the blood-red patch.

Sensing the need to wrap this up before things got worse, Mr. Everton moved to resolve the matter, and drew his sword. “Mr. Dodson, if you won’t sign the papers willingly, I’m afraid I will have to get your signature by force.”

Mr. Dodson backed away from the drawn blade, which Mr. Everton pressed against one of his many chins. Mr. Dodson let out a small squeak, “I won’t sign, I simply won’t. If you kill me, the holdings go to my business partner, not you.”

“Mr. Caden? Oh, no need to worry about him, he’ll be out of town on some… business. For the foreseeable future.” Julia replied, a much darker countenance coming over her than poor Mr. Dodson could have anticipated.

Mr. Dodson was now panicked and looked over at Portia, the woman he had hired to protect him. “Do something, woman!” Though Portia was still looking down at her dress.

“What, what—, I don’t believe,” Dodson stared as Mr. Everton pushed the blade tighter into his gullet, backing him against the wall.

“Fifteen hundred,” A quiet, sharp, and firm tone emitted from the slender, blood-red soaked form of Portia.

“What,” Mr. Everton and Mr. Dodson said in unison.

“Fifteen hundred pounds,” Portia looked up, and the rest of the people saw all the venom and anger in the world in the cold blue eyes of the Solicitor. “This dress was imported,” Portia gazed at Julia, “for fifteen hundred pounds.”

“So get a new one,” Julia scoffed, “Can you believe this woman?”

Portia walked towards a small table.

Julia looked around the room, “We’re dealing with something a bit more important here, in case you hadn’t noticed.” she said to no one in particular. “Stupid bitch,” this last part was directed at Portia.

“From Spain,” Portia growled, accentuating the statement and retaliating to the defilement of her dress by spinning to face Julia and hurling the entire bottle of wine at straight into Julia’s head.

A dull thwack, followed by the clink of the bottle hitting the ground were the only sounds heard in the room.

Julia, whether not seeing the bottle coming or not having time to react, crumpled like a sack of potatoes to the floor.

All hell broke loose.

Portia slammed one booted foot into the door, pinning the man who had been lurking behind it. In the same motion, she spun, pulling Jasper from her hair.

The two men from the hallway jammed shoulder-to-shoulder in the doorframe. Portia buried Jasper in the first man’s neck before the second could untangle himself. He stumbled backward, fumbling for his sword. Her boot found his nose before he reached the hilt.

Crack.

The door-lurker had freed himself by this time. His blade came fast—Portia ducked and felt it shear the air above her scalp. She drove an uppercut into his gut, but the man barely staggered. A fist knotted in her hair, and her face met the door as he slammed her nose-first into the oak.

She hit the floor.

Fucking bastard.

His sword plunged down once, twice. Portia rolled clear of both. The third, she caught on Jasper’s edge, the impact of the blades numbing her wrist.

Portia heard heavy boots getting closer.

Move, we need to wrap this up.

Her focused turned back to her attacker, still looming over her. He was good. He was also predictable. Every time she tried to rise, the same wide swipe kept her pinned.

Portia planted one knee on the ground, trying to regain her feet. She watched his arm cock back for the wide swing. Instead of standing into it this time, she threw herself forward, sliding between his legs.

Not quite far enough to slide all the way through, but far enough for what she needed to do.

She looked up at him and smiled. His blade was already tearing down toward her.

Jasper was faster—one clean stroke across the inside of his thigh was enough to kill the man.

Unfortunately for Portia, when severing a person’s femoral artery quite a large volume of blood tends to come out rather quickly. With Portia still on the ground between the man’s legs, she quickly got utterly soaked from head to toe in the crimson flood.

Mr. Dodson, who had evidently wet himself; Mr. Everton, who looked for all the world like he had seen a poltergeist; and Julia, who was just now coming to, all stared at the horror rising off the ground before them.

Pearly-white teeth and soft blue eyes stared back at each of them in turn. A woman of small stature, wearing the finest of dresses, with gold-adorned fingers and a ferocious posture, stood before them dripping in blood.

The Under Broker addressed all the parties involved in this deal gone wrong, “Who’s fucking next?”