Deviant Vows by Anna Widzisz

 

BEFORE

It’s been a long time coming, but the early 1980s have tipped open an outpouring for change. That’s when Liverpool gained the infamous title 'Smack City' after it had experienced an explosion of organised gang crime and drug abuse. Streets were running with heavy substances and blood.

It has become the centre of criminal activity.

In the midst of them; British firms, all of them enemies. Shipments were often lost, people were slaughtered, buildings stormed, places robbed, warehouses burned.

Total chaos. Horror.

It had to stop. Fighting fire with fire has never led to anything other than a blaze.

So even if they had reasons to keep as far away from one another, and only one to get together – the most influential seven families met in the middle of it all – the Quarter. It’s a building close to the heart of Liverpool. One that hasn’t belonged to any of them and could be considered as a neutral ground.

And so they sat around the table and discussed business deals, their goals – the future. It was hours of long and heated conversations with more than one incident of almost getting handsy. They were always close to taking out the guns and doing what they knew best – bringing death into the picture.

They didn’t.

At a late hour, way into the night, with the sky ripped open and rain falling and crashing against the windows of a big office space with a huge table in the centre, they finally decided. They formed the coalition. They formed the Firm.

Fiennes, Addison, Coldwell, Jones, Laidley, Linwood and Rainforth – sworn rivals shared the city. Shared ‘Smack City’. Each family had a demarcated territory and an organizationally structured hierarchy. They reported to one another once a month at the Quarter meeting.

There was peace.

For years they were working together and never against one another.

Until they weren’t.

Until this one twenty-year-old girl came and dealt with them exactly the way she imagined doing for years. Until they were begging, no longer fighting.

But she was the last one standing.

Or maybe not...