Accidental Villainy 16 (Patreon)

I ignored the desire to let out a distinct cry of frustration as I stepped inside. They were still too close, and getting rid of my stress was not worth damaging the illusion I had managed to build up. 

Fucking useless Tyler, ruining everything due to his sheer presence. Like I didn’t have enough problems with attacking the henchmen of the Slasher, or the drug distribution warehouse that happened to open just a few blocks away. 

Now I had to invent an imaginary villain to support us. 

Even more annoyingly, even when I returned to the bar, I wasn’t able to let out a cry of frustration freely. Not when Tara was already in the main bar area, a tense yet expectant expression on her face. I had to continue looking strong. 

I let out a soft sigh as I continued, letting Tara feel tenser at my silence. I didn’t want to torture her by that, but to enhance her anticipation. I said nothing until I arrived back at the bar, and looked at her. Her beautiful eyes were flickering with fear and anticipation. “You did well,” I said. 

She let out the breath she was holding. “T-thanks, sir,” she said, her breath trembling as it left her mouth. I could see that she had another question on her lips, one with no doubt about the mysterious boss who was supposed to be supporting us. 

I thought about lying to her about that. There were certain advantages to making her believe that … the biggest being the security of the secret. I didn’t fear her revealing the secret deliberately, but an accidental reveal was a different matter. 

She was too naive to resist a subtle interrogator. 

However, in the end, I decided to tell her the truth. The reason was simple. While the risk of revealing the truth was unpalatable, the potential of losing her respect was even more so. What if her devotion was transferred to my non-existent boss. 

No, I had no intention of competing with an imaginary person for the affection of my sexy superhero secretary. “No, it was just a lie I told to keep them away until we can put some security measures in place,” I said. 

She looked insulted at that. It clicked me a second later. She clearly treated the security at the bar as her responsibility already, taking that as an insult. 

“We don’t want them to burn the bar while we’re out for some errand, do we?” I asked, preemptively dismantling that bomb. 

Maybe my powers weren’t as useless as I had first thought. “Now, as much as I wanted to continue where we left off, I have an urgent task for you,” I said as I pulled some cash, then opened my phone to show a simple tiny security camera. They were not particularly high quality, but they didn’t need to be. “Now, I want you to go and purchase fifty of them,” I said, spending two and a half grand immediately, which was more than half of what I had taken from the group that attacked the bar the night before. 

A necessary expense. Luckily, today’s group was kind enough to drop another, larger bag, more than enough to compensate for that particular loss. The weapons they left behind were just a bonus. 

“Yes, sir,” she said, taking a step too upstairs, to change before leaving. 

“Don’t buy more than five from a store, and don’t show your purchases,” I said. Fifty security cameras at once was a little suspicious. 

I said nothing while she went upstairs and changed. Only after she went far away enough not to hear my little trick, I grabbed the baseball bat I kept as a security tool, and walked to the back of the bar. 

… and started beating the garbage can. “Fuck, fuck, fuck…” I growled with every hit, giving me a chance to focus on the present. I stopped only when my hands started hurting with every hit. 

I returned, looking in the mirror to catch my face, reddened with exertion. “No need to act like a teenager, Jason,” I spoke to myself. “Push your turmoil down, and focus. You’re a man, and you have made a choice.” 

I had made a choice, one that was more or less permanent. I had challenged a villain. Indirectly, maybe, but still a challenge. And, if I suddenly disappeared, they would rightfully assume that it was a pathetic bluff. 

It was the kind of thing that the villains treated as a matter of honor. Worse, he didn’t even need to chase me … he just needed to pay a villain that specialized in such a service, and they would find me … even bringing me back with a nice gift wrap for some extra charge. 

“A choice indeed,” I murmured as I walked to the bar, poured myself a glass of my best whiskey — which, unfortunately, wasn’t that good — and knocked it down in one. 

“Now, onto the more immediate matters,” I said as I turned my attention to the bags they had left, going through them. Four guns, some spare ammo — no blades though, as I didn’t want to directly insult the Slasher by stealing his signature weapon — but more importantly, money. 

A hundred thousand…

“If only I had this money yesterday,” I murmured as I examined the content, feeling bittersweet. If I had this money the day before, I would have just closed my rundown bar in the middle of nowhere and opened a new one in a better part of the city … but it was far from enough to get away from after insulting a villain with a famously fragile ego. 

I had no option but to stay, and commit deeper to the role. 

First, the bar design. For a moment, I thought about renovating the place, to make it something more fitting to a peripheral business of a leading villain. There were certain advantages to it…

“No,” I said after considering it for a while. It sounded like a good idea to decorate the place in a fancier way. It would even work … if I had the necessary money. 

Unfortunately, while sixty thousand was a lot of money for me, it was nowhere near building a nice avant-garde bar truly worthy of a leading villain. If I spent all that money on decoration, the only thing I would achieve was to ruin the effect. 

I needed to be more selective. But how… 

I turned my attention to the shelves, particularly the empty top shelf. “Contrast, it is,” I suddenly said as I pulled on a pen and paper, and started to make some calculations … about which extremely expensive bottles I could afford that would make the best impression. 

I immediately skipped the mainstream brands, and instead focused on some of the more unique gin and whiskey brands, with a few rare vodka and tequila brands added for variety, all almost unknown but just enough to have a reputation among the experts, combined with a unique design… at the same time, checking the bar repeatedly to make sure their visual theme fit well with my unique look. 

Some did, while others were a touch gaudier … so I decided to buy a few decanters as well to further highlight the difference. 

Altogether, I could imagine them filling their selves, creating the picture of a bar that was destined to fail. After all, the cheapest bottle I had planned to purchase was three hundred dollars. Even without adding in some of the overhead and other costs, I needed to sell a glass at least twenty just to break even at the cost. 

Add in those and taxes, and even fifty would barely break even. A challenge for all but the most expensive bars exclusive for the super-rich, and that was for the cheapest. 

Some, I had to pay two hundred or more. 

Worse, my bottles were deliberately chosen from brands that only the real enthusiasts would know about … and they often preferred to drink at their own homes. 

No, even though I planned to spend thirty thousand dollars buying those bottles, I knew that it would fail spectacularly, but it didn’t matter as long as I could sell the impression I wanted to create. 

I was about to finish my list when Tara arrived, carrying two bags filled with the security cameras I asked for, each low quality and battery-powered, but most importantly, small enough to be hidden around the street. 

Exactly what I needed. 

“Very good,” I said, even the bare compliment enough to put a smile on her face. “Now, I’m going to set these around, then we have another shopping trip to complete,” I said. 

“T-together,” she whispered, doing her best to keep her excitement hidden — and failing miserably. 

“Yes, we have some bottles to purchase,” I said, and her smile slipped away. “And, since we’re out, maybe we can finally pick you that uniform,” I added, and it returned even brighter. “Just go and freshen up while I handle setting these up,” I said. 

“Show me how good you are, my power,” I murmured as I walked back and forth across the street, occasionally placing the camera in a nook that I was confident would stay hidden, and only when the street was empty. 

With that, I soon placed fifty cameras, half of them on my street, the other half spread along the streets that surrounded me. I knew that I couldn’t cover the whole street without having any blind spots, so I used my power to identify the best spots people would use to approach while being sneaky, and focused on those. 

After the incredible benefits I had ended through the encounter with Tara, I was more willing to trust my power. It might not be fancy…

But it was more useful than I had initially given credit to…