Risk

by Raquel Belle

  I don’t know what to say, so I say nothing.

  “Trust him,” Charlotte says, “I was out of line last night and that’s why I dropped it.”

  “Okay,” I say it just to make the conversation end. We’re not seeing eye to eye here.

  Charlotte takes a breath and releases it. “You want to have a drink? I put the beers you brought in the fridge, and Derrick had some in here already. You had one last night.”

  “Yeah,” I say, “I could use one. I think I’m all recovered anyway.”

  “How’d that happen?” She twists the top off a Heineken and hands it to me.

  “I don’t think I was ever a real alcoholic to begin with. Plus, it’s all a matter of perspective,” I say. We clink our bottles and each take a long draw.

  “Yeah?”

  “Well, when you’re in a situation like what we’re in right now, drinking doesn’t seem like such a big deal.”

  “I guess you’re right,” she says. “Now, let’s see how this works,” she picks up a tool that looks like spade and slides a pizza onto it. I dust the stone in the oven with a bit of flour before she maneuvers the pizza in and coaxes it off the spade. We repeat the process another three times and then wait, sipping our beers.

  Charlotte looks around the kitchen, curiously, and then says, “I wonder if Derrick is seeing someone? All this sprucing up couldn’t have been his idea.”

  “Yeah, it definitely has a feminine touch to it. What’s the story with you and him anyway?”

  Charlotte laughs, “Oh, nothing, he’s always trying his luck…from the first day we met if you can believe that. Now it’s just our thing, he flirts, I shoot him down for fun, it doesn’t mean anything. It would be weird now if he didn’t do it. He’s been a good friend over the years. He’s always there for us.”

  “That’s nice. Sounds like all you guys are all really tight.”

  “That happens when you serve together. Those are bonds that nothing can break.”

  “Then what about Brenner?”

  She gives me a stern look, “That’s exactly why he has to go.”

  I want to let the moment pass, but I can’t help myself. “What was he like?”

  “Brenner?”

  “Yeah.”

  She seems to consider her answer before she speaks. “Disciplined. Focused. All business. I just…I can’t conceive of a world where he would do what he did. But when you look back at things, you can sort of see how they might fit. There were times where he’d get a certain look on his face, but he wouldn’t say the words. Like he’d be resentful…or bitter…but he wouldn’t talk about it. I always felt that he liked it too much, you know?”

  “Liked what too much?”

  “The killing,” she gives me a look like she’s tasted something horrible. “But Jack trusted him implicitly, he was like our unofficial second in command. Jack confided mission details to him that he wouldn’t tell the rest of us. I suppose he thought he was sparing us and that Brenner could handle it. They were together the longest out of all of us.”

  I don’t say anything so she goes on.

  “They were in basic training together. That’s a little over eighteen years of friendship…well sixteen if you minus the last two.” She shakes her head. “Why would he throw all that away and do this to us? I just can’t understand it.” She pauses and seems like she’s thinking. “You know towards the end they would argue a lot—Brenner and Jack. Brenner thought he knew better and that’s not how things are supposed to work. If you don’t follow the chain of command, that’s how things fall apart. He stopped hanging out with us when we weren’t on the job. Maybe those were signs, but you just never expect something like this.”

  “I can’t imagine what he must be going through,” I say, “you either.”

  “Well, imagine your twin sister pulling a gun on you, shooting you and then killing everyone you love.”

  Damn, she’s right, I am being such a bitch to Jack right now. He needs me in his corner and I’ve been pushing him away.

  “Looks like the pizzas are ready,” Charlotte says, pulling me back to reality, “you want to go call the guys down?”

  “Sure.”

  Chapter Forty-Four

  Jack

  After Derrick briefed me on his new emergency protocols, I had him dig up all the information he could find on DPS. There’s nothing. We can’t even figure out what the acronym stands for.

  He’s got access to every three-letter agency in the United States, DHS, NSA, FBI, DOD, DEA, CIA…all of them…and he can’t find anything useful.

  All we can see is they’re a private Russian security company. There’s a scattering of surveillance photos and a few profiles. We know they’ve got bratva ties and that’s it. Nothing we didn’t know already.

  He’s managed to borrow computing power from a bunch of supercomputers all over the world and the brute force crack is underway, it’s just a matter of time now.

  We did a bit of catching up, he told me that he’s been seeing an analyst in the FBI, then he asked about Deanna, but it got me thinking that it’s probably time we went our separate ways. She’s doesn’t seem to understand the gravity of the situation and I’m not going to fight her on it. I know what she’s asking me to do, and I’m not going to do it. I will not let that son of bitch walk free.

  She’s a civilian. How long could this have really lasted? I’ve been living in a dream…it’s time to face reality. I know she sees me differently now. Does she see a violent man?

  I’m watching the screens with Derrick and trying to talk myself into letting Deanna go when she walks into the room.

  “Hey guys, pizzas are ready.”

  “I’ll be down in a few minutes,” Derrick says, “I just need to finish up here really quick.”

  “Okay,” I say, “see you down there.”

  I get up and walk out with Deanna. As soon as we step out of the room, she takes my hand, leads me to the conference room and closes the door.

  “What’s wrong?” I ask her.

  She leans me against the large twelve-seater table, gets between my legs and then kisses me. It’s slow, like she’s testing the waters. I wasn’t expecting it. She does it again. She pecks at my chin, my cheeks and rubs her nose against mine.

  “What are you doing?”

  “What do you think I’m doing?” she whispers.

  She sucks and nips at my earlobe. I’m getting hard. She massages my cock through my jeans.

  “We haven’t done it in a while, Jackhammer,” she says, and gives me another testing kiss, “do you want to?”

  “Here? Now?”

  “Yeah,” she kisses me again, this time longer and more passionately.

  We haven’t made love in days, maybe that’s why we’ve been so at odds with each other. I kiss her back, hard, and push her against the wall. I start kissing her neck. Her hands go to work on my belt and I’m about to pull her shirt off when we hear two knocks on the door.

  Deanna yelps in surprise and we break apart just as Charlotte pokes her head in.

  “There you guys are,” she looks at us and realizes what’s going on. “Oh, well, I guess you’ve made up then,” she gives us a smirk and chuckles. “Do you need a few minutes?”

  Deanna buries her reddened face in my chest and starts laughing. I laugh as well.

  She looks up at Charlotte, tries to force down an embarrassed smile and shakes her head. She grabs my hand and pulls me with her. “Come on, the pizza is going to get cold,” she says.

  As soon as we’re out of earshot I pull her to me and whisper, “To be continued.” She nods and looks at me wide-eyed with a smile.

  We’re about to go down the stairs, with Charlotte only a few steps behind us, when Derrick yells from his office, “Guys!”

  “Yeah?” I call back.

  “Get in here!”

  We run to Derrick’s office and find him with a huge smile on his face, “It’s open,” he says.

  “The drive?” I
ask.

  “Yeah.”

  “That quick?” Charlotte says.

  “Brute force is about trying every combination sequentially and sometimes you get lucky because the key is randomly generated and—”

  “Forget about that,” I say, “what’s on the drive?”

  “That’s the best part,” he says.

  “Yeah?”

  “You ready for this?”

  “Yes, damnit,” Charlotte says, “tell us.”

  “You’re sure?” Derrick asks with an even bigger smile.

  We all shout “YES!”

  “Okay, okay, okay,” he pauses, then takes a breath.

  Charlotte grabs him by the collar, “Derrick!”

  He laughs, “It’s crypto,” somehow his smile grows larger, “a shit ton of crypto. Bitcoin—worth around one hundred and forty-seven million dollars at today’s prices,” he points to a monitor on the second row with graphs on it.

  What?

  There’s a stunned silence in the room.

  Did he just say what I think he said?

  “Come again?” I say.

  “I said—there’s one hundred and forty-seven million dollars on this thing. The drive is a crypto-wallet.”

  “You’re saying there’s one hundred and forty-seven million dollars…on that?” Charlotte asks.

  “That’s exactly what I’m saying.”

  We’re all quiet, trying to process what we’ve just heard, then Deanna shouts, “WOOHOO!” She starts jumping up and down, clapping our backs and kissing us.

  Derrick and Charlotte join in, hollering, laughing and throwing out high-fives.

  I take a deep breath and feel a smile breaking out, “Finally some good fucking news! Okay, calm down guys, one thing at a time. How do we convert that into real money?”

  “It is real money, Jack,” he says.

  “I’m talking about the actual dollars, I can’t give Dina, Angie and Beth their money in Bitcoin.”

  “This is a huge amount, so it’s going to take a little time. What I’m going to have to do is load up chunks of the crypto at different exchanges worldwide—as much as they can take—and have all the cash funneled to an account in the Seychelles to do a temporary tax dodge and keep us anonymous. From there, we’ll have all the money in dollars and you can distribute it however you want. It shouldn’t take too long, maybe thirty minutes.”

  “Sounds good,” I say, “make it happen.”

  “You’re going to lose about seven million in fees and commissions and stuff.”

  “I don’t care, we just got dumped a truck-load of money in our laps, it’s the price of doing business, that’s how the world works.”

  “Can’t that wait a little while?” Deanna says, “We accomplished the mission, Jack. You wanted a big score to take care of everybody and we’ve done it!”

  “Yeah,” Charlotte says, “come on, bask in the glow for once!”

  “Let’s take a little time to celebrate before you chain Derrick to his desk?” Deanna laughs, “we were after four million and landed up with thirty-five times that! Come on! This is a game changer, Jackhammer!”

  I laugh, “Yeah, okay, we’ve earned it. Let’s go have our lunch and a few drinks…but I want everyone sharp. You get away with four million and the right people might let it go. You get away with a hundred and forty-seven…they’re going to be looking…whether you’re Elon Musk, Bill Gates or Jeff Bezos, you’re going to look. What’s up with that tracer?”

  “It didn’t even get close. We’re free and clear.”

  “You worry too much,” Deanna says and gives me a quick kiss, “come on.”

  We all go downstairs. The mood has changed completely. We went from the edge of despair to the top of the world.

  Derrick takes a laptop down with him to work remotely—he’s never without a screen near him.

  Deanna finds some champagne flutes and Charlotte brings out a ’98 Dom Perignon Blanc. The bottle is huge. It’s the type Formula One drivers open when they win the championship.

  “Hey!” Derrick says, “I was saving that!”

  “You mean for the next time you find a hundred and forty-seven million dollars on a flash drive?” Charlottes jokes.

  “Good point,” he laughs.

  Music starts up from somewhere, I don’t know who’s responsible, but it definitely sets the tone. This is turning into a party.

  “Who wants to do the honors?” Charlotte asks, “Fearless leader?” She offers me the bottle.

  “Nope,” I laugh, “give it to Derrick, without him all we’d have is a two-inch piece of plastic.”

  “Well without you jumping out of buildings, we wouldn’t have it at all,” he says.

  “Trust me, that was the easiest part about all of this,” I pass the massive bottle to him. I see Deanna whisper something to Charlotte and they both buckle over in a fit of laughter. “What?” I ask.

  Charlotte is in stitches and manages to squeak out, “You don’t want to know,” with a shake of her head. She’s turned a bit red. Deanna is similarly incapacitated and fighting to breathe through the laughter.

  Derrick pops the cork on the champagne with a “WOO!” and then proceeds to fill all four glasses. When he’s done I stand and raise mine up, everyone follows suit.

  “To the team,” I say, and look to each one of them in turn, “past, present and future. There’s nothing we can’t do if we do it together.”

  “To the team,” they echo and we touch glasses.

  “Damn, that’s tasty,” Deanna says after taking a sip.

  “I know, right?” says Charlotte.

  “It cost enough,” Derrick says, faking being morose.

  “Listen here you stingy fuck—” Charlotte is obviously messing with him.

  “I’m kidding!” He laughs with his hands up.

  “That’s what I thought,” she nods at him with a serious look before cracking up.

  We eat and drink and make jokes for the next thirty-five minutes but when Derrick is ready, we all talk it over and decide that we don’t want to give anyone too much money—you should have enough money to enable you to do something with your life, but not so much that you can sit around and do nothing.

  The wives’ kids need to be looked after, but not spoiled. We decide that we’ll give Angie, Beth and Dina four million dollars each. That’s enough to pay for everyone’s educations and keep roofs over their heads till they can manage on their own. I show Derrick their account numbers in my notebook and he makes it happen.

  Derrick says he doesn’t really need any money because he’s doing well, but I insist that he takes one million. I tell him that he can consider it payment for his services. If no one else in the world has cracked AES 256-bit and he did it like he was falling off a log, it’s the least we owe him.

  Deanna, Charlotte and I decide to do the same—one million dollars each in our personal accounts.

  I get Derrick to set up another account and put four million into that one. I’ll text the relevant details to Anton. He did take quite a hit on the job so that ought to bring him back to par…hopefully even to profit.

  The rest of the money, one hundred and twenty million, we decide to leave in the Seychelles for now. I’ll call it our discretionary fund…should something ever come up.

  Maybe we can use it do something together, maybe we could go into business for ourselves…I don’t know right now. Derrick turns the computer to me to enter a new password for the account, then I write the details in my notebook.

  “Why don’t you just take it and retire, Jack?” Derrick says, “I mean, you’ve given everything a man can give to this job. I think you deserve it. What do you guys think?” he looks to Charlotte and Deanna.

  “It doesn’t take a hundred and twenty million to retire. Sunshine and fresh air are free, and I’m only thirty-six,” I wink. “Put that away for now,” I point to the computer. “Maybe one of us will come up with a good idea before the night is done.” I raise my glass
of scotch, then look at Deanna, Charlotte and Derrick, “I’ve got everything I need right here. Some things, money can’t buy.”

  We touch glasses, but I feel like I’ve bummed them out because no one says anything for a while, then Charlotte downs her whisky, stands and turns up the tunes in the living room. She comes back and pulls Deanna and Derrick with her to dance. She knows better than to do it to me. I just give them a smile and a nod.

  It’s finally done. Finally. Ross, Lester and Daryl can rest easy knowing their families are taken care of. Now there’s only one thing left to do.

  Chapter Forty-Five

  Deanna

  It’s not even five ‘o clock and we’re jumping around like lunatics in Derrick’s living room. It’s great! I’m having so much fun!

  But then I look over at Jack and see the somber look on his face, he’s deep in thought. Why does he always have to carry the weight of the world on his shoulders?

  I tap Charlotte on the shoulder and give her a wink when I point to Jack. She nods and I make my way to him. I jump onto his lap and put my arms around his neck, “Hello!”

  “Hey,” he laughs.

  “Whatcha doin?”

  “Nothing, just thinking.”

  “About what?” I give him a small kiss.

  “Stuff,” he kisses me back.

  “You want to go see the world’s largest ball of twine tomorrow?” I kiss him again. “Well, not tomorrow, it’s in Kansas, but we can start working our way up there?” One more kiss.

  He smiles at me. “Hey, what were you and Charlotte laughing about before with the champagne?”