Reunion: Diversion Six

by Eden Winters

  “Kinda late to be asking now, ain’t it?”

  Jimmy scowled.

  Lucky rolled his eyes. “All right.” He pulled in a deep breath, let it out slowly, and tried to imitate Walter’s words in a Southern accent. “Hardly the time to ask such a thing, is it not?”

  Jimmy winced. “I’ll check the bookcase for family videos.”

  Walter kneaded Lucky’s shoulders. “Are you sure you’re up to going through with this?”

  Lucky stared at himself—not himself—in the mirror his brother had probably used every morning. Hair parted and slicked into submission. Topped off with the too-sweet scent he’d noticed in the hospital. Add a bit of a sneer and damned if he couldn’t pass for the guy in the photos. Just a driver. No real danger of being made if he stayed beneath notice. “I need to find out how deep in the shit Bristol was.”

  Not to mention put a stop to whoever brought carfentanil into the country. As if the US didn’t already have enough drug problems. But truthfully? Lucky missed his job. Being in the action. What a hypocrite. One moment he worried about winding up dead, the next he nursed an adrenaline rush.

  Jimmy stepped back into the bedroom, stuck a disk into a DVD player, and turned on a wall-sized TV.

  Bristol’s face appeared. Despite the circumstances, Lucky’s heart lurched. Maybe if he hadn’t been so hard on the guy as kids…

  Onscreen, Bristol asked, “How do you want your steak cooked?” Someone off camera must have spoken. Bristol nodded. “Rare it is.”

  Jimmy paused the video.

  A cookout. With people Lucky didn’t know and who hadn’t been a part of his life. Another felon to portray. Nothing personal. Nothing at all. “How you want your steak cooked?”

  Walter cringed and didn’t bother to hide his reaction.

  Still needed work. “How do you want your steak cooked?”

  Jimmy sighed. “Let’s try another clip.” He fast-forwarded and tried again.

  Bristol pulled his lips back in a lazy smile. “You’re sexy dressed like that.”

  An image came to Lucky’s mind of Bo in his damned hot assless chaps. “You’re sexy dressed like that.”

  Walter smiled, possibly for more than one reason. “Better. Try again.”

  “Wow! He looks so much like you. And your other brother,” Jimmy commented, gazing at the video. “If he’d been wearing a hospital gown the day I saw him go into your room, I’d have fussed at him to get back in bed. I’ve seen plenty of videos and pictures, but seeing him here, now, with you for comparison…”

  After fifteen minutes of watching, Lucky did a perfect imitation, “Hi, I’m Bristol Lucklighter.” He even managed the same oily smile.

  “I have something for you.” Jimmy grabbed a box off the bed, crouched down, and lifted Lucky’s pant leg. “You can’t be too careful. How’s that feel?”

  Lucky tested the weight of the leg holster and gun. “Works.”

  Walter searched Lucky’s soul through his eyes. “How are you doing? Feeling all right? Remember, I trust your gut instincts more than any intel. Say the word, and this operation stops here. No one will fault you.”

  The incision seemed hell bent and determined to be a pain in the side for of all eternity, not to mention the wood chipper ripping Lucky’s heart out piece by piece. Yet he’d never abandon tonight’s effort and pass up a chance to learn the truth. “I’m tougher’n a pine knot, as my sister says.”

  “I’m sure you are.”

  Jimmy slapped Lucky’s shoulder. “Nine o’clock. Show time.”

  Hey, Lucky’s line.

  ***

  If Lucky’s heart pounded any harder, it’d fly out of his chest and beat him to the airport. He hummed Achy Breaky Heart into his microphone, sending Bo a message, if Bo happened to be within hearing.

  At one time the silver BMW might have been Lucky’s dream car. Now, surrounded by his brother’s things, wearing his brother’s clothes, it made his stomach churn. Mama always said to respect the dead.

  Hard to do when the dead tried to kill him.

  Lucky pulled the car into the gate and parked near the hangar, like he’d watched his brother do before on videos. Bristol had been a lackey, with nothing much expected of him.

  All the same, Lucky ran his hand under the seat and caressed his .38.

  After a few moments, his target emerged from the hangar, stepping straight into a floodlight’s glow. “Six feet, about two-hundred pounds,” Lucky murmured to his tie tack. “Forty-ish. Dark blue golf shirt, khaki pants. Bulged out backpack.”

  The guy got into the back seat, set the bag aside, and closed the door. “Did you take care of that matter we spoke of last time?”

  What matter? Killing Lucky, maybe? “Yes.” Lucky added a “sir”.

  “Good.”

  He sat idling. What now?

  After a few moments of nerve-wracking quiet, the man said, “Take me to the warehouse. And be quick about it. I need to be in Toronto by morning.”

  Lovely when suspects spilled information. Soon the SNB would have a complete list of all passengers bound for Toronto within the next sixteen hours. Lucky drove the car out of the gate, toward a warehouse off I-95, one of the routes he’d memorized.

  The man spent the entire ride on his cell phone. Lucky strained to hear the words. With any luck, the mic caught everything.

  Somewhere at the end of this whole ordeal, maybe he could get on with his life. He pulled into the warehouse gate Jimmy said normally stayed locked.

  Unlocked and opened. They were expected. A lone streetlight barely chased back shadows. Shadows. Good to hide in.

  Lucky stopped the car.

  His passenger slipped a packet over the front seat, the size of a deck of playing cards.

  Gloves. The man wore plastic gloves. And Lucky didn’t have any. No way would he touch the wrapper when a touch might kill him, even though he’d brought along naloxone, the magic elixir, in case—in handy little inhalers. No needle required.

  The man chuckled. “I’ve forgotten how fastidious you are.” He placed the pack on the console. “A gift.”

  Lucky made no move to touch the package.

  “Come with me.”

  Wait! What? “You want me to…”

  “Yes. Come with me. And leave your gun under the seat.”

  Oh fuck.

  Chapter Twenty-four

  Lucky stayed two steps behind the man who suddenly made his world scarier. In over a decade with the SNB, he’d never been burnt while undercover.

  He’d keep his perfect record, thank you very much. The fact he walked behind gave some comfort. No one in their right mind turned their back on an enemy.

  The ankle holster offered some comfort—not much—but better than nothing.

  He followed the man up a set of steps to a loading dock and into a darkened building. Darkness, his one true friend in this situation. Outside, other agents better be regrouping, rethinking original plans and figuring out how to cover a man inside.

  Their footsteps echoed in a cavernous room, empty except for a few metal racks, illuminated only by emergency exit lighting marking doors, and a light up ahead. Lucky mentally marked exits. If worst case scenario became reality, he’d learned to duck and run.

  Only, his gimpy assed-leg didn’t allow for much running, nor did his partial recovery from surgery. He donned Bristol’s sneer, pulled himself up his full five-feet-six inch-height, and squared his shoulders. He’d make use of something he’d learned in training—from Bo.

  For the next few hours, Lucky Lucklighter, Simon Harrison, and any of Lucky’s other personas didn’t exist. Bristol Lucklighter. That’s who he’d be. The high-living, low morals, money hungry sonofabitch who profited from loved ones’ deaths and wouldn’t help his own father.

  Nope. Not the way to get into Bristol’s head. Not loved ones’ deaths if you didn’t have anyone you loved more than yourself.

  Money. Power. Possessions. And being more than a tobacco farmer’s second
son. In his own head, Bristol had overcome his past, deserved to look down on lesser beings like his family. He’d made something of himself.

  And Bristol hated his older brother, a man who hadn’t gone to college, hadn’t scratched and scraped his way up the ladder, but still managed to live the life Bristol wanted, thanks to a wealthy and powerful lover.

  If his parents had tried harder, they could have provided a better life, a life Bristol didn’t have to hide from the popular kids he’d tried to impress in school. And he wouldn’t have had to depend on his brother’s rich lover to pay his way through college.

  Screw them. Screw them all. The asshole walking in front of him provided a means to an end. Nothing more than a bug smear on the bottom of Bristol’s expensive Italian loafer. Without trying hard, he’d own these guys, run the whole show.

  By the time they approached the hallway light, smug aloofness replaced any fear.

  The backpack he’d been staring at for the past few minutes held the key to all a man like Bristol wanted.

  His escort opened a door and entered a dimly-lit room, not even bothering to glance over his shoulder to make sure his flunky followed. Bristol’s heartbeat raced, but not from fear. Pure adrenaline shot through his veins.

  No windows, only one door. Standing behind Backpack Guy kept him somewhat concealed, both by shadows and the man’s body, and close to the exit. He swept his gaze over a scene he’d witnessed many times: the drug deal. From tiny casual buys to massive trafficking operations, he’d seen them all.

  The stacks of bills spread out before him on a table in what must have once been a conference room rivaled any single buys he’d participated in.

  Two men stood on the opposite side of the table. One exuded authority, the other held a semi-automatic weapon. Don’t leave home without the hired muscle. For a moment, Lucky’s facade wavered. He knew the muscle. Every single inch, from the dark, tousled hair to the freckles across the nose and on down to the assets hidden beneath jeans and a tight T-shirt.

  No recognition shone in Bo’s eyes, other than a quick once-over. No. Not Bo. Rent-a-Thug, who didn’t know Bristol Lucklighter. Bristol Lucklighter. I am Bristol Lucklighter.

  Lucky had been told to leave his gun behind, so he wasn’t supposed to be an open threat, but he was definitely backup and possibly a witness. Whoever Backpack Guy was, he didn’t trust his partners in crime, or he wanted to exert a little authority himself. And judging from the bulge in his light jacket, he’d come prepared.

  Why not have Lucky armed too? Oh. Right. Bristol never could shoot worth a shit. Maybe as a sign of faith too. Honor among thieves and all. Either way, dumbass move on Backpack Guy’s part. Never, ever, let the buyer have the upper hand.

  The buyer bore a striking resemblance to one of Lila’s baby-daddies on South Bend Springs—information to be filed away for later use in descriptions.

  The man he’d brought to the party flung the backpack onto the table. “It’s all there.”

  The one he pegged as the boss kept a steely-eyed glint on the supplier and opened the backpack with gloved hands. Packets fell out onto the table and floor. The buyer trained his beady, hard-edged gaze onto the dozen or so escaped packets.

  Oh, dude, you never bring that much money to a buy, screamed through the part of Bristol’s brain still owned by Lucky. You’ve given up your leverage. One squeeze of the trigger and we get the money and the drugs.

  Sloppy.

  The seller nodded but didn’t reach for the money. “Bristol, get the cash.”

  On a first name basis. If the guy turned around and got a good look…

  “You’re not going anywhere.” The buyer stiffened, took a step back, and nodded to his thug. The gunman aimed his weapon straight at Lucky. Oh shit.

  Backpack Guy shouted, “What? Why not? We had a deal.”

  The man with excellent peripheral vision replied, “We did, but that’s not Bristol Lucklighter. I had him killed.”

  Fucking hell.

  All three men honed their sights on Lucky.

  Lucky had transmitted a lot of evidence to the SNB. Killing him now only prolonged the inevitable.

  All traces of Bristol fled.

  And so did Lucky.

  ***

  Outrunning healthy men wasn’t happening, not with Lucky’s beat-up body. Why hadn’t he listened to Walter and Bo and taken things easier?

  Because if push ever came to shove, he needed to be here, for himself, his family, his department, and even Bristol, learning firsthand how deep in the shit his brother had sank.

  He’s done nothing you haven’t done. Yes, he had. Lucky never tried to kill anyone or betray his family. And he didn’t get the moral high ground often.

  Being in unfamiliar territory left him with few choices. He could either limp through the warehouse where he made an easy target but knew the lay of the land, or find out what waited behind door number one.

  He chose the door and hunkered down in a janitor’s closet. Footsteps pounded by. “Get the little asshole!” the boss of the group shouted.

  Lucky crouched, putting him in position to use the ankle-holstered gun he’d properly thank Jimmy for later.

  He cracked open the door and peeped out, straining his ears in the silence.

  Bap, bap, bap, bap, bap.

  Oh shit. Gunfire. Never a good thing. And Bo out there, God knew where. The toy-sized gun with a thirteen-shot clip fit oddly in Lucky’s hand, nothing like his .38.

  Thirteen shots better be more than he needed. He eased out of the closet, his back to the wall and his gun at the ready. The room where they’d met to deal lay to the right, and the shots came from the left.

  Right, then.

  In times like these, his lack of height gave him a huge advantage, making him much harder to spot.

  He paused long enough by the conference room door to snap and send a few pictures, and clue in the listeners-of-the-mic to his whereabouts. Too bad they couldn’t tell him what the fuck the shots were about.

  More footsteps, coming his way.

  The empty office across the way made an excellent vantage point. The boss came back, huffing for breath, shoved some drugs and cash into the pack, and shot down the hall to the right, one hand pressed to his side.

  He’d left behind quite a haul. Desperate, then.

  Lucky counted to ten, murmured his intent to his tie tack, and silently stalked his prey. Dark spots glistened wetly on dingy, industrial-gray carpeting. Ahead several light fixtures lacked bulbs, giving both predator and prey darkness for hiding.

  The asshole who said he’d had Bristol killed would answer to a pissed off Lucklighter.

  The blood trail led straight down the hallway and veered off once or twice, into windowless rooms. The wounded man sought a way out, and didn’t appear totally familiar with the building. Worked for Lucky.

  According to the plans Lucky reviewed earlier, the warehouse lay that way, conference room, offices with no windows. The hall eventually led to an exit with a chained metal door and metal grids on all windows.

  Both he and his quarry worked their way into a dead end.

  He observed but didn’t try to apprehend. Not without backup.

  Walter’s lessons finally hit home. Boss would be so proud.

  The hallway came to a T intersection. Movement caught his eye and he fused his back with the wall. The blood marked a turn. Someone—and not the one he sought—lingered in the hall to his left. They stopped, so might suspect his presence.

  Not good. He counted to three, gripped the gun in both hands, and popped out of his hiding place.

  And stared down a gun barrel.

  He froze a scant second before his brain screamed, Shoot!

  Bo’s wide eyes met his. Relief whooshed out of him. If choosing one person to run into at a time like this, Bo ranked number one.

  Bo ranked number one anytime. Lucky pointed toward where the dealer dripped blood, down an unlit hallway.

  Bo nodded.

/>   He’d kiss the guy later. Lucky took point, darting down the hall and squeezing himself into a recessed doorway. He bounced from doorway to doorway, Bo taking each shelter he vacated.

  A breeze brushed Lucky’s face, and he glanced around a ledge to an outside door standing partially open. Oops. Jimmy gave him bad intel about chained exits.

  He’d chew the asshole out later.

  Stooping, he dashed to one side of the door and put his back against the wall. Bo took the other side.

  Not a sound came from outside, save the distant shrill of sirens, growing closer by the second.

  Open gate. Parking lot. For the office workers, most likely, back before the place was abandoned.

  Lucky eased up to see around the doorframe. Squinting didn’t help his night vision. His side pained him some, about five on a scale from one to shot. He’d live.

  Tires squalled and three carloads of Greensboro’s finest came barreling through the gate, followed by a black SUV.

  Judging from muffled sirens, more cars surrounded the back of the warehouse.

  An officer hopped from the first car, gun aimed and ready for business. “Step out with your hands on your head.”

  Idiot. At this angle Lucky could take him out easily. Good thing Lucky only played a felon for the job.

  Now.

  Hearing his boss’s voice in his head, he swung the door wide and did as told. The officer kept the gun trained on him. “Pat him down.”

  Another officer approached, took his gun, and began going through the motions of a search.

  “Those aren’t drugs in my pocket,” Lucky growled. “I’ve just got a really big…”

  Bap, bap, bap, bap. Lucky dropped to the ground and crawled on his belly to the nearest police car. Fuck, that hurt! The cops were gone. Probably sheltering behind their own cars.

  Where was Bo?”

  There came a time when a man got too old for this shit, and a clock ticked away in Lucky’s head.

  A black van approached. Oh, cool. SWAT team. Dark shapes hopped out of the van, fully geared, scuttled into the shadows and, one by one, entered the building. Let ‘em. Lucky’d stay right here.