I mean, obviously with the mission. We have to fight on every front imaginable.
But you know regular fucking cozy office job workers would be a little awkward if they hate-fucked and had to show up in the same office the next day.
My basically sworn enemy just strangled my cock to perfection, milking out my cum so well I think angels sang. Maybe devils danced. Whatever. Point being, I have to deal with this mess with her. If it was hard to be around her before, fuck who knows what will happen in my head when I see Eliza tomorrow.
Part of me wants to go press her up against the shower wall and I realize.
Fuck it.
I follow her into the bathroom.
I catch her off guard, and she gasps. I press her up against the wall and I watch her thighs part more than a little in reaction.
“Eliza Lang,” I say slowly. “I know you’re not responsible for Taylor.” Yeah. That’s all I can manage. But for some fucking reason it matters to me that I tell her this.
She cocks her head to the side, wrapping her fingers around mine laced on her throat. “I’m not. It’s a warning,” Eliza says, looking off in the distance for a second, and then her eyes blaze back at me. “But it isn’t mine. I’m sorry.”
I shake my head and I want to look away, and I don’t want her to see the pain in my eyes. I can tell by how she’s looking at me, Eliza can tell this fucking hurt me.
“I know that he was the only person you had...other than Zario…” Eliza starts. She doesn’t say anything else.
Probably because I fucking freeze up at this moment. I can’t think about this shit right now.
I put her hand down to her pussy.
“You get nice and cleaned up, big day tomorrow,” I tell her.
She smiles at me, and God fucking help me, Eliza smiling at me actually makes me smile.
“Good night,” I tell her.
I leave her room like I’m not fucking running.
In my head, I am.
Because every part of me was screaming to stay.
Fourteen
Eliza
“Could you please pass the Glock?”
Grayson pushes the Glock across the table without even looking up at me, his icy silence almost too much to bear. Not that I can blame it all on him—I haven’t been exactly chatty today.
“Thank you,” I tell him in an icy tone.
I know, this is weird.
No, not the fact that I’m cleaning up a literal arsenal of weapons with one of the deadliest men in the drug trade.That’s kinda part of the job. What I’m talking about is the fact that we’ve barely spoken to each other after...you know, after that.
And yes, the italics refer to the hot sex Grayson and I had back at the motel. Hate-sex...as hot as it is, it always leaves a sour taste in one’s mouth. Especially when there’s a dead friend involved, and your boss was the one that put him out. Yeah, no wonder things are awkward.
“They’ll be here in five,” Grayson grunts, assembling the final rifle and putting a strap on it. Slinging it over his shoulder, he then packs the rest of the weapons on the large duffel bag we have at the center of the table.
“Got it,” is all I say, doing my best not to look at him.
“You won’t screw this up, will you?”
“If you keep out of my way, I won’t.” I can’t help but respond in the same vicious tone he’s using. If there’s one thing I’ve never been able to do, is turn the other cheek. I’m not that religious, in case you haven’t noticed. Probably something to do with being one of the most valuable operatives in the whole drug trade thing. “Is your intel really accurate? I’d hate for us to go on a wild goose chase.”
“My intel is solid.” His voice is as flat as the breasts of an early-shift stripper, but then I notice some hesitation there. “Taylor gave it to me.”
Ah, fuck. Nice going, Eliza. Just keep rubbing salt on that wound, will ya? I could say I’m sorry, but I don’t. If the asshole wants to keep acting all bitter, then that’s his problem. Besides, this game we’re playing isn’t for the soft of heart. By the time we’re done, there’ll be a lot more bodies laying on the ground.
I know I’m being callous in here. Despite what you might think, I’m not some cold-hearted bitch, alright? I do have feelings, even though I’ve always done my best to bury them deep in the desert. And I get what Grayson is going through. In this job, you don’t get to make friends. And to lose the few ones you have...yeah, that’s gotta hurt.
To make matters worse, now I’ve realized that the last thing that that Taylor guy did was find the whereabouts of the man holding the cypher we need. Usually, cartel bosses are cold calculating bastards. Despite what you might think, they’re not full blown psychos that get off on burning people alive and stuff like that. They’re more like high-powered CEOs that simply won’t stop to achieve their objectives.
Of course, every once in a full moon they simply go apeshit. I guess it’s easy for all that money and power to climb to one’s head. I’ve seen my share of irrational brutality over the years, and the worst of it usually happens when the fucking head of a cartel loses his shit and goes on a power trip, telling his goons to start icing people right and left.
And that’s exactly whats happening here.
Jesus Christ, if my boss, Lorenzo Quentin, wanted to send a message, couldn’t he have done something classier? Like chopping the man’s fingers or some shit like that? I get it, we’re not the Yakuza...but it doesn’t hurt to say ‘it’ll just be the finger, motherfucker’ from time to time.
Well, screw it. No use in dwelling on that. In less than five minutes the abandoned warehouse we’re in will be packed with local thugs we’ve managed to hire in a hurry. Not the best way to run an operation, using mercenaries, but I do what I can with what I got.
Here’s the deal: The chemist who originally developed the coke squared formula had an associate that was funding him. An investor of sorts. Once the chemist disappeared off the face of the Earth and his lab was blown to smithereens, the investor was left with his dick in his hand. The only thing he had? The cypher—which was worth nothing, unless you have the original formula to apply it on. The chemist, whoever he was neglected to inform the investor that he had given the formula (without the cypher) to the accountant. He was trying to compartmentalize as much as possible - probably hoping the information asymmetry would keep him alive. But now he’s gone. And with no backing from a cartel, the only course of action left for the investor was to sell the cypher to the highest bidder.
My boss would’ve paid—probably—but, according to Grayson’s intel, the guy has already promised to sell the damn thing to the Russians. Luckily, we know exactly where they’re meeting.
Hence the guns and the local thugs.
And the Guerlain Kiss Kiss lipstick I have on my lips.
Rule number one in a shootout: always look your best. If there’s any chance that this might be your last day on Earth, you don’t want to be caught wearing cheap makeup.
“They’re here.”
I hear the growl of an SUV’s engine approaching, and Grayson hits the gate’s remote. It slowly crawls up, and I squint my eyes as the headlights of the black SUV hit me straight in the face.
“Are these for us? Muy loco,” some stupid idiot wearing a bandana says the moment he jumps out of the car, his eyes darting straight to the duffel bag Grayson’s carrying.
“These are for you, yeah,” Grayson replies. “just try not to shoot yourselves. And see if you can survive this.”
But of course they won’t.
They’re cannon fodder.
Half an hour later and I’m sitting with Grayson inside our own SUV at the docks, the armed thugs we hired parked in the car right next to our. I glance at Grayson from time to time, but he doesn’t seem to notice.
And if he does, he doesn’t seem to care.
This is so goddamn infuriating. I had the best sex I’ve ever had in my entire life, and then the whole thing goe
s sideways. Why does it have to be this awkward? Sure, yeah, there’s that dead friend thing, I know.
“Look,” I whisper, sinking down in my seat as I see a car slowly roll toward the pier. It kills the lights the moment it stops, and three guys jump out from the inside. One’s a stocky man in a large business suit, greying hair perfectly combed, and the other two look like linebackers. They dwarf the man with the briefcase, and they start looking left and right the moment they step out of the car. Luckily for us, we’re too far off to be noticed.
“Should we go in?” I ask Grayson, certain that the cypher we’re looking for is inside that briefcase.
“No.”
Yup, just like that. No. It almost feels like being slapped in the face. In fact, I’d prefer to be slapped in the face instead of being treated like some annoying nuisance he has to put up with.
I mean, sure, we have the intel because of him. But if I weren’t here to make sure my cartel didn’t send a team of sicarios to chop his head off, there was no way he’d be able to put an operation like this together.
“Miguel, are you in position?” Grayson says into his handheld transceiver the moment another car rolls into sight.
“Yes, jefe. I’m ready, and I have eyes on the targets,” Miguel replies. He’s the only guy we’re paying that isn’t part of the local idiots parked next to us. A true freelancer, Miguel used to be a sniper during the Iraq War. When he returned to the States and saw that no one gave a shit about veterans, he decided to make his way through life the way he knew bast—by putting .50 caliber bullets through people’s skulls.
“Wait till the other guys are in sight, and then fire away. And don’t lose sight of that briefcase. Don’t let anyone escape with it.”
“Gotcha,” comes the simple reply, and then Grayson and I climb out from our SUV. The thugs follow us for a few feet, and then we press our backs against one of the thousands of containers littering the place.
I close my eyes, taking deep breaths as I wait for Miguel to take his shot.
When it comes, it’s like thunder.
I jump out from behind the container, guns blazing as I head straight toward the deal taking place. Two of the Russians are already down, and three more are hiding behind a black executive sedan. The chemist is already lying on the ground, as are his bodyguards, and they’re not moving. Judging by the massive pool of blood they’re lying on, I’ll take a wager and say they won’t be moving for a long time.
“Fuck!” One of the thugs groans as the Russians raise their semi-automatic rifles and unload everything they have on us, bullets ricocheting right over my head. Two of the thugs go down fast, one being hit right in the eye, and the remaining three run toward cover. And judging by how fast they’re running, I’m not sure if they’ll be of much use right now.
“I don’t have a line of sight,” I hear Miguel’s voice through Grayson’s transceiver, and I let out a frustrated sigh. I guess we’re going to have to do this the old way.
Holding two Beretta’s in my hand, my back firmly pressed against one of the containers, I look to the side. Grayson’s there, in the exact my position I’m in, and our eyes lock.
For a moment, I think he’s going to simply look away, but he gives me a slight nod. I nod back at him, and we jump into sight, raining down bullets on the two remaining Russians.
I’m not an expert shooter, but my quick-fire is enough to force the Russians to look for cover. As they scurry around, Grayson goes down on one knee. Taking aim with his rifle, he quickly dispatches the two of them, a thin mist of blood hanging in the air as they fall to the ground.
With my heart beating at a thousand miles per hour, I rush toward the eight bodies lying in front of us. I scan the ground, feeling momentarily nauseous as I can’t seem to find the briefcase, but then I spot it under the investor’s large frame.
Grabbing it, I open it with trembling folders and remove a simple notebook from the inside.
“Is it there?” I hear Grayson ask from behind me. Looking back at him, I flip through the pages and show him the final piece we needed to complete our puzzle.
The cypher.
Fifteen
Eliza
One Month Later
“I still can’t believe it,” I marvel, holding the handrails as I gaze down to the warehouse’s main floor. There, men holding rifles patrol the rows of tables as our head chemist barks orders at his dozen minions, all busy trying to process the coke. Not just any coke, mind you, but the fable coke squared.
“Me neither,” he agrees quietly.
It’s been a long month. With blessings from the cartel, we’ve opened up a secret location an hour south of San Diego. The one caveat both cartels requested was to keep the location secret from the other. Which means outwardly neither side knows where exactly we are. Even though they’re probably tracking us covertly, we haven’t seen any overt signs as of yet.
Standing by my side, Grayson perches his elbows on the handrail, scanning the whole of the warehouse. Even though he’s not one to show much emotion, I think I can see a hint of excitement under his hard expression. No wonder, though; what we just did together is going to be a complete game changer.
If coke heads all around the world can’t keep their noses out of the mythical white powder, willing to suffer through the comedown, just imagine what a miracle cocaine formula that will bypass the comedown will do. We’re going to make so much money with this that our cartels might have to buy a whole continent just to launder the money.
“It’s incredible, isn’t it?” I continue, waving one hand at the operation happening just a few feet under us. “Not just the coke but...the Bonita Muerte and my cartel, working together. How crazy is that?”
“I’ve seen crazier shit,” he shrugs. “But this is pretty impressive, I’ve gotta admit it. I’m actually surprised these guys haven’t started shooting each other yet. The power of money, huh?”
“Yup,” I agree with a curt nod. Setting up this base—a supposedly abandoned warehouse smack in the middle of New Mexico—was one of the most impressive things I’ve done. Not just because we’ve managed to import the raw materials here undetected, but because both our cartels agreed to a temporary truce.
Half of the crew comes from Grayson’s side, while I supplied the rest of the men. That way, both sides are forced to work together instead of going into war. I don’t know how long that’s going to last, but for the time being...I’m fucking proud of what we’ve achieved. Who knew that drug trafficking would afford me an outlet for my diplomatic skills?
“Do you think this is going to work?” I ask Grayson, curious to hear what lies behind those indecipherable eyes. “Penny for your thoughts.”
“It has to work.” Straightening his back, he rests both his hands on the rail. “We have the formula, the cypher, and the men. Now it’s only a matter of time. And we have that as well...all the time in the fucking world.”
“It’ll work,” I echo, realizing that my life is about to change for good. My work for the cartel has always ensured that I have the best things in life money can buy, but with this formula...oh, God, there’ll be so much flowing into the cartel that they’re going to drown me in untraceable one-hundred dollar bills.
“Rafe!” I exclaim as I see the man that has watched over me all my life come up the stairs. Despite the bags under his eyes and his thinning air, there’s still a certain imposing air about him. A cartel man for all his adult life, I’ve always been surprised to see the kindness he was capable of. At least toward me. If it weren’t for him, I don’t know if I’d have been capable of climbing the ranks like I did.
“Eliza,” he nods solemnly, eyeing Grayson with suspicion. The two stare at each other for a short, tense moment, but then Grayson just shrugs and walks down the stairs. “Are you sure he’s alright? The Bonita Muerte guys aren’t exactly reliable.”
“He’s alright.” I smile, turning toward him and placing both my hands on his shoulders. “You worry too much, Rafe.�
��
“Well, someone needs to do the worrying around these parts,” he sighs, raking one hand over his face. “I don’t like it when people aren’t on edge. We’re not producing gummy bears in there, you know?”
“No, what we’re producing is even better than that. And you shouldn’t give Grayson a hard time. If it weren’t for him, we wouldn’t have gotten this far.”
“Yeah, I’ve heard. I couldn’t care less about him, but I gotta admit...the crew respects him. Too bad that he’s completely unhinged,” he continues, shuddering slightly. “Ever seen some of his handiwork? Everyone’s afraid of the Bonita Muerte cartel because of him. Because of the things he’s done.”
“Well, that’s how he handles his enemies,” I reply, a quick smile on my lips. “But when it comes to allies...even you said it, the crew loves him.”
“I wouldn’t go that far, Eliza...but they do respect him, and that’s even more important. They respect you as well, you know?”
“Me?”
For someone that operated in the shadows for so long, it’s almost baffling the way everyone in the front lines keeps bowing their head to me—not because of my rank inside the cartel, but because they actually respect me for what I’ve done. Even though only a few are privy to the secret formula situation, I guess that word got out that I did something pretty fucking impressive. I’m not one to bask in the glory, but...ah, what the hell, I love to bask in the glory.
“You, Eliza, of course...I always saw it in you. You’re smart, you’re beautiful, and you have the guts and the ambition to achieve anything,” he whispers, locking his eyes on mine. I merely smile at him—I owe him a lot, and I’m super grateful for all the things he did for me, but I know he has always looked at me in a way that I really can’t...reciprocate.
“Life made me this way, Rafe,” I finally manage to say, looking away from him and shaking my head. “Nothing more, nothing less.”
Don't Trust Him: An Enemies to Lovers Romantic Suspense (King Vs. Queen Book 1) Page 7