Until now.
"Goddamn it." He hissed in a frustrated breath, snatched his phone up, and dialed a number Desk had told him to commit to memory for when he wanted to contact her. As usual, it took a couple of seconds and a handful of beeps, clicks, and warbles before the line eventually connected.
"Taylor, to what do I owe the pleasure of your call?"
"I need advice," he admitted. Thankfully, there would be no one to listen in to see that he was looking into his numbers. It had nothing to do with ego, though. He couldn't help but wonder if there was a little money to be made on himself in this fight. "Some…gambling advice."
"You're wondering if it's possible for you to bet on yourself."
"I…yes, how did you know?"
"The fact that you don't think I have live access to your Google searches has stretched beyond adorable and into sad. The reality is that if you were a professional fighter betting on yourself in a professional fight, red flags would be raised. You would probably be stopped from making that bet. But given that your fight isn't sanctioned by the Nevada Gaming Commission and there won’t be any real oversight, I don't see why you shouldn't make some money from it, assuming you're careful. You'll want to run the money through me and I can make the bets for you."
He hesitated as he considered what she’d told him. "I'm not the first one to come to you with this proposition, am I?"
"What? Of course…not. No, you are not."
"Who else?"
"I'm not supposed to say."
"Desk…"
"Fine. Some of the team have already put money on the fight. Vickie and Jennie, specifically."
"I’m not sure if Jennie is technically part of my team."
"No, but she's part of my team." She sounded like she had practiced that line for a while.
"Did they bet on me or the other two guys?"
"After your little demonstration, it was a lock to bet on you. Vickie has tremendous faith in your ability to win and has put down a substantial amount of the money she has saved."
"It’s not such a huge a leap, given that she has a couple million waiting for her in a blind trust."
The AI paused for a few seconds, but she didn’t respond to that. "Anyway, how would you like to proceed with the betting? How much do you think you'd be willing to bet on this?"
Taylor frowned and drummed his fingers on the desktop. That was a question he hadn’t yet found the answer for. He was doing well for himself, but most of his money was either in the process of being laundered or thoroughly invested in the building and business. Not much of it was liquid or accessible.
"What kind of odds am I looking at?"
Desk needed a second to check. "There have been fluctuations in the odds over the past couple of hours, with many people putting money on you losing to the two guys. If you go for a simple win bet on yourself, the odds on that are about five to one and climbing. It would be higher for knockout rounds and other scenarios. A few people even think you'll take one of the other fighters out before you go down yourself, but that's neither here nor there."
He took a deep breath. Betting on something like this still felt like it was against some kind of inner code, but if Marino would profit off this, it made sense that he do the same.
"I think about ten grand from my savings should be enough."
"That's not much—"
"It's all I'm willing to put down. You never know when something will go wrong. I could slip or sweat gets in my eyes and they get a lucky shot in."
"Is that the same logic you apply when you head out to fight some fucking Zoo monsters?"
"Sure, and I’d bet ten grand on myself anyway."
Desk paused again. "Okay, touché. I've worked with a group of different brokers who are all involved in this fight. If you like, you can send me the cash over a wire transfer and I can bet it for you. I’ll distribute it to make sure Marino can't track the money to you even if the fucker tries."
"Wow, you sound like one of those Internet scams involving a Nigerian prince."
"Taylor, please. If I wanted to scam you, I would be far more creative about it. Besides, since I am technically part of the company, it means any profit you make profits me too."
"And you're not taking any cuts from our winnings? Should there be winnings, I should say.”
"No. I have no need for money nor the material possessions it buys. "
"Right… Okay, well, I trust you then. You'll have carte blanche of my financial possessions to bet on the fight as you see fit, but I'll hold you responsible if I lose."
"That is fair enough," Desk asserted and sounded cheerful about him trusting her. "Oh, and I should tell you that engaging in coitus prior to a fight could have an effect on your testosterone levels, so it is better to avoid it."
Taylor smirked. "That's a myth, you know."
"Maybe, but do you want to risk it?"
He shook his head. "Thanks for your help, Desk. I'll talk to you tomorrow."
It was always raining in London. Why people ever wanted to meet in the most miserable capital in the world astounded him.
But there were things even he couldn't ignore and that included a meeting with people he ordinarily would avoid as though his life depended on it.
And in most cases, it did.
Seated in a café and sipping his macchiato, all Jack had to do was settle into his memory palace and essentially keep on working.
It came as no surprise when a middle-aged Asian woman in a black pantsuit and glasses sat across from him. A few moments later, a nondescript Caucasian man joined them and took the only seat remaining at the table.
The location had been chosen well. His surveillance of the venue had revealed no attempt to bug it, and it was in one of the few areas in all of London that wasn't obsessively covered with cameras. This left them at least six blind spots to use when leaving so they wouldn’t be identified as having been in the same venue.
"Do you want coffee?" Jack asked with a glance at each of them, and both shook their heads. He shrugged and took a sip of his own. "Suit yourselves."
"We are not here to exchange pleasantries," the woman snapped without even a hint of a Chinese or any other accent.
"More important business awaits our attention," the other man agreed. His voice was also devoid of any particular accent as well, which might as well have been an indicator on its own. There weren't many places in English-speaking countries that didn't have at least some kind of an accent, after all. Its absence showed that they had put considerable effort into learning the language in its most bland version possible.
"Very well." He sighed, placed his mug down, and regarded his companions warily. "I'd like to know what one of the two of you did with the agent I infiltrated into that base off the coast of Algeria. Don't bother to deny anything. This is an honest question among folk who respect each other—or so I assume—and we already know that both the FSB and the MSS have assets in play there."
"We were curious about why so much money was being poured into a defunct American nuclear base," the Russian stated and scanned their surroundings. "We appreciate your gesture of goodwill by providing the original plans to the building. The chances are, however, that they've made a great many alterations and, dare I say, improvements to the structure, which appears to be mostly underground."
"Unfortunately, the MSS lost contact with our asset at more or less the same time as the two of you lost yours." The woman showed no sign of emotion, and Jack could only imagine that there was considerable displeasure not revealed. "He was supposed to report at least once a day under the pretense of emailing his parents but he missed the last three windows of contact."
He narrowed his eyes. "I…my man was supposed to contact us by emailing his parents too."
He and the Chinese turned to the Russian, who maintained a neutral expression.
"I suppose none of us is as creative as we think we are," the woman finally admitted under their glares. "You don't suppose that i
s what might have tipped off whoever severed their connection to us?"
"We can't know that without information," Jack countered calmly. "I know this is radical, but we need out-of-the-box thinking for this to work again. How would your handlers react to a one-time offer of partnership? We could bring in specialist teams to infiltrate while they're still assembling personnel and share all information gathered across our agencies?"
The woman sighed, the first sign that she was human and not an AI in a human suit. "Under these circumstances, I am afraid we have no choice. There must be certain assurances, of course."
"Assurances from all sides," the Russian agreed. "We will share all that our asset gathered on the location while she was still active as a gesture of goodwill."
"I will arrange a reciprocal exchange," Jack concurred.
"We will do the same," the Chinese confirmed. "Once that is done, the team will be assembled and implanted in the next group sent to the island."
He glanced at his watch and the few sips left in his cup. "You guys should leave, I imagine. I still have a coffee to finish so I’ll exit a few minutes after you. My office will be in touch."
Neither offered any farewell and simply stood from their seats and left using the exit plans they had already mapped out hours earlier.
"This fight Marino has arranged is one of the most interesting things happening in Vegas. We need to get in on the action while there's still action to get in on."
Marcel’s temples pounded, but he wouldn’t show the two men he played poker with any sign that he was in pain. He needed an aspirin, that was all. They had been at the middling-stakes game for hours and he needed a break soon.
Even so, he had to admit that old man Lucio had a point.
"The betting has already become fierce," he stated finally, put his cards down, and slid them across the table to indicate that he’d chosen to fold. "I don't know who has put so much money on Marino's guys, but it has sure as hell tipped the scales. It's beginning to look like a safe bet to go with the outsider and hope for an underdog win. That's where New York's money will go, anyway."
Lucio nodded. "Chicago still hasn't decided what odds are in their favor, but I think that is probably where we are leaning too."
The third member of their party, a pudgy, middle-aged man named Paulie with a red Hawaiian shirt and a cigar in his mouth, muttered something around the cigar before he pushed a stack of chips into the middle of the table.
"What was that?"
Paulie took the cigar out of his mouth. "I'm only saying that betting against the family—even if it's that coglioni Marino—is never a good idea. They'll always find out about it, and they'll always look for payback if things go sour. It’s best to simply kiss the ring, make sure there's no bad blood, and move on. Philly won’t make any bets and if we do, it'll be a nominal amount merely to make that brutto figlio di puttana bastardo in Vegas happy."
Marcel smirked and waited for the hand to finish and for Lucio to draw the stack of chips he'd won to his side of the table. "If we hide the investment, no one needs to know. Besides, if you think Marino isn't playing both sides of the betting scheme, you're crazier than his father was."
"His father was a good man," Lucio interjected while he waited for his cards to be dealt.
"He was still a nutcase," Paulie muttered around the cigar. "Say what you want about that kid of his—and I do often—he has a good business mind. He’s maybe not the best guy to have in Vegas at the moment but he has a good mind for the business, and that's all he needs to keep the famiglia happy. They don't care how he does it as long as there's no interruption to the cash flow. And that's all Vegas has ever been, let's be honest."
Marcel didn't give the pair of aces he had in his hand a second look as he slipped his large blind into the pot. "Whatever. I couldn’t give a shit if he's peddling whores to the feds in that casino he owns. The fight is still a good look at what kind of money he's rolling through and has the potential for a big payday. We're looking at the odds rising ten to one against that outsider prick—and if you ask me, if anyone offers you ten-to-one odds on anything, you take it. Well, almost anything.”
The flop was dealt, and he still revealed nothing as another ace appeared between a lady and a jack.
"Gambling is fucking fun," Lucio added. "If you have a fight like that on the cards, why not put some action on it?"
Chapter Thirteen
"How are you feeling?"
It was an odd question to ask on the eve of a fight. Taylor almost didn't know how to answer it. Something cold seemed to have settled in his stomach. The familiar feeling was the kind he remembered from his time in the Zoo. It wasn’t one he'd experienced since, of course, and was peculiar because he didn't feel it every time he went in. In fact, he only felt it in that moment when the jungle went wild and he knew he was in for the fight of his life yet again.
He wondered if, during his time there, he had been susceptible to the same pheromones that were released when a Pita plant was plucked or when one of the bigger monsters had the sac attached to its spine ruptured. It was like it prepared him, although maybe not in the way it did the mutant beasts. It took him into the cold, dark place in his head and let him tap into his more sadistic, violent, and primal nature.
And old friend, he liked to think—one that had gotten him out of so many different scraps. It was perhaps the ultimate showcase of his survival instincts.
"Taylor?"
He looked at Niki, who stood beside him. That cold, dark place didn't have any room for the warm feelings she gave him. Maybe having her next to the ring while he fought wasn't that great an idea after all. But there was no time to change things now. He would simply have to close off and let her watch him in that state.
"Yeah." His voice was calm and devoid of any emotion, stress, or any sign that the world affected him in any way. "I'm good to go."
"Good. Because a limo is waiting for us outside."
"There's a what?"
"Marino sent a limo. He called to say he wanted you to know that he was treating you like any other prime-time fighter he's ever had fight in his casino. Of course, there won't be any crowds waiting to greet you, no news coverage, no face-off against your opponents, and no tedious interviews. Only you walking in to put a beating down on two idiots, then out you go."
Taylor nodded.
"What? No playful banter? No rejoinder? No painfully unsubtle double-entendre?"
He made no effort to explain because she wouldn't understand. She still thought this part of him was somehow human and that he was something she could quantify or categorize. He didn't want to put the cold, dark place into words. That would somehow make it real and he didn't want to do that. It was dangerous to normalize what he was.
"Let's go," he replied simply.
Niki narrowed her eyes, but she didn't question it. He pulled his coat on and jogged down the steps of his room and out into the shop. Bobby had closed up early for the day. He and Tanya had headed out to get ready as they would also be in attendance. Vickie had done the same with Elisa. Their absence left Taylor with Niki and the two men who still wore the signs of the beating he'd put them through—bruising for the most part, although Jansen walked with a slight limp. The doctors had found no lasting damage to his liver, but it was still painful.
Taylor's scars were more evident, interestingly enough. The swelling in his nose and eye had gone down, but the stitches over the latter were hard to hide. It would give the two men in the ring with him a target to attack—a weakness. They would be fairly predictable and would look for an easier shot at him and try that repeatedly. While they would be good fighters, they wouldn’t be creative. If they had been, they wouldn't have been low-level mob thugs.
Still silent, he stepped into the limo and the driver turned out of the parking lot and onto the route that would take them to the Strip and toward the casino. He wasn't dressed in furs or anything exotic or outlandish that would catch everyone's attention. A redhe
aded giant would do that well enough without props.
A valet was there to open the limo doors for him, and people took pictures. He could tell they didn't know who they were taking pictures of, but with the limo, the way he was received by the hotel, and the gorgeous woman beside him, they assumed he was someone famous.
He wasn't guided to the boxing ring in the center of the casino area, which was still closed for renovations. As they were shepherded into one of the private elevators, the interest faded and the tourist gawkers and reporter hopefuls turned away in search of new possibilities.
Taylor kept his eyes lowered. His body was relaxed and unaffected by anything around him. There was nothing in the world—outside of maybe the Zoo itself—that would bring him out of the trance state he felt he was in.
Niki appeared to sense that as she hadn’t said much of anything since they entered the limo. Or if she had, he hadn't heard her.
The elevator descended a few floors into an underground area that had already been set up for the fight. The ring was elevated like it was in regular boxing matches. No crowds were present aside from a handful of VIP guests in attendance in booths above the ring from which they could look onto the action. Whoever was in there already enjoyed what looked like a party with flashing lights and music that was mostly drowned out by the soundproof glass.
He didn't care about them or their pleasures. Nothing had relevance except the one thing he was there to do.
Surprisingly, they encountered a metal detector at the entrance. Taylor looked beyond it to where a handful of men had gathered at the ring. The two fighters were being given a few last-minute instructions by their trainers. He vaguely registered the many trainers in evidence. Marino had put a good deal of money into preparing the two for the fight.
Niki paused in front of the metal detector and stared at Marino's man for a few seconds until he explained it.
"Oh. Mr. Marino was insistent that no weapons would be present in or near the fighting ring. All things considered, with how heated these events can be, it was thought to be the safest option for everyone."
Monster In Me (Cryptid Assassin Book 8) Page 11