Total pages in book: 74
Estimated words: 71880 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 359(@200wpm)___ 288(@250wpm)___ 240(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 71880 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 359(@200wpm)___ 288(@250wpm)___ 240(@300wpm)
“Thanks. Nah, let him sleep.” I’d heard him last night. He slept as restlessly as Joel did. “This is great work, Mr. I’m-sticking-to-low-risk-work-now.”
Darius chuckled into his mug. “No gunfire, no problems. We had Ryan in the trees too.”
That would be Joel soon as well. He and Ryan had been scouting the terrain surrounding Carillo’s place all day yesterday, even though we weren’t sure we’d actually attack here. Chances were we wouldn’t, to be honest. But each plan required several backups.
Joel and Ryan had headed out at first light today too. Recon combined with an early morning workout. Reese and Shay had left shortly thereafter, and River and Mercier were talking Blanco history in the kitchen while Gray prepared breakfast—
“That’s Ramirez.” Darius was checking his phone and answered a call. “Shoot, buddy.”
I flipped to another camera angle and took a sip of my coffee.
Today should be the day. The cargo ship was scheduled to arrive in Barcelona around noon; we just didn’t know if Gajero had disembarked earlier. Ports had increased their security heavily since the early nineties, and if he was coming through with hostages…
If my criminal network was big enough, if I had the right connections, I would’ve made sure a smaller boat met up with the freighter out at sea. But that required a higher degree of corruption; as in, the captain of the freighter would be aware of what was going on.
“That’s incredible,” Darius said. “When is she— Okay.” He listened a while longer before speaking again. “Perfect. Talk soon.” He ended the call and turned to me. “Ramirez and Willow managed to gain access to the Russian’s cell phone. They’ll let us know as soon as they hear anything.”
Hot damn. Willow was really knee-deep in the spyware field with Hillcroft, wasn’t she?
“Incredible’s right—Christ.”
“Ramirez knows better than to explain shit to me, so when he calls, I’ll hand the phone over to you.”
I chuckled. “Sounds good. We should send a text to everyone to be geared up and ready to split, regardless if they’re running errands or out making me feel bad for not doing cardio.”
“Don’t get me started.” He shook his head. “Every time Gray walks around shirtless, I feel the need to go for a run, but then he feeds me cinnamon roll bites instead.”
I laughed. That’d been me yesterday, sans cinnamon roll bites. Joel had returned with Ryan, shirtless and drenched in sweat. Joel had abs that went on for days. Although we didn’t have the age gap Darius and Gray had, Joel was so fucking fit that my doctor telling me “you’re perfectly healthy” felt like a “well, maybe you should drop fifteen pounds and join a gym.”
But Joel insisted he liked the way I looked, so maybe he could learn how to bake cinnamon roll bites instead.
River Tenley
“Cigars, huh?”
“Yup.” I jumped back into the SUV, and Reese pulled away from the curb to take us back to the house.
I’d felt inspired by Mercier earlier, who’d said he was looking forward to his celebratory cigar when he came home. He’d painted quite the picture of his son, his old man, good food, Crew in his arms, a glass of red, a whiskey or two, and a cigar.
Just when we returned to the house, Darius and Ryan stepped out onto the driveway with binoculars.
“Now what?” Reese killed the engine, and we climbed out. “Any updates?”
“Petrov was on the phone with someone we think is traveling with Gajero,” Darius responded. He was peering through the binoculars, aiming them up the mountain, though I didn’t understand what he’d see. Carillo’s safehouse was farther away.
“I’ll get our bags,” Reese told me.
I inclined my head and trailed closer to the brothers. “What’re you lookin’ for?”
“We can usually see the pillar of smoke comin’ from their chimney,” Darius answered. “You see anythin’, Ry?”
Solid clue of Carillo possibly preparing to move. Andorra was warm in the summer, no doubt, but not overly hot. Evenings were still chilly because of the altitude.
“Nope. We might as well pack the cars,” Ryan said.
I’d say so. We already had to be careful when we stepped out in the driveway since everyone who drove past could see us, and if Carillo was, in fact, getting ready to leave, it meant he and his seven closest guards were about to come through. Plus a Russian contractor I couldn’t wait to deal with.
Elliott and Darius had already advised us to be ready at all hours, which was essentially our default mode as it was, so it took us five minutes to fill the cars and another ten minutes to make it seem like we’d never been here.
Gray had paper bags filled with snacks for each car, one case of water bottles, power banks, medic bags, and one radio. Ammo was distributed evenly, and we teamed up the way we’d arrived, with one switcheroo. Darius, Gray, Ortega, and Mercier in one SUV, Elliott in another with Joel, Crew, and Ryan, with Reese, Shay, and me in the last. We needed our two snipers to take the lead on this one.