Page 102 of S.O.S. Billboard

Jake’s looked up at the rough dirt ceiling and shook his head. “If I didn’t need you two, you’d be joining Delaney and O’Reilly off my payroll, but since I’ve already lost two men… Okay. Fine. I’ll figure out how to deal with this shit-show, later. Right now, I need to get into that safe.”

Damn.O’Shea had been hoping the blowhard would pontificate longer.

She was sure she wasn’t going to like what was coming next.

Jakes leaned down, getting right in her face. “I need the combination to the safe, Miss O’Shea.”

She coughed.

“Wheww,” O’Shea grimaced, scrunching up her nose and drawing her head back as far from the man as possible. “Dude. You need some serious breath mints. When was the last time you brushed your teeth?”

Jakes mouth tightened. He wasn’t amused. “Give me the combination, bitch, or you might be in danger of losingyourteeth.”

O’Shea shrugged as nonchalantly as she could while bound. “Well that’s too bad, because I don’t have it.”

“You don’t have it,” Jake’s repeated, taking one step away. He hauled back his arm and slapped her hard across the face.

Shit.

Luckily, the hit was on the opposite side from where his flunkies had smacked her earlier, but it still hurt like a bitch.

“Hey,” O’Shea snarled, spitting blood at him. He hadn’t broken a tooth, but one had cut the inside of her cheek. “What don’t you understand about I don’t have it?”

“Oh, you have it, alright,” Jake’s glowered. “There’s no way my ex would have thought about putting my shit in a safe. She’s as dumb as they come, and much too trusting. If she’d hiddenmy papers, they’d be between her mattresses or in a shoe box in her closet.”

The guy was clueless. Didn’t he know his ex-wife at all? He was the one with putty for brains, and he was going to regret every nasty word that came out of his filthy mouth.

“She had the safe long before I showed up,” O’Shea informed him. “And she showed me where it was just in case there was trouble. What shedidn’tdo, was give me the combination.”

O’Shea braced for another blow, but Jake’s straightened his cuffs, glared at her, and backed away.

“Fine,” he told her. “If that’s the way you want to play it. Boys?” he addressed his two stooges. “I’m leaving her to you. Make her talk, and don’t come get me until you have that combination.”

He picked the safe up off a rough wooden table against the wall, turned, and marched up the rickety stairs without a backward glance.

The guy O’Shea had nailed in the nuts turned and gave her an evil grin.

This wasn’t going to be fun.

At all.

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

Billboard looked up the hill to the large, sprawling one story mansion—all glass and wood—that stood on the bluff. Del had parked their vehicle down the street and around the bend, where a few minutes later, Daire and Brent showed up. They’d approached covertly on foot, but Prez and Sarge were already casing the place.

Sarge had hacked into town records, finding the blueprints which they now all had loaded on their phones, but they needed to find out if Jakes had guards or lookouts to be taken care of before the team breached, and that’s what their advance team of two was doing.

Prez had already located the white van parked inside the enormous,opengarage.

“They’re here,” he let the team know.

Arrogant sons of bitches, Billboard snarled to himself. Did they figure nobody would come looking?

Prez also kept them apprised as he scoped out the interior of the van, but other than traces of blood—not in the back, but on one of the front seats where the perps would have sat, thank God—he found nothing.

“No exterior security,” Sarge stated eventually.

Had Billboard already thought Jake’s an arrogant ass?Uh, yeah.

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