Page 76 of Double Shot

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We started to plan,but you know how that goes. The second you planned anything was the second things changed. One man changed them.

Hiram Emerson, Republican, Texas.

He’d been speaking in front of several committees, attacking the cost of the War on Drugs, and that the government had no place sending DEA agents into other countries, and doing God knew what sort of “CIA spook business” over there. Those men were needed at home, on the border, and hunting the real threat to Americans, illegals crossing the border, and the home drug trade.

Everything that happened in France was a French problem, even the suspected leader of this criminal organization was a Frenchman, and that was most definitely a French problem, a European Union problem. It wasn’t something the citizens of Texas, or Alabama, or Maine needed to be footing the bill to deal with. His words were fire and acid, and then people were listening.

“You’ve got to be kidding,” Lach said. “No one believes this asshole, do they?” He muted the small television in the kitchen but good ol’ Hiram kept right on screaming, waving his papers and putting on a good show at the lectern.

“He’s trending positive,” Roan said. “And peoplearelistening.” He was back in his happy place, the kitchen, putting an impressive chiffonade on some basil for a garnish. God, his knife work was sexy… I was starting to sound like Lach.

“Why are they listening to that giant empty hat?” I asked, getting my brain firmly back on the problem at hand. “Is he supposed to look like a cowboy? I mean, what is even happening here?” I waved my hand at the television like I’d had a particularly abrasive and condescending personal shopper wave at me once.

“He’s the senior senator from Texas, and it looks like in the next election cycle he’s likely to become the new leader of the Republicans, if they carry the Senate, he’ll be the most important person after the president,” Roan said.

I looked back at the television and mouthed the word,Gross.

“For a Brit, you seem to know your politics.” Lach gave him a snipe.

“For a Yank, you are typically unaware of them.” Roan gave him one back.

“Now,boys,” I said, turning my attention back from the television. “If this takes the Escadrille out of the center of attention, they get to recover, and then they’re a problem again, am I right?”

“You are naturally correct,” Roan said. “And this feels too convenient for them to be anything like a coincidence.

“Who the fuck is that.” Kyle stood up from his seat at the counter, looking at the screen. “You have to be fucking kidding me,” he growled. In the publicity shot, standing six smiling faces to the left of Emerson, was a very familiar face. Her makeup was conservative, and her hair wasn’t blonde, but I wouldn’t forget that cunt’s face even if I were struck blind.

Kaijin…the name slithered through my brain like a snake covered in cloying perfume, the taint of merely thinking it lingering long after I’d thought it. I didn’t dare say it out loud, I cast a worried look in Roan’s direction. He stood, knife forgotten in his hand, but his grip around the handle was a white-knuckled one.

I am so going to make that bitch pay,I thought to myself, twisting on my own stool with a mighty desire to do some violence.

“What in the actual fuck is she doing there, half of the international police people are looking for her,” I said, incredulously.

“The Nazi had ties to the German government, and if it took that long for the French to move on Mont Saint Chauvignon, they must have had people there too. It shouldn’t be a surprise that they have people inside our government here,” Roan said sourly. He set down his knife and leaned heavily, palms flat against the counter as we all watched.

“This is a major problem, mate,” Lach said, picking up the remote and turning the television off so we didn’t have to look at her haughty fucking face anymore.

“No, that’s an opportunity,” I shot back, twisting my lips back and forth, the wheels in my head turning.

Chapter Eighteen

Roan…

Our plans were laid out, moving as a unit to Austin, Texas with the intent of smoking Kaijin out of hiding, and then take her down. She was the closest threat and had escaped us once before. Ajahi was missing somewhere overseas, and from near as I could tell even the Cartel didn’t know where he and his men were. Things had been especially ugly for them the last few months, being caught between international attention and local gunfire. Some of the other cartels had taken the outing of the Escadrille as acarte blancheto move in on their territory.

Some nations, formerly in various ways beholden to the Cartel, did much the same. Compounds were attacked, fields were burned, workers were liberated or killed, and in some countries their leaders preferred the latter to the former. It was an ugly business all around, though there were few tears that could be shed for corrupt governments and incompetent international agencies attempting to kill a powerful and vindictive Cartel.

On a certain level, many people supported the actions of Emerson. The news was a constant downer, each seeming victory in the war on drugs was countered with violent massacres, abductions, horrific maimings, terrorist bombings, and all the rest.

People were to the point that when that fell out of the news, and the new daily outrage revolved around a few high-profile celebrity nude leaks and some off-color jokes from people of importance just felt better. They could get properly angry about that, sign a petition, post comments on their social media, cheer it up proper. Not quite as cathartic when the new item of the day is the daughter of some foreign cabinet member being kidnapped and then returned with both of her hands and her eyes removed.

The planning dragged out, there was no looming sense of urgency, so we dawdled.

There were things that seemed to need doing before taking off on our next dark adventure.

When the phone call came, it was a complete surprise.

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