Page 28 of Don't Trust Him

“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.

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