Page 60 of Collide

She was so focused on staring at the building that she wasn’twatching where she was going and tripped in her ridiculously high heels. She grabbed hold of my arm with the hand that wasn’t already in mine, and I quickly wrapped my arms around her waist to stop her from falling.

“You okay?” I asked when she was solidly standing on two feet.

Under the bright light from the warehouse lights, I could see hercheeks flush red.

She was so fucking cute.

“Yeah. Sorry. This place is huge,” she said, her gaze landingback on mine and looking……impressed?

“This branch of my business accounts for 40% of my income, Riley. Ihave a reputation for being able to source any weapon available on the black market. People from all over the world contact me to do business, I supply to some of the largest gangs across the globe. I needed somewhere big enough to store the goods and house the employees who work here.”

It didn’t phase me sharing this level of detailed information with her,it’s not like I was ever going to let her go so she could go off and squeal. I wasn’t sure if she realized it yet, but Riley was mine and I was keeping her.

“Doesn’t that bother you?” she asked, narrowing her eyes at me. Fuck, when she gave me that look, I felt like I was a naughty kidbeing scolded.

“Why would it?” I retorted. “People use weapons every day, if it isn’tme supplying them, it’d be someone else.”

She stared at me, considering this. I didn’t think she’d understand it,but I’d grown up with the philosophy that human nature meant people would always do dumb shit. There will never be a way to stop murders, people taking drugs, or whatever other bullshit people get up to, and there will always be someone to cash in on it, you can stand back and watch some other schmuck gain from people’s stupidity, or you can be the schmuck that reaps the rewards.

I knew which schmuck I’d rather be.

“Come on.” I held her hand again and led her to the door.

Miles was walking up and down, pacing the floor with his hands andtugging roughly at his hair. Behind him, six or seven of the security officers loitered, all equally looking concerned, and rightly so. The fact I was here meant they hadn’t done their jobs properly.

Miles' shoulders slumped in relief the second I walked through thedoor.

“Thank fuck,” he said, walking towards me. His eyes darted to Riley,surprised to see her here.

Him and me both.

“What the hell is going on, Miles?”

“Boss, Luis,” he said by way of an explanation and a wave of hishand. When I didn’t reply, he continued. “He managed to sneak off to the living quarters. The shipment had just arrived and I was dealing with that. The fucker took the opportunity.”

That at least explained why Miles was shitting his pants. He and theother guards knew to keep watch on Luis, and he’d fucked up.

Epically.

I don’t think I had ever despised someone as much as I despised LuisRodez, and if I’d had it my way, he wouldn’t be within a thousand feet of my warehouse. But he played an important role.

His father, Jose Rodez, was a valuable contact in Argentina fordealing in weapons, both importing and exporting and I got a hell of a lot of business from him. His son, Luis, was a fucking prick though and acted likehewas the one in charge of my weapons business.Jose had insisted Luis worked in the warehouse to ensure smoothtransactions and it was, frustratingly, one of his terms of conditions to agree to the deal we had.

I’d since come to realize that Jose wanted rid of Luis, he wasnothing but a pain in the ass. The man was an untrustworthy, smarmy cunt, and I wouldn’t have pissed on him if he was on fire. A sentiment I was sure his father echoed. I had agreed to the deal but I’d warned both Jose and Luis that if hedid anything to piss me off, I wouldn’t hesitate to end his existence, something Jose had quickly accepted. However, in the eight months he had worked for me, he hadn’t put a toe out of line and I’d never had a reason to put a bullet through his head.

Looked like that would change tonight.

“Why wasn’t anyone watching him?” I growled at Miles who coweredunder my glare.

“I thought one of the others had him on camera, Boss. We’ve got aquick turnaround on the latest shipment, I was trying to get it sorted. Kai, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean for it to happen.”

“What did he do?” I questioned, ignoring Miles’ pleading. I’d deal withhis stupidity later and he damn well knew it.

Miles swallowed before he spoke and once again, his eyes darted toRiley before coming back to mine, an unspoken question passed between us. He was making sure it was ok to talk freely in front of my girl.

I nodded my head once.

“He…uh…he broke into a room where one of the girls was. She wassleeping and he attacked her.” Miles looked to the floor, he didn’t need to say the words out loud for me to know what he meant when he referred to the girl being attacked.

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