Page 62 of Fight

“Six,” Mal replies, “guy in the grey suit is the one calling the shots, and clearly on a power trip.”

“Got it,” Rome and I reply together.

“Three, two, one. Move now,” I add.

We work well, all converging on the boat, our weapons held up and moving exactly like a team should.

“Don’t move!” Rome bellows loudly as we surround the crew, who all start to reach for their weapons but stop as soon as they realise they’re surrounded. None of them put their hands up in the universal sign for surrender, but since they are no longer reaching for their guns, we don’t start shooting.

“What is the meaning of this? Where is Silas?” the man in the grey suit demands loudly; however, he doesn’t move but stays on the boat, standing next to six long crates.

“Silas is no longer in charge,” I tell him with a sharp smile, “this town will no longer be on your route. It’s now protected by the Ravens.”

His men begin to mutter, and I’m hoping that’s because they’ve heard of our reputation, the new one and not the old one, and also of our newfound connections with Mona and her family. They’re well known in the criminal world for being formidable. Considering all of their hands move further away from their weapons, I’m hoping that means that I’m right.

The guy in the suit stares at me for a second, obviously checking me out as his eyes run over me and make my guys bristle in anger. He then bursts into laughter, “And what is a little girl like you going to do about it? I’d be careful with that gun; it’s not wise to hold one if you can’t use it.”

I roll my eyes, ignoring his taunts since it will most likely make him madder if I do, and I reply, “We’re giving you the courtesy of warning you. Something that we didn’t have to do. Your buyer will no longer be meeting you in this town, and you are no longer welcome here. Where you decide to make this exchange instead, I simply don’t give a fuck, but this town will no longer be used by you.”

His eyes flare with anger as his men shift uneasily, either because of his reaction or because none of us have lowered our weapons yet, and we’re not going to. This is going to go one of two ways, either he agrees to leave this town alone, or he doesn’t, and he loses his life instead. I will make this town safe again.

“I think we might start doing weekly drops instead,” he taunts, “maybe we’ll add human trafficking to our stock too. I’ve seen plenty of young kids here that will make some of my clients very happy.”

My anger boils, along with my disgust, and the cocking of my gun echoes in the silence. His eyes widen slightly as he realises that I’m serious, “One last time, leave this town and don’t come back.”

“No, and I’m sick of your shit,” he retorts; he reaches for his gun and pulls the trigger.

I dive to the side to avoid being struck but feel a burning sensation along the outside of my arm, and I instantly know I’ve been grazed, however, I don’t have time to do anything apart from shooting my own weapon. My aim is true, and he hits the floor. Another shot sounds out, and I glance up from the floor as someone else goes down. I expect there to be more shooting, but as I look around and cautiously get to my feet, the rest of the crew are staring at my men with wide eyes as they hold their hands up in surrender.

“We don’t want any more trouble,” one of them says. “We’re happy to use the next port over and leave the town alone. This is more trouble than it’s worth.”

“Good,” I reply.

“We’ll also make sure that everyone else knows that this place is protected, you shouldn’t get any more trouble.” A different one replies.

“We should warn you that this town is now under heavy surveillance from our associates and us, now that you’ve been warned to stay away, if we see any of you in the town again, we’ll shoot first, no questions asked,” Rome warns them, his voice deadly.

“No problem, we understand completely,” another one says, and they all look nervous enough that I’m inclined to believe them.

In any case, Cecil should hopefully now have their faces uploaded to the system, and Ace has something that he built in when they did the cameras that means the grandparents will be immediately alerted if any of them show their faces in the town and then either they can take care of it, or they can call us and we can.

We keep our weapons trained on them as they slowly and cautiously move to unhook the boat, and we watch as they take the weapons and the two dead bodies with them. I’m hoping that’s the last we’ll see of them for their sake more than ours.

“Well, that went as well as could be expected,” Rip says as he puts his gun away, and we turn back around to head back up the dock.

“It could’ve gone a lot worse, and at least we know that Cecil can now track them with the cameras if they step foot in town again,” I reply, putting my own gun away and glancing over my shoulder at the boat far off in the distance.

“Speaking of, Cecil’s calling,” Ace says, as he pulls out his phone and puts it to his ear, listening intently before his eyes land on me, looking worried, and I instantly tense, aware that something could have gone wrong with the Conspiracy team. Without saying goodbye, Ace hangs up and then folds his arms over his chest, “Anything you’d like to tell us, Jynx?”

His words are so unexpected that it makes me pull a face as I reply, “What? Are the Conspiracy team okay?”

“They’re fine,” Ace replies, still staring at me and making the others glance between us both, clearly not knowing what’s going on, me neither guys, me neither, “You’re not okay though.”

My eyebrows hit my hairline, “I’m fine.”

“Cecil just told me that he saw you get hit by the bullet when the guy in the suit fired,” Ace says, striding toward me.

“What!” The others all exclaim together.

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