"You're gonna love this. She found him," I said, "because she had a contract on him."
My brother peered at Jordan. "That's special. Like, real special. How long did it take you to figure that out?"
"A story for another day," he replied.
"And the reason we need you," I said. "SEALs, Green Berets, Delta Force, these guys don't know spycraft. You know that fact as well as I do. They can play the game enough to carry out a mission but they're not infiltrating shit." When Wes didn't take that opportunity to insult me, Jordan, or the business we ran, I continued. "Whatever they taught you in that off-book, deniable as fuck intelligence program, we need you to teach it to our squads."
"No part of me is interested in that shit." Wes shook his head. "Thank you, next."
Jordan scoffed. "So, you wouldn't want to run spy-game ops? Because that's what we're talking about."
"Sounds amazing. Cool, cool, cool. But I have so many things I have to fix before I can even think about a job," Wes admitted. "I've said a lot of dumb shit—"
"Yep," Jordan agreed. "The entirety of this conversation comes to mind."
Wes shot him a glower before continuing, "I've done some dumb shit too—"
"Yep," I agreed. "Skipping out in the middle of the night when there is a long line of people who care about you would be a fine example."
"You two together are a real pain in my ass," he snapped. "I'm just saying the job is the least of my worries. Whenever I run out of rum and decide to get off this beach, and whatever I do, I'll land on my feet and I don't need handouts from either of you."
Jordan shot me his usualI'm bored and this is wasting my timeglare over Wes's head. I glanced at my watch. We were cutting it close and Shannon was going to have my ass if I wasn't back in time for this wedding. She'd also have my ass if my brother wasn't in tow.
"Listen, Wes. We didn't come all this way for you to piss and moan," I said. "We're looking to put together an espionage team and we need someone with your skill set to lead it. If you want to stay here, we're not going to stop you."
"We're not?" Jordan asked.
"No. We're buggin' out." I met Jordan's confused stare with a pointed glance at my brother. "Like I told you on the ride down here, Kaisall, Shannon's brother is getting married in a few hours. I promised her I'd be there on time."
"Right, right," Jordan murmured. "I forgot about that."
"It's because you block out all conversation when marriage and weddings are involved," I said. "You know, given your current inability to get it up in that area."
"I signed up for a snatch-and-grab," Jordan replied. "Not emotional abuse on a lava beach."
Wes lifted the rum to his lips, draining the last of the liquor. He pitched the empty bottle over my head, saying, "If this reunion is supposed to be a snatch-and-grab, you two need a refresher course on the basics of black ops. Aside from burying a microchip in my ass, this showing is shameful."
"Like I said," I continued, "we gotta go. Shannon is alone with both kids and she's dealing with a disaster at the office too."
"What was that about again?" Jordan asked. It was good of him to play along. Finally.
"Her assistant threatened to quit." As far as I knew, that wasn't the case but Wes didn't know that.
From the corner of my eye, I saw Wes's lips part. The muscles in his jaw ticked. His eyes narrowed. Then, he said, "He's not herassistant."
Jordan ran his knuckles over his jaw. "What? You know him?"
Wes shot a glare at Jordan. "He's the managing director of operations."
"Yeah, you're right about that. Managing director of operations," I said, nodding. His misplaced rage was beautiful. He was a mess of rum-flavored feelings and it was proof we were getting somewhere. "Anyway, he's going through something right now. He's talking about leaving town."
Wes reached for another bottle of rum but soon realized he was all out. He slapped his palm on the sand.
"She's devastated, of course. He's been working with her since—"
"Years, right?" Jordan asked.
"Yeah, they go back a full decade. She basically adopted him. Gave him a place to stay, put him to work at her firm, sent him to school. He started out as an assistant but worked his way up. She's going to be a wreck if he leaves and it will be a bitch for her to replace him but I can't see it ending any other way. He's been in shambles for a couple of weeks now. Just fuckin' shambles, man."
