“Not burn,” Spike sighs. “We send a message.”
Maverick smirks. “My messages burn.”
I snort. “Let the man burn something, Spike. He’s had a week.”
Bones glares at me. “Stop encouraging arson. It’s too fucking early.”
“Stop hating joy.”
Tank leans forward. “We can hit the Palm Springs location tonight. Quiet entry. Controlled fire. No civilians.” He glares at Maverick. “And no spreading that shit to the whole block.”
“Relax,” Maverick says. “My men know how to light a controlled blaze.”
“Destruction and a message,” I say, licking my lips. “Delicious.”
“And after that?” Foster asks.
Maverick taps the border map. “Cortéz’s primary warehouse in Mexicali. He’s fortified it, but he’s predictable. Runners, lieutenants, stash points. We take the legs out from under him first.”
Bones smirks. “So we cripple his operations before we kill him?”
“Yes,” Maverick says. “Then we corner him. Then we end him.”
Crusher cracks his knuckles in excitement.
Spike looks around the table at his officers, Maverick’s assassins, and me…his wildcard, his chaos grenade.
Spike’s voice is as cold as steel when he talks. “Cortéz thinks he has us in a bind. He has no idea we’ve teamed up with the Italians. Mistake one. Mistake two…he won’t be expecting us to take this to his door.”
“Los Fantasmas is filled with hundreds of drug-fueled soldiers,” Foster reminds us. “But they’re not disciplined. They’re not trained to think. They move because someone tells them to move. You take away the brain? The body collapses. If we kill Cortéz first, we’ll just be sweeping up stragglers.”
Knuckles nods. “Hit him at his weakest spots, and the entire body falls.”
“Less clean-up,” Maverick adds calmly, like he’s discussing wine pairings and not mass homicide.
Luca agrees with a single sharp nod, but the rest of Maverick’s men stay silent and serpent-still.
“True,” I say, kicking my boots up onto the edge of the table until Tank swats them off…fucker. “But if we kill him first, then we don’t get to watch his face as his entire empire crumbles around him. And honestly? That’s half the fun.”
Tank huffs, “Then we don’t kill him. Not right away. We capture him.” His eyes darken, voice dropping. “Let him be Bones and Skip’s plaything. Keep him alive long enough to feed him updates as we dismantle every piece of his life. And we carve whatever answers we need out of him in the meantime.”
Bones grins. It’s unsettling for most. But for me? I can already see his brain working as it decides which of his toys he wants to use first.
Maverick nods. “If you capture him, scan his entire body for a tracking device before you even bring him near the compound. Not just his clothes. His skin.”
Knuckles blinks. “In hisskin?”
“He’s the head of a cartel,” Maverick says, like it’s the most obvious thing in the world. “When you run an empire, and a multi-million-dollar corporation on top of it, giving your most trusted men a way to track you can be vital.”
Crusher whistles. “A multi-million-dollar corporation, huh?”
I raise my brows. “Brother… you own a multi-million-dollar company?”
“Several,” he smirks, adjusting his suit sleeve like the dramatic bastard he is.
“Damn,” Crusher laughs. “No wonder you’re always disappearing for weeks at a time.”
Spike ignores all of us and turns to Foster.
