“I get what you are saying, Dante, but everyone who lives in this country needs money. I’ll hold off on it. But if they start making suggestions, then I’m going to use the tools we have at our disposal.”
Dante grumbled something incoherent.
“What?”
“The debt people owe motorcycle clubs can rarely be paid off with money.”
I glared at him, but he didn’t offer anything more. Probably because there wasn’t anything more to say.
Finally, the driver stopped at what looked like an abandoned car garage. There was a single motorcycle out front, along with a very tall, very bald man with his arms folded. The man was fucking huge; he made all of my security guards look like boys.
“I don’t know who the fuck that is,” Dante said. “That’s not Crush nor Prince.”
“One of their security guards?”
Dante laughed. It was a nervous laugh, but a loud one.
“Black Reapers don’t have fucking security guards,” he said. “They are their own security guards. Come on. Let me do the talking, you can interject as needed.”
I sighed. So be it. I may have made the request for the meeting, but Dante was right. I wouldn’t have requested a meeting with businessmen from Sweden and then expected I could speak fluent Swedish.
We got out of the car, and the big burly man only unfolded his arms. God, he was a fucking sight. Probably six and a half feet tall? Two hundred and fifty pounds of rock solid muscle? And his facial expression never changed. Even when a breeze brushed by and I grimaced a bit, this man gave no reaction.
“Looking for Crush and Prince,” Dante said. “We came to them. Where are they?”
The man said nothing at first. He looked both of us in the eyes. I never backed down from anyone, and I would not start today. But fuck, this mountain of a man was damn good.
“We’re Cassius and Dante Vale,” Dante continued. “I know you are not Crush and you are not Prince. Who are you? Where are they?”
“They’re inside.”
It was not the big burly man who had spoken. Rather, just to the side, it was someone with floppy black hair, tattoos on practically every part of his body, and a mean, haunted scowl. This man was not as large as the big one—I doubted he was my height, even—but there was a scrappy presence to him that suggested he’d go toe to toe with anyone, the mountain man included.
“And are we welcome inside?” Dante said. “My brother here requested the meeting.”
“Then your brother can go inside,” the man said. “You stay out here.”
“The fuck?” Dante said. “We are brothers, we?—”
“I’ll be fine, Dante,” I said.
A power move on their part. Not the first time I’d seen something like this. Probably the first time I’d been in a spot like this where my life felt in danger, but that was a matter of degree, not type.
“Did you ask for the two of us to be present?”
“No, I said I’d come. I didn’t think of it.”
A mistake on my part. I was so used to “meetings with an investor” or “meetings with a CEO” that actually entailed meetings with a half-dozen people that I hadn’t thought to make that distinction here. Oh, well. I trusted that my public status and reputation would keep me alive.
“Fucking idiot,” Dante muttered under his breath. I ignored him and walked forward. Mountain man did not move. Scrappy man only nodded to the doorway in the shadows, so shrouded that I had not seen it when we parked.
I turned around and gave a short nod to Dante. He did not look happy in the slightest. I could live with that as long as we both lived.
I stepped inside and saw a dim light hanging over a desk. I almost laughed—it looked like something out of a torture scene from James Bond. Everything here had clearly been set up to make me feel uncomfortable; I knew the game well. I played it when we had other businessmen and politicians meet us. It was just a little more subtle.
But I had to admit, there was an undeniable tension I could not let go of so easily. It was one thing to see the game being played; it was another to know the opposing party had no limits to how they’d play the game.
“Crush?” I said into the darkness. “Prince?”
