“I’ll call Havoc, run all this over with him, and decide who is better to come with me.”
“Thank you.”
“No, thank you. Nice to know someone gives a fuck about this ugly mug.”
He picks up a pen from his desk as I step back, and launches it at me. “Get out of my office.”
I grin. “Yes, boss,” I mock with a salute.
I head back to my office and call Havoc to give him the rundown.
“So we still don’t know what this guy officially wants?”
“No, I don’t think he’s going to be able to resist telling me, though, when we meet. I get this feeling from him like he thinks he’s the smartest person in the room.”
“Micro-dick energy, as Nevaeh would call it. She has issues with people who believe their own hype. Alright, so what’s the plan?”
“I’m going to meet him, but change the meeting place on the way. If he wants to see me desperately enough, he’ll come,even if it means messing with his plans. Guys like this tend to think they can do things on the fly. Well, we’re about to test that theory. I want to send Powers in to the original meeting point and do a sweep.”
I hear the chair creak as Havoc moves. “You’re thinking explosives?”
Why else would I want to send in our resident bomb disposal guy?
“No idea, but I’d sleep better tonight knowing a bunch of innocents didn’t get blown to kingdom come because I zigged when I should have zagged.”
“Alright, text me the location and what you know. I’ll pull Powers into my office and fill him in. Where are you going to redirect him to?”
“Has to be somewhere feasible. Gonna need a good reason to switch shit last minute or he might get suspicious.”
“The Book Nook?”
I let my eyes drift closed, knowing how badly everything could go wrong. “I can’t. I refuse to risk Delphi’s livelihood one more fucking time.”
“Had to ask. It’s the logical choice. What about the rental?”
“What rental?”
“The one you lived in before you moved,” he drawls. “You paid your rent a year in advance.”
“I also told you to give the keys back to the owner and tell them to keep the money in order to let me out of the lease early.”
“Yeah, about that…”
“Havoc—”
“Look, someone needed somewhere to stay anonymously. The place is paid for, and I trust them completely, or I wouldn’t have allowed it. The security system at that place is top-notch, and the neighborhood is quiet, so it’s perfect. I did some digging, and the landlord is actually an owner of multiple propertiesaround here and neighboring states. But they live up in Washington, so I doubt they’re concerned with the comings and goings enough to realize the person living there is not actually you.”
I rub my hand over my face and sigh. “Alright. And the person that’s living there?”
“I’ll deal with them. It won’t be for long, and if any damage occurs to the property, I’ll take care of it.”
“Alright. If the place is still technically in my name, I doubt it would raise any red flags if this guy ran a search on me, nothing that he’d figure out quickly enough before meeting me. I’ll tell him my woman had a seizure, and I won’t leave her while she’s vulnerable. Something tells me he views the world in terms of predators and prey. If he thinks there is someone on the property that would make me vulnerable, it will make it more enticing.”
“And of course, there will be someone there. It just won’t be Delphi. I’ll send Toot over to meet you there. As much as the guy is a pain in the ass, nobody shoots quite like he does.”
“So we have a plan. How long do you need to set things in motion?”
“How long have you got?”
