Jamie picked up his small coffee cup and leaned back in his seat, smirking like the cat that got the cream. “We have word of a shipment coming in from Mexico. The Reyes Cartel thinks they’re good, but they have leaks in their chain. We were able to find out that when they get a shipment into Florida, it goes to one unloading spot before it gets sent a few places for distribution. If they have heat on them, they let it sit there for a few days. They hold their drugs in a storage facility behind a small fireworks shop. The product stays in the back, usually overnight. We’re going to take their drugs and leave them high and dry. Now, we could sneak in—” He sipped his coffee and hummed. “—but Sloan wants us to check out the security and go in during the day. Make some mess.”
“Why?” Aspen shifted in his seat and his knee knocked against mine. “More of a chance of attracting the wrong attention. Cops.”
Corbin shrugged. “He wants Reyes to know t’was the Irish that fucked him, I expect. If no one’s around to pass on the word when we take the drugs, it won’t be as satisfying for the boss because there will be guessing, and there’s no guarantee Reyes will find out who pulled the trigger on him.”
“This is a message,” Aspen murmured and glanced at me. “This is more dangerous.”
Jamie nodded and grinned. “And the payday is more generous, as always. I’m going to take Hunter to Ireland after this and give that boy a proper holiday. Tour around Europe a bit. I can’t wait. My ma keeps asking me to bring him around again. Thinks he’s handsome.” Jamie rolled his eyes, but he had that smug pride I deeply understood. I loved it when I was out with the boys and people noticed me with my arms full of men they wished they could pull.
Jealousy began to eat at me as I nodded and forced one of the few polite smiles I would waste on anyone today. He sounded too happy for me to be a prick, but I couldn’t imagine taking anybody home to Dundalk.
“Anyway,” Jamie said, staring around the table. “It’ll certainly take all of us, and a few men we have around town, to pull this off. There will likely be a security team.”
Groaning, I studied the blueprints for the storage facility again. It was a simple tin building with not much going on. “Why don’t they have a more defensible location? This doesn’t seem right.”
Corbin shrugged. “I thought the same thing at first. It gets down to pride. Reyes thinks he’s crafty. Didn’t imagine we’d find out about the unloading point. The shop where the product is cut and wrapped for local distribution is guarded like Portlaoise Prison. This? Not so much in comparison, but they don’t have staff going in and out to mess about with the drugs. They probably think no one knows about it.”
Aspen grunted. “Are we planning to scope it out in person first?”
Jamie nodded and his drying curls bounced. “Let’s finish breakfast and get on it.” I glanced around the table and grabbed the small cup in front of me, grimacing at the strong Cuban coffee. It was sweet, though, which was at least right for first thing in the morning. I gulped the brew down. When I was finished with my drink, I tried to push back my chair to stand as I set my cup down, and the pain on the back of my legs had me squeezing my eyes shut. Aspen pulled my chair out for me and gave me a wry smile. I wasn’t mad at him, exactly, but he should’ve known better than to do that shite here.
With his shoulders shaking, Jamie was doing a poor job of holding in his laugh.
Corbin stood and walked out, but I’d seen the bastard smiling.
“About today—”
“Don’t even ask. I’d be dead before I couldn’t do me job,” I growled out.
Aspen nodded and raised his hands, stepping back.
Standing, I huffed, then got in his face. “I’m perfectly fine.”
He slung his arm around my shoulders and leaned in, not saying a word while I fought through the pain of his muscles pressing into my abused back.
“Ye are straight from Satan to torture me, aren’t ye?”
He nodded. “Tell me again how you’rejust fine.”
Straightening, I ignored the fire in my body. “Aye. ’M perfect.”
Aspen patted my back, and I elbowed away from him with a hiss.
“Ya two done flirting? We need to go.” Jamie didn’t sound irritated yet, and it would take him a while to get there, but I didn’t want that on my head today, so I nodded. We stepped apart and followed him through the high-ceilinged hallway and out of the house. The exterior of the two-story mansion was just as nice as the inside, and I took a second to admire the French-inspiration that had gracefully given in to the local tropical influences. Everything, except the dark wooden trim around the windows and doors, had a cream theme, making the building appear bright and airy. It was the perfect getaway for a mob boss.
Butfecking hell, two boring black Honda CR-Vs waited in the driveway for us, and they were a huge departure from the opulence we’d just been in. Jamie and Corbin took one, and we had the other. They were ugly vehicles, but they were everywhere on the road, and we wouldn’t stand out driving one.
We followed Corbin and Jamie from Hibiscus Island to a parking garage in Miami. The entire area was city jammed up against sprawling suburb, and I wished I’d made myself more familiar with the surrounding neighborhoods if we were about to pull a job. Like New York City, which tended toward strict grids, these streets weren’t too difficult to manage, but somehow the names all ran together in my head and I wouldn’t be able to find the city center if you paid me.
We went into the parking garage and had to drive slow. With the stiff way I held my body, my back began to sting and ache, and my arse was already awash in pain with the short amount of time we’d been sitting.
“I’m driving on the way home.” Aspen had a folding knife out in his lap, and he appeared to be inspecting it for flaws. The blade glinted as he twisted it.
“Why?”
Aspen hummed. “We’re going to do this? There’s no one for you to be embarrassed about overhearing us in here, so I’m going to tell you how it is.” Surprised, I glanced at him, and his steady brown eyes looked right through my soul and had my heart speeding faster. “I saw your back and that cherry red ass. You can stretch across the seats on the way back and keep the pressure off it.”
I moaned and focused extra hard in front of me. “Sounds good.”
