“You and whose army? I set this deal up months before you even thought of it. No one round here even knows who you are, and you think they’d do business with you?”
“It’s my supply. All the links, the contacts. All mine.”
Martell tilted his head. “Are they? When was the last time you made a call? Handled a mule? You got lazy, D. And no one cares anymore. You’re through.”
He started to stand. Dante made a crazy grab for his arm and missed.
Martell straightened, and for the first time, seemed to notice Luis. He tossed him the package and pointed at Dante. “Plant this on him and dump him somewhere. Do that for me and I’ll consider us done.”
“Done?”
“Yeah. I know you don’t want to roll anymore, and I’m cool with that if you make things right with the trash.”
Luis snorted. “I don’t have the means to dump him anywhere. He ditched the car miles away.”
“Even better. It was stolen. Leave him in it.”
“That doesn’t help me.”
“I’m not trying to help you,” Martell retorted. “I don’t give two shits about the fucking Pope brothers or whatever. Just do what I’ve asked, before these guys finish what they started—”
He broke off as the big man who’d searched them suddenly cursed at the CCTV he was monitoring on an iPad.
“What is it?” Martell demanded.
“Police,” the man said. “They come. Two minutes.”
How the hell he knew that, Luis had no idea.They must have cameras every fucking where.
The room began to empty out through a door Luis hadn’t clocked. It was concealed by a black curtain and somehow led to daylight.
Martell ghosted through it, leaving his bargain basement drugs behind.
In Luis’s hand.
The rest of the room cleared, parrot and all, and panic hit Luis square in the gut. The police were coming, and he was holding enough coke to put him away long enough to have middle-aged spread by the time he got out. Add in that Dante had a bullet in him, and they were both royally fucked.
Run. If you leave now, you can get away.But as hard as Luis tried to make himself move, nothing happened, and it took him far too long to realise his treacherous heart wouldn’t let him leave Dante alone and bleeding on the snooker club floor.
A shout ripped, unbidden, from Luis’s chest. He punched the wall and wrenched Dante’s coat off, flinging the sweaty leather away before he thought better of it and crouched to drape it over Dante’s shivering form. “I fucking hate you.”
Dante chuckled, flat and breathless. “I know. And I get it now, so you should go, now, before they get here.”
“You know I won’t leave you like this, so don’t pretend to be a god damn martyr now.”
“I’m not. I mean it. Leave the package and get the fuck out of here. That way, you’ve given Martell what he wants and got rid of me all in one. You can’t lose, brother.”
Luis had been losing his entire life, ever since genes and DNA had gifted him Dante and their waster mother as his only family. Dante’s words washed over him as he tracked the sound of the approaching sirens.
Dante gripped his arm, fingers digging in hard. “Fuck’s sake, Luis. Justgo.I’m fucked anyway, and you don’t deserve to get caught here.”
“I can’t—”
“You can. Just like I left you all those years ago. Get the fuck out of here.”
Dante’s blood was seeping into Luis’s jeans and the hem of Paolo’s sweater. He was in no danger of dying, but the sight of it made Luis’s stomach roll and his heart clench with fear. The more blood he had on him, the more conspicuous he became. If he was going to run, it had to be now.
“I—”
