I have a gun in my bag, a switchblade in my boot, and a modified taser in my pocket. If Wayan wants to fuck around, he’ll find out.
The car unlocks as I approach. The constant state of anxiety has strung me so tight, I’m about to snap.
“What the fuck do you call this time?” I fume, slamming the door behind me. Cigarette smoke and BO slams into me, and I almost swing the door back open to escape it.
My brows spear into my hairline when he holds a hand up to my face without looking at me.
You know what? I might kill him too.
Wayan prattles off a string of words in Bahasa, throwing his hands up in annoyance before pointing angrily at the tourists in front of the car as if they’re the ones on the other end of the phone. He says his goodbye in the form of an aggressive tap before chucking his phone on top of the four others sitting in the center console.
Oh, good. It looks like we’re both in a splendid mood.
“Let’s make this quick, ya?” he mutters, scowling. “I have things to do.”
“So do I,” I snap. “I don’t appreciate being told you’re late at the time you’re meant to be here.”
He glowers at me, and I return the glare tenfold. I flinch when he reaches behind me, and I quickly right myself to pretend it never happened. He unceremoniously drops a box onto my lap.
“Careful,” I hiss. Gripping the container, I send a scathing sneer his way.
His shrug sends a bolt of irritation through me. I grit my teeth and focus on checking the wafers. If he brokeanyof them with that little stunt, I’m ripping his head off.
Attempting to ignore the low throbbing in my arm and my blurring vision, I unlatch the box to check it.
What kind of sick joke is this? “Where the fuck is it?” I’m not in the mood for any of this bullshit—or any bullshit, for that matter.
He doesn’t look at me. He just takes a deep drag of his cigarette. “Pirates,” is all he offers as an explanation.
My stomach sinks. “Tell me everything,” I demand.
Wayan shrugs, rolling down the window to flick the ash out onto the sidewalk. “Got there, and it was already empty.”
I stare at his side profile. “And?”
“The courier said it was pirates. That’s all I know.”
It’s fine.
It’s fine.
Fuck.
It’s not fine. We need those wafers to make the next batch.
“And the parts I ordered for the machine?”
Wayan nods at the empty container. “Gone.”
I gawk at him, dipping into my energy reserves to stop myself from blowing up at him. “And you couldn’t havecalled meabout this so I didn’t come out all this way for nothing?”
An hour and half, I waited, and for what? The time I could’ve spent dealing with my security breach could’ve been the difference between life and death.
I feel like I’m about to lose my mind. I want to smack him upside the head, or maybe just hit someone in general.
Tears spring to my eyes. I’m so exhausted. I’m tired of looking over my shoulder, tired of seeing Tommy hidden behind every corner.
I can’t deal with this right now. I want to go home, back to the garage I was raised in, back into Dad’s arms whenever he’d do his weekly reminders of how proud he was of me.
