Castello checked his phone for messages; nothing, he was going to kick Connor’s ass for not following the rules. “Zack, we got anything on the books?” he asked his second again.
“Nope,” Zack answered, “We are meant to be on a month’s downtime to let the fiasco in Kandahar die down.”
Yeah, Castello would be freaking happy if that shit show died down.
The capture of a former military person gone rogue and being brought to trial was headline news on every TV station in the country. Every damn time he’d turned on a TV over the last two days it was all he saw. Thank fuck nobody knew who he and his guys were.
“Why?” Zack asked.
“Fritz Blackwell has asked us to go to Texas to discuss a job.” Castello answered. “I owe him for saving Rourke.” He reached for the plate Sawyer held out to him, “I will go and see what he wants.”
Zack tossed his plate into the sink. “Road trip to Texas could be fun.”
He rinsed his mug out before putting it in the dishwasher. “I’ll check the trucks.”
“Shotgun.” Sage’s voice called from the living room, “I call shotgun.”
“Driver picks the tunes and Shotgun shuts his pie hole.” Zack yelled back.
“Asshole.”
“Dumbass.”
This chaos, it made Castello batshit half the time, but he wouldn’t change it for the world.Having the other half of your heart here could onlymake it better, dumbass.“Someone call the idiot and tell him to get his ass home, or he isn’t coming with us.” he ordered.
“What about Rourke?” Sawyer asked, “Is he coming too?”
“He has classes this week.” Castello eyed his tech guy. “My kid doesn’t need to be any more involved in our world than he already is.” The last thing he wanted for his son was a life of war. He wanted him in a safe job, here somewhere in small town USA where people didn’t shoot at him and he didn’t have to watch every step he took for a fucking IED.
“I just figured he might want to see the guys again, he and Kalon became good buddies when he was there last year.” Sawyer muttered, “I’ll grab the go bags.”
Castello watched Sawyer leave the room, there was something going on with Sawyer, he couldn’t quite put his finger on it. But either Sawyer would
talk to him, or he would shake it out of him. “Chow down,” he told the others, “Once Connor gets here, we’ll hit the road.”
“Roger that.”
***
“Are we there yet?”
“No, Sawyer, we are not there yet.” Castello gritted out the words.
“I need to take a leak.” Connor brushed his hands together, sending sugar from the cola bottle jellies flying.
Who the hell had swapped out his soldiers and sent him toddlers in their place? “We stopped ten klicks ago, you should have gone then.” Castello smacked Connor’s hand away from the stereo, “Leave that alone.”
“Boss, this music sucks.” Connor whined. “Back me up here, Sawyer.”
“Shut the fuck up.” Maybe he should have sent all of them in the other truck with Zack, Rafe, and Sage. Balas could ride shotgun with him. Give the dog an open window to hang his head out, let him feel the wind in his ears, and he was happy. Balas also had the added bonus that he didn’t give a shit what music blasted through the truck, heavy metal or opera… the woofer didn’t have an opinion either way.
“Boss…”
Castello cut off Sawyer before he could finish the sentence, “Play fucking I Spy or something” he ordered, “Leave my damn tunes alone.”
“But…”
“Shut. Up.” Castello’s knuckles whitened as he attempted to keep from exploding, he should have brought Rourke and left his pack of dumbasses at home in California. In the rear-view mirror, he caught a glimpse of the mutinous look on Sawyer’s face. Damn it, it knew that meant he had about ten seconds before the idiot started to kick Connor’s seat or something equally annoying. “Try it, Saw, and I swear to fuck you are walking the rest of the way. Got it?”
