Page 63 of Bourbon & Blood

La Croix…

“Saint, you an’ Cy look less out of pocket than I do, brother. You go on an’ git ‘im,” I said. I hated that I had to wait in the van.

“We got this, boss. No worries,” Cy said easily, checking his gun.

“Don’t get cute,” Saint shot back at him curtly and I gave ‘im a nod, backing up his assertion.

“Make sure it’s ‘im,” I said. The boys nodded and bailed out of the van, heading on up the steps to the moderately fancy house.

“Shit,” I muttered. We was in the area around Harrison and Argonne. Upscale. Nice. Way richer ‘n the likes of us should be hangin’ around. All it took was one patrol comin’ by and running the plates on our van and we were sunk; because, of course, the plates were stolen.

We didn’t care so much about gettin’ popped for that, aside from the embarrassment. If we was gonna get locked up, it’d better be for somethin’ worth it and not somethin’ so petty.

I waited for what felt like entirely too long, suckin’ in a breath and letting it out harsh, drumming my fingertips and thumbs against the steerin’ wheel as I shifted in my seat. I hated waitin’ on the outside. Hated giving up control.

It wasn’t long before Saint and Cypress came out of the place with a rolled-up carpet over their shoulders. Saint turned and hollered somethin’ jovially while Cy gave a polite nod in the direction of the house and shut the front door.

“Heh.” I huffed a laugh. I knew a bullshit charade outta my boys when I saw it. There weren’t no one in that house they was talkin’ to. Nah, you looked close enough at the rug they was haulin’ out, you would see the irregular lumps in it.

I got out and opened the doors of the van and they tossed the rug in. The rug grunted, and I smiled.

“Slicker ‘n owl shit!” Cy said with a grin from the passenger seat as Saint took up behind the wheel.

“Get us out of here nice an’ easy, brother. We ain’t outta the woods just yet,” I told him as he turned the wheel and pulled us out and away from the curb.

The carpet made muffled noises, and I punched it.

“Shut the fuck up,” I snarled low and quiet. “I’m fixin’ to deal with you in a minute.”

Fuck.I hated it when they whined.

We rode outta the city right quick and got out onto the two-lane highway to get us into the swamp. Somewhere where our quarry couldn’t be heard screaming.

“Smokehouse?” Saint asked, and I nodded.

“You know it.”

The smokehouse was almost always the place we took ‘em to ask questions and make ‘em sweat and this was no exception.

Once we got there, we made quick work of unloadin’ the dude and gettin’ him inside. It was still light out, but that light was failing. Plenty of time yet before Alina was off work for me to meet her.

The fool pissed himself when Saint pulled the bag off his head after gettin’ him hung up. I admit to participatin’ in a little theater. When the dude’s eyes adjusted, it was to me standin’ there naked.

Not that I was interested in boning the motherfucker – nah, it wasn’t nothin’ like that. No, it was a DNA thing. The blood was easier to wash off skin and there wasn’t no risk of takin’ anything incriminating in the fabric of my clothes. That and it tended to send the fear of God into ‘em – a dude especially.

“Let him talk,” I said and looked to Saint who stepped up and tore the duct tape off from over dude’s mouth. He worked the bandanna out of his mouth with his tongue and immediately started babbling.

“What do you want? What’re you gonna do to me?”

“Well that depends on you,” I said easy. “You cooperate, you tell me what I wanna know, and things go easy.”

“What do you want to know?” he demanded, complying quickly.

I grunted and gave a nod. Dude was a pussy, that was clear – a skinny gopher boy, fetch and carry, fawning all over big daddy politician’s boots.

I hated the type. We may share a penis in common but he weren’t no man.

“A little while back, you booked a hotel room,” I said. “At the Ritz Carlton there downtown, yeah?”

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