Page 3 of The Deeper Game
“We’re visiting vengeance on those whofucking-gbetrayed us,” Odin said.
“Haven’t you heard?” I asked. “The best revenge is living well.”
Odin rolled his eyes. “The best revenge is for their skin to melt slowly and painfully in thefucking-gfire of our wrath.”
I didn’t have much of a reply to that, so I continued on. “There’s a free clinic Thor could volunteer at. You could do your art, Odin. Zeus can amuse himself. I’m sure I could find a way to amuse myself. With you guys.”
Thor raised an eyebrow. “Correction.Weamuse ourselves withyou.”
I gave him a look.
He touched my cheek. “Do you need a demonstration? Of us amusing ourselves with you? Sating ourselves on your body?”
Desire shot down clear through my core. “Be serious.” I took the iPad from Thor and shoved it at Odin, who was again peering through the binoculars. “Look at it. Imagine yourself there.”
“I know what Jerba looks like.” Tunisia wasn’t where he was from originally, but surely he was homesick for the Middle East. The call to prayer. The specific kind of heat. The strange pop music. The desert.
“Imagine yourself sitting on that balcony,” I said. “We could retire here.”
“We don’t retire,” Odin said.
“Why?” I asked. “Why can’t we retire? We have so much money. Like,somuch.”
“We haven’t delivered enough pain,” Odin said.
“When will we have delivered enough pain?” I asked.
“When ZOX screams like a furry little mongoose. Especially Agent Denko.”
Thor’s expression turned grim.
I frowned. And not just because I didn’t know what a mongoose was. The whole vengeance thing was getting to me.
Their vengeance was righteous, yes, and it was driven by a burning fire, ever since the secret agency they’d devoted their lives to had betrayed them.
Taking down banks, the most public of crimes, was the bestfuck youtwo secret agents and a doctor could come up with.
It was something I loved about them at first. But as the weeks had turned into months, I’d become uncomfortable with running on pure vengeance.
I wanted better for them. Because I loved them, even though we’d never said the words to each other.
Loving them was scary, because my beautiful bank robbers were doomed, according to a good number of people.
I usually enjoyed beautiful, doomed things, but the constant threat of losing them?
When would it end?
Chapter Two
“Tellertwo on her way to a smoke break,” Thor said.
I checked my my lucky bank-robbing wig in the mirror—long blonde hair with bangs—ideal for fitting in with the Beverly Hills peeps. In real life, I’d cut my hair short and dyed it platinum blonde. Before that, in my life on the sheep farm, it was long and red.
Satisfied with my wig, I straightened my diamond necklace. One of the good things about casing this place were the extremely fabulous outfits required to look the part. Today I wore a pink silky shirt dress with gold heels.
I sat back and sighed dramatically. “One thing’s for sure—living in a vacation paradise would be a hell of a lot more exciting than sitting in this stupid truck doing the most boring thing on the planet.”
Odin lowered his binoculars. He had a gleam in his eye that spelled trouble. “This is boring to you, Isis? Do we need to make it un-boring? In a perhaps excruciatingly pleasurable manner?”
