Chapter 10 #2
I grin. “Are you hearing this, ‘Vil? I go on vacation for a week, and Miller starts gunning for my job.”
“Right,” Miller scoffs. “Because I’m gonna level-up until I can do calculus in my head when I’m five Jack and Cokes deep. That’s in the cards for me.”
A burn phone buzzes, and Anvil hands it to me.
There’s a two-word message from Callahan’s burner. Girl home.
“The Lobos just found out the Sosas have no hostage. I wonder if the Sosa VIPs made it back to Colombia yet. If not, I don’t like their chances of making it through Mexico.”
Miller’s satisfied expression tells me all I need to know about how he’s going to do running ops.
“How’s it look, ‘Vil?”
“Fine. Smelt the weapons.”
“All business. That’s my partner,” I say with a wink. I lead Miller to the spot where we’re going to melt down the weapons and electronics. I run things down for him, and we get started.
“So how is it between you and Zoe these days?” I ask.
“How is what between us?” Miller says, his posture immediately stiff.
“You guys still aren’t talking?”
“I don’t know. I’ve never been particularly talkative around her. She’s the boss’s beautiful girlfriend. Being friendly sends the wrong message all around.”
“The wrong message to who?” I say. “You think C will get the wrong impression? Because I’m here to tell you he never has.”
He shrugs, his jaw set. “I don’t know. The day of the standoff, she tried to get me to hold information back from C. She got upset when I refused to have that conversation with her.”
“She was wrong to suggest that. You made the right call. C acknowledged that to you, right?”
Miller nods grimly.
“Tell me what’s on your mind, Mill.”
“Some women are dangerous. Zoe Arantes is one of them. Maybe she doesn’t mean to be, but she is.”
So his wariness runs pretty deep at the moment. How wide a tarp he’s thrown is still unclear. “How about my sister Ash? Is she dangerous?”
He smiles and shoots me a look. “Definitely. In a different way, but yes.”
“Bet you’re glad she picked up that gun though?”
Without hesitation, he says, “If she hadn’t picked up that gun, I’d be dead.”
“You sure? She told me you had it under control.
He looks away for a moment, like everything about that day troubles him. “The truth is, Trick, there was a shooter on my six, coming from a neighboring yard. I didn’t see him until I shifted positions, which I couldn’t have done if she hadn’t had a gun on the leader.”
“Hmm. She must have missed that.”
“Maybe.”
I smile. “You think Ash is covering for you? She doesn’t need to, man. You were seriously outnumbered through no fault of your own.”
“Yeah, but I think I should’ve taken a better position from the jump in that standoff. I think Anvil thinks so too, but he hasn’t said.”
“What now?”
“Nothing. Maybe I’m overthinking it.” He shrugs, trying to cover.
“Hey, ‘Vil?” I call out.
“Trick,” Miller says in a low voice. “Come on.”
“Come on nothing,” I say, frowning.
Anvil walks over. “What?”
“Miller thinks he took the wrong position on the day he faced off with the Sosas in the street.”
“Yeah, he did.”
For fuck’s sake. “I thought you went over what happened with him? If you had something to teach him, why didn’t you?”
Anvil’s face is a concrete block. “He didn’t ask me. He’s yours. I figured he’d ask you.”
Mine? I don’t know what the hell Anvil’s talking about. Miller belongs to C Crue, like all of us.
“What if he didn’t know to ask?”
“He knew. Case in point,” ‘Vil says, gesturing to us.
I roll my eyes. “It’s weeks later now. When this went down, I was gone. You let him twist all this time?”
Anvil gives me a bored look. “I let him think.” Anvil turns his head to address Miller. “When you’ve got a question for me, ask it. If you don’t, I assume you want to figure it out on your own, using other resources.”
“We want your take on it now, ‘Vil. Break it down.”
Without hesitation, Anvil says, “He moved in too close to Hornsby. It left Miller’s back exposed.
It was a natural mistake. Hornsby called him for help.
When Miller arrived and saw him down, he zeroed in.
The first instinct is to see how bad Hornsby’s hurt, but it’s the wrong move.
Saving Hornsby is not the objective when there are three unarmed women on the scene who are all a higher C Crue priority than him.
” His flat stare turns to Miller. “With the number of enemies so high, you have to take the best position you can. Even then, it probably would’ve ended badly.
The wildcard is what saved you, Miller. But you already know that, don’t you? ”
Miller nods.
“Don’t let it eat you up,” Anvil orders. “All of us have made the wrong move on occasion. And that scene was about as tough as they come.”
Miller nods again.
“One other thing. If something’s planned out, you can bet Trick will make the best choice every time, so you can do what he does right then and forever after. But if a scene’s going down in real time, don’t watch what he does and try that yourself later.”
Miller glances between us.
“Are you saying I’ve got poor judgement under pressure?” I ask, not even trying to mask the surprise in my voice.
“No, I’m saying when things are fast and loose, you operate in a way that only works for someone with your skillset. Miller’s not you. In a multiple shooter scenario with a gun in hand, there’s only one guy who can do what you can.”
I crack a smile. “‘Vil—”
“But there’s a downside to your greatness, Trick.
You don’t always see what you don’t need to see.
Other guys, especially inexperienced ones, can’t salvage a suboptimal situation on the fly.
It’s why C doesn’t want you training new guys anymore.
You’ve still got Miller because he’s grandfathered in with you.
But if you want him really ready to handle himself alone in the field, you’ll send him to me.
” He flips a hand over to gesture he’s finished.
“You wanted my take on things. That’s it. ” Anvil walks away.
After a beat, I mutter, “Jesus Christ. Ever have days where you feel like shooting your best friend right through the heart?”
Miller chuckles.
“He’s right about one thing. There are things I don’t see.
I had no fucking idea personnel training had gotten contentious.
” I lean close and lower my voice. “All right, here’s what we’ll do.
Anvil, the tactical guru, is now officially in charge of your field training.
Unofficially, I’m still gonna tell you everything I think might help you stay alive and out of jail.
I can’t say for sure, but I think some of what I say should be relevant to you, since the last I checked I’m made up of DNA like everyone else and don’t have an invisibility cloak or magic wand to cover my tracks. ”
Miller’s laughter echoes through the clearing.
I shake my head. “I’ll tell you another thing. This moves ‘Vil down at least two spots on the godfather list for my kid. I’ve got a cousin I haven’t said more than seventeen words to in the past year who’s ahead of him now.”
Miller leans against a tree, grinning. Then his smile slowly fades. “Thanks, Trick. It’s been a rough few weeks.”
“Yeah, I can see that. It shouldn’t have been that way.
” My tone turns serious. “If you didn’t ask ‘Vil for advice because he comes across as such a fucking hardass, I get it. I’ve been trying to win him over for more than a decade, and after tonight, it’s looking like I’ve got maybe another seven to ten years to go. ”
Miller exhales a small laugh.
“But listen, don’t hesitate to hit any of us up for a tactical discussion.
Over the years, C, Anvil and I have spent thousands of hours talking through all kinds of different scenarios.
Interrogations. Testimony. Ransom. Different types of shootouts.
When to keep fighting. When to lay the guns down.
Twice ‘Vil and I have been in situations where we really should not have gotten out alive. Seriously. Pinned down. Outgunned. Once it was my idea that got us out. The other, Anvil came up with a way for us to tip things in our favor. Both times, we talked for hours afterward about what went right and what went wrong. Post-hoc analysis is part of what we do on the regular, so use any of us as a sounding board. In fact, use all of us. Me, Anvil, and C.”
“That’s not an option.”
“It is.” For fuck’s sake. “Must not seem like it, but I’m telling you, it is. You never need to shut down and isolate yourself to survive in this crue. That’s not how we roll.”
After a few moments of silence, he says, “C cut back my responsibilities, and he limits his interactions with me now. That speaks for itself.”
“Look where you are tonight.”
“Sure, but you offered me this, right? Which I appreciate, by the way.”
It surprises me that guys in our own crue don’t always understand how we operate.
“You’ve got it wrong. I was the one who talked to you about it, but that was only after C gave me the green light.
With something like this, if any of the three of us had said no, you wouldn’t be here tonight.
You’d be reading about it in the morning like everyone else. ”
“All right.” He nods. “Good.”
That at least seems to have the ring of truth to him.
Miller’s the best of the new recruits. He’s better, in fact, than some guys who came on board before him.
I hope bullshit doesn’t get in the way of business.
C needs to continue utilizing Miller for bigger stuff, and everyone needs to stop acting like business decisions are personal.
It’s one thing for C, ‘Vil, and I to treat each other like family, with all that that entails; it’s another to have a young crue member believe he’s being cut out because someone’s girlfriend got her feelings hurt.
Good thing honeymoons are only a once in a lifetime thing because apparently not everything keeps rolling perfectly when one of us is gone.