Chapter 10
“Do I have to remind you that you have a fucking mission to complete? Why are you spending more time with Bishop’s daughter than you spend trying to close this case?”
Fitz’s voice boomed through the other end of my phone. Was this motherfucker keeping tabs on me? It took everything in me not to cuss him out. He had some of the other young agents afraid of him because of how much pull he had, but I wasn’t one of them.
I never used my people’s name to throw around my own weight. That was why motherfuckers like Fitz forgot who the fuck I was related to. There was no amount of bitch in my blood. My dad didn’t raise me to fear anybody or anything.
Fitz never needed to remind me of my mission. I had been knee-deep in this assignment since I first heard about them needing a younger agent to infiltrate the Durty Boyz. There was no reason to question my loyalty to the dedication I had to bringing this mission to a close. Well, besides Maeve.
“Keep your eyes open for what’s going down tonight. That’s where your focus should be, not on me and who I spend time with. I’m the best at my job. I know my mission, and I don’t need your fucking input.”
I hung up the phone on him just as fast as I had answered. I was finally making moves in an organization many had deemed impossible to break into. One wrong move could mess up everything I had been building, and having this conversation with Fitz right now was the wrong move.
I had already briefed him on the play tonight.
Bishop would be meeting with the head of the Jack-town JUs, his biggest rival in the city, for a drop.
The Jack-town JUs hated the Durty Boyz, but they still depended on us to supply them with enough guns, drugs, and women to keep their operation running.
The border meet tonight, where over twenty races had already been matched, was just a cover for that drop.
We had just made it to the border meet, and Maeve and I had gone our separate ways.
She walked closer to the crowd, where dozens of cars and bikes gathered to race, and I’d walked in the opposite direction toward the wood line to look for a spot to piss.
If Fitz had called even two minutes earlier, she would have been within earshot of that conversation.
I released the piss I’d been holding for the last hour, shook myself dry, then tucked my dick back in my pants. As soon as I zipped and turned around, I saw I had company. I didn’t know how long he had been standing there.
“Who was that on the phone?”
Tyrus must have walked up while my back was turned.
He was a Durty Boy who was always trying to find something he could run and tell.
That was the problem with most of the men in organizations like this one.
They were always looking for something that would put them in a higher position, even if that meant snitching on, stealing from, or killing the next man.
“Mind your fucking business, my nigga. You don’t know me like that,” I snapped before bumping him out the way with my shoulder. Now wasn’t the time for me to falter. I couldn’t act like I’d been caught red-handed doing something I wasn’t supposed to.
Although I didn’t know how much Tyrus had heard, I didn’t say enough to put my cover at risk. I wouldn’t give him the impression that he could use me to make the other men fuck with him more than they already did. He would never get street credit off me.
He had no idea who I was on the phone with or what we talked about. The only way I could blow my cover right now was by saying more than I needed to. He was fishing, but I wouldn’t take the bait.
“Nah, I feel like you lying. I never trusted your ass.”
“Did I ask you about your fucking feelings, nigga? You shouldn’t be feeling a damn thing about me. And what you mean, you never trusted me? I’m not a bitch for you to be feeling or trusting me. The fuck I look like to you?”
“Answer the question. Who was that on the phone?”
He stepped back in front of me like he was trying to block my path.
“I ain’t answering shit. Now what?”
I stepped closer to Tyrus, ready to be on whatever he was on. Badge or no badge, I would never let another man feel like he got some kind of control over me. I would die right here before I let that happen.
“Get the fuck out of my way,” I spat, still looking him square in the eye. I could see him contemplating what he was going to do next. I just hoped he made the right decision because I had no issue with catching a body right here.
“Make me.”
Tyrus challenged me like this was a standoff. I didn’t want to jeopardize this mission, but I wasn’t about to let another man punk me. On assignment, in uniform, or not, I was a man before any of that.
There was no way I was going to let somebody step to me and walk away like it was sweet. I punched Tyrus dead in the jaw. He stumbled back and immediately pulled his pistol off his hip. A bitch, just like I thought. He was scared to fight me.
I’d been around men with guns my whole life, so nothing about this situation made me flinch. He was pussy for even having to pull out a pistol in the moment where we were talking as two men. That showed me his hand. He didn’t even trust that he could beat me.
“You better use that pistol, nigga, because you going to need it if you don’t get the fuck up out my way.”
I stared him in his face and laughed because if he thought I was scared or would beg for my life, he had another thing coming. There was no way somebody like him could put fear in my heart.
“What is going on here?”
Maeve stormed up and got in between us. Tyrus instantly put the gun down. Bitch ass didn’t want Bishop to know that he had a gun pointed in his little girl’s face.
“Move out of the way, Maeve. This don’t got nothing to do with you. Just two men having a conversation.”
“I don’t trust this nigga, Maeve. Move out of the way and let me put a bullet in his head.” Tyrus’s chest heaved as he talked. “I overheard him on the phone, and it sounded like he was talking to cops to me.”
“Nigga, how you get all that from a few words? Better yet, how you know what it sound like to talk to the cops? You must’ve been talking to them recently?”
“Nah, this ain’t about me, and don’t try to flip it. This is about you and that phone call I just overheard.”
Tyrus cocked the pistol but didn’t raise it again. Maeve was still standing firmly between us. I pushed her out of the way gently because I didn’t want her to fall, but I had already asked nicely.
“Let’s do this, my nigga. Maeve too small for you to be acting like she’s the reason you can’t get active.”
I stepped up to him again, but Maeve recovered faster than I expected her to. She was right back in between us. She pushed me back to create more space, and I let her.
“Tyrus, if you don’t trust Dima, then you don’t trust my father. Is that what you want me to tell him? Unless you want my father to hear about this little situation, I suggest you leave.”
She stared him down, standing toe to toe just like I had a minute ago.
“Leave now,” she said, pointing her finger.
He tucked his tail and walked off, just like she said. He was a scary ass nigga. The way Maeve stood up for me made my dick hard. She didn’t care about what he said. She defended me like she saw me for who I was, not the mask I’d been wearing.
The way she looked at me was a problem that got bigger by the day. Fitz mentioned that I needed to be focused on the mission, and he was right. I had a job to do, and I was losing myself in this woman.
The longer Maeve stood in front of me, the more cloudy my vision became. I was supposed to be bringing Bishop Moore to justice, but instead, I was falling for his daughter. What was I going to do when it was time to turn them all in?