Levi
The brakes squealed slightly as I came to a stop, and I frowned, making a mental note to have someone look at them.
Mechanical expertise was... well, not my expertise, but I’d dealt with enough vehicles to feel confident it was probably the brakes.
The car was supposed to be in good shape and was relatively new; there was no reason for that kind of noise.
Some people might be tempted to give me shit and call me fussy over an annoying noise, but I liked to think of it as having standards.
Some people? You can just come right out and say Dom.
I sighed. “I suppose at this moment in my life, he would be the only one inclined to do so.”
What a depressing thought.
“That he’s the only one willing to give me shit?” I wondered as I stared at the warehouse and the men standing outside, waiting for me. The windows of the car were heavily tinted, so they couldn’t see me talking to myself from a distance.
Yes.
“And how is that depressing?”
I don’t know, Levi, what could be depressing about being surrounded by people who take everything so seriously that they can’t come up with a good joke, or people who are too terrified of upsetting you that they wouldn’t dare.
You spent your whole life around people who knew how to laugh and wouldn’t let you take yourself too seriously, until you decided to leave. Now?
“I’m not sure what to say in the face of you thinking that someone giving me trouble is a positive thing.”
Oh...is that why you’re ignoring his texts?
I grimaced and chose to leave that one alone.
Didn’t stop me from picking up my phone, unlocking the screen to look at the couple of texts he’d sent me.
Some dimly hopeful part of me had hoped he’d throw the napkin away like an intelligent person, or just lose it.
I hadn’t had much hope for either; my luck hadn’t been good enough lately for the second, and he was far too determined for the first. I also knew there wasn’t much point in ignoring his texts for much longer; he would hunt me down.
Is this what we’re gonna do?
I sighed, bringing up the message and tapping back to him.
Sorry, been busy. I don’t have an off-season or much downtime, unlike someone I know.
I tucked my phone away and slid out of my car.
I had no sooner stepped out and taken a moment to adjust my jacket before I felt my phone buzz. “Jesus, are you hovering around the phone, Dom?”
My shoes crunched on the asphalt of the poorly maintained parking lot as I made my way toward the warehouse. I snuck a glance at the phone and snorted.
Wow, aren’t we feeling extra bitchy today?
Then I watched as the next one popped up.
I hope you aren’t stupid enough to think that’s gonna piss me off enough to stop talking. I’ll blow your shit up.
“Gentlemen,” I said to the two at the door as I shot back a reminder to Dom that he should keep in mind that ‘blowing your shit up’ can mean different things, especially for someone like me, before silencing the phone and tucking it away. “Does this mean we’re ready?”
“Yes, sir,” one of them said, swinging the rusty door open so I could step inside.
The inside was stuffy in comparison. I didn’t think the place had seen fresh air in a couple of decades, and the smell of rot and shit was strong, rat shit to be specific.
I had smelled it enough times that I could recognize it instantly, though I wasn’t particularly fond of the smell.
A few lights had been turned on, but that only made the shadows look more threatening and ominous, even with one of the guards at my side, while the other stayed behind.
Not that I wasn’t capable of dealing with a threat, but I wasn’t exactly a combat expert, and a show of strength and confidence was important for this type of meeting.
From further down the aisle of dusty shelves, quick feet approached, and I watched as Will appeared, flashing me a nervous smile before coming to my side. “Both of them are here, arrived just before you did.”
“Punctual of them,” I said, making a mental note.
I had expected my...guests to make a point by making me wait.
That meant I was already operating under a false assumption, so I needed to be careful.
Those kinds of mistakes could quickly become lethal.
I still expected some form of power play, that was the nature of the beast when the beast was formed by criminal politics. “And their people?”
“They brought about the same amount,” Will said in a low voice that wouldn’t carry beyond our brief conversation. “Ours were ready before theirs got here.”
“Did they arrive with them or after?”
“One of them came with their men, did a sweep, and got into their own positions. No trouble, but the guy who came with them...makes me nervous.”
“If they didn’t make you nervous, I would be concerned for your mental health,” I said dryly.
“He’s...I don’t know, dangerous.”
“Aren’t we all?”
“Not like this.”
“How so then?”
“It’s hard to explain, but he seems...off.”
“Unbalanced?”
“Maybe? It’s just a feeling.”
“Never dismiss what your intuition tells you just because you have nothing concrete to back it up,” I warned him. “But never commit to those feelings until you have something solid to work with.”
“Right, yeah,” he said quickly, but I didn’t think he would take the advice to heart.
The more I dealt with him, the more I could see he was a pretty decent person, which meant he wasn’t suited for this kind of work.
It was a shame that Augustine had insisted he be involved when it was obvious he wanted to do anything other than stick by my side.
Maybe in the future, when I had regained our foothold in this area, I’d find a way to get him moved to something less.
..intensive on his nerves. Hell, if there was an opportunity to find someone in the damned family who might be able to do something positive in this world that didn’t require them to get their hands dirty, I didn’t see why I shouldn’t take it.
“Well, let’s get this underway,” I said, checking the time and ignoring the message notification at the top of the screen. “I have other things I need to deal with today.”
“Right, yeah,” he repeated in the same nervous, rapid speech that always left me torn between wanting to comfort him and giving him a good, hard shake. Neither of which was going to help.
With Will behind me, along with the door guard, we walked through the maze of shelves until we reached the middle of the warehouse.
It was the spot I’d picked for the meeting at the last second.
Specifically because it would give all of us a sense of being locked in and provoke paranoia, given so many places someone could hide.
Of course, my men had been here from the moment I had chosen the spot, so that would only make them more wary.
There were multiple ways to... provoke people, and often the provoked were sloppier than usual and also less careful about guarding secrets or tells.
Of course, it could also backfire, but considering this was not intended to be a friendly meeting between equals, I had no reason to be hospitable.
I stepped out from the shelves to look at the table under one of the overhead lights and made rapid mental notes about them as I approached.
One of them, I knew, was Luis; the other went by Reg.
Luis was the muscle in the area, while Reg was in charge.
Both had come, even though I’d needed only one of them.
Either they were trying to convey some intimidating aura, or they were admitting that neither of them was more in command than the other.
Or they’re just friends.
Mmm, there was that.
“Good afternoon,” I said as I approached the table, carefully watching their body language while making sure I wasn’t obvious about it. I was presenting an attitude of control and power, and I didn’t need them to realize I was watching them carefully.
Los Muertos had made many gains over the years throughout much of the country, mostly in the southern end, as Eliza could attest, since she’d been feuding with them for the past decade.
Their strongest seats were in the southeast, but they still had a good hold throughout the southwest. They had been creeping up through California for a few years, and while I had interacted with them on occasion while operating out of Seattle, they had mostly behaved themselves.
That was, until the news hit that Will Senior had been taken down.
Smelling blood in the water and seeing an opportunity, they had grown much more active in Northern California and Oregon.
If I were overly paranoid, I might think they’d had something to do with Senior being caught with his pants down.
Los Muertos was brutal in its dealings, but they were clever and cunning when necessary.
The thing was, if there was someone the feds wanted to take down harder than The Family, it was Los Muertos.
While I could picture them working with an enemy to bring down a shared foe, I couldn’t see them teaming up with Los Muertos.
And now they were in my city, and I needed to deal with them before they got too comfortable.
“Levi, right?” Reg asked, standing up, gripping my hand, then shaking it before gesturing to the seat across from him. “Nice of ya to call us together.”
“Of course,” I said politely as I took the seat, adjusting my coat. “It’s become obvious, I think, that everyone involved could benefit from sitting down and talking.”
“Yeah,” Luis said, his expression never changing. “I’m sure when your daddy sent you down here, he wasn’t expecting to run into trouble.”
“Trouble,” I repeated, meeting his eyes, “is a mild way of putting it. For the past month and a half, you have practically set the city on fire.”