29. Dax
DAX
“Yeah, I’m still not putting together why we’re all here though?” Picasso interjected. “If you guys know all this, why aren’t you doing anything about it?”
Cameron gave Picasso a pitying look. “Not the brightest crayon in the box, are you?”
“What the fuck does that mean?” Picasso snarled, shoving out of his chair. “You got something to say to me?”
“Not particularly no, but if there is any hope of getting back into Dax’s good graces, I’ll have to play nice,” Cam sighed.
“The problem that we have is that their base of operations is in Mexico and their government is bought and owned by the cartel. They won’t let us in to deal with it or arrest them and hand them over. ”
“So you expect us to do the job for you?” Sprocket asked, cocking his head to the side.
I could see Sprocket trying to follow the logic of what Cam wanted us to do but couldn’t quite seem to connect the dots together. The problem was he thought Cam would stay within the line, like most FBI agents would, but that wasn’t really Cam’s style in life.
“Yes and no, I’ll get to that in a moment,” Cam said as he dimmed the lights in the room and clicked on a projector.
A vaguely familiar face popped up on the screen that seemed to set the others off.
“What the fuck does he got to do with anything—he’s dead!” Picasso blurted, slamming his fist on the table. “Hannibal has been gone for over twenty years now.”
Ah, so it was the family resemblance that I was seeing in this man’s photo. Their uncle had the same dark brown hair and jawline, but Eagle took after him more than Picasso did. I suppose that is why his mother named him after her brother.
“We are well aware of the fact that he is dead, but members of his crew are not. Some of them have gotten out of prison and joined the Mad Dogs, since they are similar minded in lifestyle choices as the Devils Spawn was. Mastiff is just as cruel as Hannibal was, if our information on this man is accurate. I want to offer you all a deal of full immunity from crimes you’ve committed and might still commit while working on this case with us.
Our goal is to take down the Mad Dogs and the De León Cartel, cutting off the Tesoro Cartel’s legs, before we wipe them out too.
This is why we had to take you in the way we did, so that the criminal world wouldn’t think you came in willingly.
I will be your handler and for the next two days you’ll be under our protection as we make plans on how to take this trafficking ring down,” Cam proclaimed, a pleased smile on his lips.
Wes shifted in his chair to look over at me with a raised brow. “You dated this prick for how long?”
“Whoa, rewind. What did you just say, Wes?” Cognac spluttered, before turning to me. “You dated a fed, loba?”
Rolling my eyes, I gulped down the last of my coffee and set the mug on the table.
“Cameron and I dated for about a year back in college, the year Devin died. Once my twin passed, I broke things off, and well you all know the rest of the history on that. I haven’t seen or heard from him in eight years, I had no idea he’d turned to the dark side. ”
“Very funny, beautiful, you know that we dated for over a year, and you didn’t dump me, you vanished into thin air with a note telling me it was over,” Cam corrected.
“Full disclosure, I was recruited from the police academy once you made your rise, Dax, or should I say, Two Tricks. I’ve been watching you for six years, protecting you from the eye of the FBI, since I believed that Westly was the man behind the curtain.
The two of you together created this taskforce and gave me the job I have now.
So imagine my surprise when our informant told me that—you—the pink-haired sprite, was none other than the illustrious Two Tricks the whole time. ”
“What can I say, I’ve always been an overachiever,” I shrugged.
“So, what is this, some kind of Blacklist deal where I get a tracker and you as my handler allowing me to carry on with my life of crime so I can bring down the big baddy you want? Where does it end after we’ve accomplished this whole thing? ”
Cam hit a button on the remote, causing a string of names and faces to get tossed up on the screen in some crazy interconnecting pattern. “Funny you should mention the Blacklist, only this time I’m Redington, with the list of names, and you’re going to lead me to them.”
As I take in the hundreds of people, I notice that they are mostly people that I deal with, or clients of mine.
“You expect me to give them all up? I’d have nothing left, there’s no way that they wouldn’t figure out it was me.
Some of these people don’t interact with anyone outside of a small circle of trusted sources.
” Shaking my head, I pushed out of Void’s lap to stand.
“No. Arrest me, throw me in jail for the rest of my life, but I’m not doing that.
The Hidden Empire is mine, created with my blood, sweat, and tears.
I won’t betray it or my friends to get out of jail. ”
Cam caught my gaze and held it, searching my expression as if trying to determine just how serious I was. The answer to that question is deadly—deadly serious.
“You would let all of your lovers take the fall and end up locked away for years, if not a life sentence, because of your pride?” Cam challenged.
“That’s asinine even for you, Dax. What happened to the woman I knew that wanted to be an artist that traveled the world, drifting from one place to another?
I can set you free from this life of crime, just like I was able to do with your help, all those years ago. ”
So this was his plan all along, he wanted to save me from this version of myself. Well, guess what motherfucker, this is who I’ve always been lurking deep down. It was way too easy to become Two Tricks, it felt natural, like a part of me that I’d always denied myself.
“You, Cameron Able Black, can fuck all the way off. I don’t need your goddamn help or for you to save me from this ‘dark’ world that I motherfucking created!
” I fumed. “I’m out, I want nothing to do with any of this.
Just know that if you lock me away, then no one will be left to fight this battle for you, because it’s clear you can’t do it on your own or why else would you have come to us?
Either let me go and I’ll deal with this problem my way, or you put me in a cell, because there is no fucking chance in hell I’m going to play this game with you.
The Dax you dated is gone, she was burned in a fire of loss and pain and was reborn as this—and it’s never gonna change. ”
The room fell silent at my declaration, but when I quickly glanced around the room, admiration with a mixture of heat flickered in my men’s eyes.
They saw the real me, even if Picasso felt like I was hiding things from him sometimes.
I didn’t want to go back to the rose-colored glasses life, this new version took the world by storm and that’s how I wanted to keep it.
Cam, on the other hand, looked like I’d just thrust a knife through his gut, eyes wide with shock at my challenge.
“I think it might be best if we all took some time to wrap our heads around this,” Sprocket suggested.
I started to speak, but he cut me off with a look.
“It seems that there might need to be some adjustment to the plan and Dax is still recovering from surgery. Stress isn’t really the best thing for her right now, you did say you wanted us to stick around for a few days, yes? ”
Cameron shook himself out of his funk and seemed to bring himself back to center. “Yes, today has been full of unexpected turns of events for both parties. I’ll escort you to where we have you set up in protective custody.”
Void picked me up and set me on his hip like a little kid, but I just wrapped my legs around his waist and let him hold me.
Out of all the guys, Sprocket and Void seemed to just understand what I needed without having to voice it—just like Wes.
Dropping my head to his shoulder, I closed my eyes and just took a few deep breaths to calm myself down from the fury that still flickered under my skin.
No one really talked as we piled into a blacked out fifteen passenger van.
Cam stayed behind and two other agents drove us a few blocks away to an apartment building.
It was nothing special and reminded me where I used to live before Wes and I bought our house… but much cleaner.
When we walked into the apartment, it was a simply furnished three bedroom, with a fully stocked kitchen.
Eagle headed there right away and started to pull things out to make us some dinner.
I hadn’t realized how late it had gotten, being inside a building that didn’t let in a whole lot of light.
I settled on the brown corduroy couch that looked like it came out of the eighties, but it was comfortable, and flipped on the television.
There splashed across the seven-o’clock news was our arrest with cellphone images of us getting put in the SUV.
“So much for keeping this low profile,” I muttered, as Sprocket came to sit next to me.
He uncurled me from my ball, setting my feet in his lap and started to massage them gently. “You want to talk about what happened back there?”
“Do you?” I shot back, knowing I was taking out my anger on the wrong person.
Sprocket just gave me a look and turned back to the television. “All you had to say was no, little rebel, I’m not gonna force it out of you.”
True to his word, we sat in a comfortable silence as the others drifted in around us.
I noticed Wes wasn’t here in the living room, so I glanced around the space spotting him working side by side with Eagle.
They were talking in low voices as they worked, like it was the most normal thing in the world for them to do this.
Letting my head fall back against the arm rest, I let my mind wander.
Somehow, in a way I never saw coming, I now had a family again.
Yeah, we were still new to this and each other, but somehow it just seemed to…
work. Wes fit in with this group of guys easily, even if Picasso gave him a hard time and called him stupid nicknames, but it was almost like they acted like brothers.
Sprocket seemed to have found a solid friendship with Wes, which made sense to me; their brains worked in a similar way.
Void could deal with anyone as long as they didn’t stand in his way, same with Cognac, who was more than happy to have another bro to hang out with.
This moment right here made me feel safe, warm, and dare I say…
happy. So why do I feel so bothered that Cameron pulled the shit that he did back in the conference room?
Was it my need to screw things up when they become too good to be true?
Harper always warned me that I seemed to blow something up when it looked like it might be more than skin deep.
Well, these assholes, as much as I didn’t want to admit it, were way more than fucking skin deep.
They were well and truly under my guard and it was amazing as much as it was terrifying.