Chapter 15 #2
“I’m also an ESA,” Fenn said. He shifted his weight, then went on with, “The BSI has been tracking the Dumfries gang for ages. They were thrilled when I told them what we have here, and they’ve been rushing to put things in place to arrest your friends once they arrive.”
“No! No, you can’t!” Lucas gasped. “They’ll kill me if they find out. These are not nice people.”
I felt a rush of fear from Linus and reached out to him. As soon as he felt my touch, confidence filled him, but he was still painfully disappointed in his brother. “If you help us catch the bad guys, I’m sure the cops will give you some kind of immunity,” he said.
I could tell that he wasn’t sure of that at all. I wasn’t sure of it myself, and judging by Fenn’s expression, neither was he.
“What, so I’m supposed to pick who I want to kill me?” Lucas blurted, rocking back and forth like he wanted to run. “Either I get murdered by Wally or locked up by the fuzz?”
“If the police are able to catch the Dumfries gang and arrest them all, they won’t be around to murder you,” Linus reasoned.
“Yeah?” Lucas snapped, marching over to glare at his brother face-to-face. “Well, what about the Westfield family? Those are their guns I’ve got out in that van. They’re expecting the drugs.”
“I’m not going to lie and say the BSI won’t be investigating and going after them, too,” Fenn said. “But for the time being, there isn’t anything implicating them directly in this exchange. They’ll probably be more inclined to deny everything and pretend none of this happened.”
“Until they decide to come after me to permanently silence me,” Lucas said, gripping a hand around his throat.
“You’d be safe in jail,” Linus sighed, lowering his head.
“Or maybe a witness protection program,” I offered, hating to feel my omega’s grief over his brother’s transgressions.
“Yes!” Lucas grasped onto that. “The witness protection program. If I help the cops bring down the Dumfries gang, maybe the Westfield family, too, then they’ll whisk me off, give me a new identity, and I won’t ever have to worry about any of this again.”
We all looked to Fenn. “It’s a possibility,” he said with a wince, rubbing the back of his neck.
Fenn didn’t really have the ability to make any promises along those lines, but I kind of got the impression it wasn’t incredibly likely the witness protection program was an option. I wasn’t going to tell Lucas, though.
“This is perfect,” Lucas said, his restlessness turning into a dance of excitement.
“I can totally do this. It’ll be fun, like playacting.
I’ll act all cool and suave when Wally and the guys arrive, I’ll lure them in, and then the cops can jump out and make the arrests.
I might even come off looking like a major hero in the whole thing. ”
“Yeah, maybe you will,” Linus said, though that wasn’t what he was feeling at all.
“Great.” Lucas clapped his hands together and started for the door. “I’ve got to pick out a good outfit for this whole thing. I don’t have a lot of clothes here, but I think Papa has some of his old suits in storage upstairs. I could look like a real gangster for this scene.”
None of us tried to stop Lucas as he left the room. We all stood right where we were, watching him retreat into the hall, then listening for his footsteps on the stairs.
“Do you think he’ll really play along and help the cops?” Fenn asked.
“Not for a second, unfortunately,” Linus said, his shoulders dropping. “He’s got to be up to something. But then, Lucas is always up to something.”
“Zane and the others need this operation to be a success,” Fenn said.
“I’ve been in touch with them again and told them about the Westfields.
That was a piece of information they were definitely glad to get.
Another unit is tracking them now. And it’s helped them finalize a few details about the plan.
They’re going to pose as members of the Westfield family when Wally Dumfries and the others arrive. ”
“Don’t they all know each other?” I asked.
Fenn shook his head. “The two gangs have worked together for a while, but they do their business anonymously, mostly online on the dark web.”
“Two criminal gangs, and they’ve never met each other face to face,” Linus said, pushing a hand through his hair in disbelief.
“If you think about it,” I said, “that makes perfect sense. If one gang gets caught, they can’t identify or implicate the others.”
“Then what’s to stop the Dumfries gang from getting suspicious as soon as they see people other than Lucas waiting for them and to call the whole thing off?” Linus asked.
“It’s going to take some finesse,” Fenn said.
“Zane and his team are going to have to stay out of sight until all of the Dumfries are off their boat. Which is why I let the cat out of the bag with Lucas. We’re going to need him to act like everything is normal to get the Dumfries guys away from their boat and to explain things. ”
“That’s never going to work,” Linus said. “Lucas will only think of himself. The second things get tense, he’ll bail and run, probably ruining the whole thing.”
I hated that my omega was right and that it put us all in a dangerous position.
Fenn didn’t look at all upset by Linus’s statement, though. In fact, he had a spark in his eyes that I wasn’t sure I liked.
“You’re right, of course,” he said, smiling. “Which is why it’s lucky we have the perfect decoy.” He looked straight at me.
I sucked in a breath when it clicked what he meant. “No,” I said. “It’s too dangerous. I won’t have it.”
Linus figured it out, too. “You want me to pose as my brother in order to foil a smuggling gang?” His voice shot up to a super high octave as he gaped at Fenn.
“It might be the only choice we have,” Fenn said. “I agree that Lucas isn’t going to play nicely on this one. He’ll try to save himself, which could potentially get a lot of people hurt.”
I was furious with my brother for playing the “people might get hurt if you don’t do this” card. The problem was, he was right.
Linus stood there gaping for a moment, but I could feel the wheels turning in his head.
“Well, I mean, Lucas and I used to swap places all the time,” he said, his voice hoarse.
“That’s how this whole thing started, isn’t it?
” He looked to me. “I was pretending to be Lucas for a job interview. I’ve pretended to be him for a lot of things before. ”
“I don’t like it,” I said. “I don’t like any of it. The whole reason we left Kincade Slopes to come here to the beach house was to confront your brother for crossing boundaries and putting you in danger by pretending to be him. We came here to stop this sort of thing.”
“True,” Linus said, nodding slowly. “But in this case, me pretending to be him might actually help people. It might put an end to his shenanigans once and for all.”
What Lucas was involved in was way more than shenanigans, but my omega had a point.
He was clever and far braver than he thought, and if he took his brother’s place this one last time, there was a good chance Lucas would end up getting what was coming to him in a way that would mean he couldn’t put Linus in danger ever again.
“Okay,” Linus said, turning to Fenn. I could feel he’d made his mind up and I wasn’t going to be able to convince him otherwise. “I’ll do it. I’ll impersonate my brother when the Dumfries gang arrives so that we can catch the bad guys and put an end to all this. Just tell me what to do.”