7. August 20, 2024 #2
“Each one of you made choices to do what you did to protect innocents. Well, maybe not the brothers.” He referred to the twins, Nemo and Midas. “They were more like ‘take from the rich to give to the poor.’”
“Mostly their poor selves,” Steel pointed out.
“You’d be surprised what those two have within them though. There’s an innate need to protect those in need. Predominantly in Midas, but Nemo has his strengths as well. Channeling his hotheadedness has made him much better suited to the vengeance behind Mythos. He’s grown exponentially.”
There was a knock on the door, and Waters stuck his head in. “Sorry to interrupt, but we’ve got movement on Daleyza.”
He felt his heart rate increase. “Movement?”
“I wasn’t due to check the cameras yet, but with today’s threats from your uncle, I figured I’d better.
She’s had visitors the last couple of days.
No visual identification, as they’ve stayed inside their vehicle up to now.
There have been no kids at the house since Livia was taken to the facility on the thirteenth.
Midas checked her phone records. She placed a call to each of her day-care families.
When he checked the recordings, she told them she would be unavailable for the unforeseen future due to a family emergency. ”
“Mierda! I still don’t know how they figured out I’m alive.”
“Answer is easy,” Waters said, his focus still on the outside world.
“It was mentioned earlier in the meeting. The Salieri have photos of your secret visits to your wife and mother. Whether you want to believe it or not, your family has gone to bed with the enemy. And if that’s the case, we need to move even faster.
We have no clue whether whoever is watching them is Salieri or Colonel Cartel.
My guess is that it’s the former using the cartel to do its dirty work.
They sniffed out your involvement with them, and with us, and now they’ve got the perfect excuse for retribution against Tribe for the execution of Zion, as well as our past run-ins prior to that. ”
Steel asked, “Do you think it’s General Howard pulling the strings? We haven’t been able to locate him or the kid, Andres.”
“Don’t know. Midas watches Howard’s accounts twenty-four seven.
There hasn’t been so much as an attempted login.
If he’s surfaced, he either has other accounts hidden or he has support from the Salieri brotherhood.
Maybe he even has a liquid source somewhere to pull from, making it untraceable.
As for the kid, there’s been nothing on him either.
Andres may have been cut loose as a liability. ”
“You mean executed,” God supplied.
With a nod, Waters leaned against the wall, arms across his chest. “Certainly a possibility.”
“What about the kid’s inheritance?” Steel asked. “Could Howard be accessing that?”
“Unlikely,” God volunteered. “Midas shut down the plantation’s accounts almost as fast as Nimbus’ when Cherry and Demon returned from St. Lucia.
There hasn’t even been an attempt to access it, according to the digital trip wires he’s put in place, and his systems check daily.
Nothing going out, and the only thing going in is accrued interest.”
“He must be getting help,” Waters mused.
“My spidey senses are telling me that Howard is a smaller fish. More like Norton, probably, trying to work his way up the ranks. The banking guy, Giudici, identified himself as one of the Worthy, the second tier. A descendant of one of the seven adopted continental leaders. That means there are six more of him out there because Zion was still working his way up the chain. But those seven didn’t act on their own. ”
God swore under his breath. “The Worthy are answering to someone else. A big boss. Someone we’ve missed.”
“My guess is it’s a descendant of the original leader. Fucker could be anybody,” Steel muttered. “How do you find someone who has that kind of protection around him?”
“Well, I was just thinking about that.” There was a pause before Waters spoke again, his voice subdued. “You lure them out. You give them what they want most.”
Their boss whirled around. “Out of the question!”
“We can’t let these people keep operating their organization. Right now, they’re like a computer virus, running rampant and unstoppable. Intercepting a single shipment of women is just a nuisance to them. It doesn’t have any real effect, and they just keep going.”
“Doesn’t mean we stop trying,” God growled.
“No, but if we want to stop them—really stop them—we need to go for the head of the snake.”
This couldn’t be happening. Waters could not be suggesting what Steel thought was being put on the table.
The tingle started. A faint halo shone around Waters.
A flash of sight—his friend surrendering, beaten.
A pinch. Fire racing through his body. Broken.
Extreme sorrow. A flash of Kubrick’s smiling face.
His girls laughing. Both images hazy, as if in a dream.
Cold. Fire, then cold. Repeat, repeat, repeat.
Darkness. So sick. Weakness. A sluggish heartbeat.
He shook his head to clear the glimmer. That could not be his friend’s plight.
Waters’ tone was resigned as he insisted.
“Boss. You know I’m right. All of this started with me.
I disrupted the supply chain. Granted, Sarah found them, and Cherry helped, but Zion worked to keep her out of it as much as he could.
Grinds my gears, but it’s true. These past few years have all been about revenge on me, and by extension, Tribe.
Kubrick coming along gave them a doorway into us, and the hits have just kept coming. We’ve been lucky so far.”
“You’re not sacrificing yourself for my family,” Steel ground out.
“And you wouldn’t?” his friend asked. “No. The truth is, you would. You have been all this time. Hell, you still are. Every time we deploy on a project, who does the heavy lifting so we’re more likely to go home to our women…
and now the children? You think we don’t know why you do it? No. It’s time those debts are repaid.”
“You owe me nothing, Waters.”
“On the contrary. I owe you everything. So do every one of your teammates. None of us would be where we are now if it weren’t for you. So shut the fuck up about settling the score.”
“Then don’t disrespect the sacrifice by throwing it all away!” He threw himself into a chair. “Pendejo! I swear to God, Waters. If Kubrick doesn’t kick your ass, I will.”
“She’d be the first to tell me this is the right thing to do.”
“Even if we agreed to this stupidity, it wouldn’t work. They won’t stop. You can’t bargain with the devil and win,” God reminded him.
“No, but it will buy you time to get Daleyza to safety. I know you’ll come back for me.”
“And what if we don’t get back in time? It’s Sarah all over again. No. It’s too risky. I forbid it.”
Waters raised his eyebrows. “You ‘forbid it’? Jesus Christ, who are you, my father?”
With a sigh, Steel looked up at him. “If he says no, you’re just going to do it anyway, aren’t you?
Just like with your sister. You’re going to go off on your own and try to solve the problem.
Then we’re going to have to go back in, haul your ass out of there, this time probably more like your corpse.
What happened to we do none of this alone? ”
“We all meet our end at one time or another,” Waters said quietly. “Do I want that to be the way it goes? No. The thought of the pain that would bring to Kubrick, Catalina, and Liliana guts me. But you are my family, too, and if there’s a chance to survive, you know I’ll do whatever it takes.”
The team leader looked at their boss. “That shipment years ago was Zion’s, but we’ve been a thorn in their side long enough that they won’t be able to pass this gift up.
The only way to end these assholes is to get to whoever is running the show.
So it’s time to stop fucking around and be the mongoose.
Lure the cobra out of his den by giving him the juiciest egg to snack on.
Then, while he’s distracted playing with his food, the farmer cuts off his head.
The body of the Salieri relies upon the absolute chain of command of the power structure.
They will writhe in confusion without their leader and fall into chaos.
By the time they figure out how to shore up their defenses, we can rescue Ka-Bar.
Then Tribe, along with Mythos and Tripoli’s people, can make short work of the rest of those sick fucks. ”
“Fuck me, Henry,” God muttered again, quoting another one of Waters’ girlfriend’s favorite phrases. The man stared into his coffee cup, as if it held a miracle to prevent Waters’ suggestion from becoming a reality.
The silence ticked on and on.
“Kubrick’s going to have my balls,” he said to no one in particular. “How am I supposed to justify sending you to these monsters, leaving her and those two little girls orphaned again?”
“Because you know you have to. Because she knows it too. If it’s going to go to shit, make the sacrifice mean something. I’m one life. If we do this, and we do it right? If we rain down justice on this group, then my life will be worth the thousands of women we save from their hands.”
Neither Steel nor Waters moved or spoke. God’s edict would merely be the official answer because Steel knew his friend was determined to do this, no matter what the answer was.
How did you repay such a sacrifice? Because that’s what it was.
They all knew the Salieri wouldn’t be able to resist Waters walking into their den, and he’d be a dead man walking.
How would Steel ever be able to look Kubrick in the eye again, knowing that he and his family were the reason hers was going to be torn apart?
“Fuck,” the man whispered. To them all? To himself? It didn’t matter. The choice had been made. “Make sure your paperwork is up to date with Cherry. Push back the meeting another three hours, though no amount of time is enough. We better come up with a damn good plan.”
Without a word or a look, Waters left the room.