“What was that?” Cherry asks.
“Nothing.”
As soon as we get out of the car, Antony is right there.
“Boss, we gotta talk.”
“Did Kate explain everything to all of you?”
“Yeah.”
“Then stop calling me ‘Boss.’”
“Fine.” Antony sighs. “Can we just hold off on all of that for a minute? That new hacker guy found something on the web. It’s news from Seattle, but it’s not public knowledge yet.”
“What is it?”
Antony glances at Cherry.
“Spit it out,” I tell him. “She’s more a part of the family than I am.”
“Okay.” Antony takes a deep breath. “Joseph Franks was killed yesterday. A sniper got him while he was on the deck of his boat in the Puget Sound.”
Cherry wraps her fingers around my arm, tightening her grip.
“A sniper?” Taking a hit out on a mafia family member might be a common thing, but a successful hit on someone so high up in the organization is not. An actual sniper doing the job is almost unheard of. In fact, it points to a single individual.
“Direct hit through his eye,” Antony informs me. “No trace of the shooter.”
“Did Moretti take out Franks?” I speak in a hushed voice and look over my shoulder as if I’m going to find a gun pointed at my head just for saying the words.
“Moretti’s enforcer was killed in the last tournament, remember?”
“Oh, right.” I don’t personally keep up with the tournament information, but Threes does, and I remember him talking about the death match in question. “I forgot about that. So, who did it?”
“No idea, but it’s apparently creating complete chaos, and Landon Stark is nowhere to be found.”
“Where is this information coming from?” I ask.
“The new hacker guy.”
“The one who set up all the new algorithms? Ron Phillips’s kid?”
“Will Phillips, yeah. That’s the one. He set up some program that monitors police band radios or something. He’s been getting information from all over the place. Threes had him do it so we’d have some heads-up if there was ever any trouble headed our way.”
“Is he here?”
“Threes is inside.”
“I mean the Phillips kid.”
“He can be.”
“Get him.”
“Will do, boss.” Antony pulls out his phone and types a quick message.
“Let’s get some of this other shit out of the way while we wait for him.”