“Chicken is good.”
I thought about my route back to the apartment. It had been complicated enough, but that didn’t mean there was no way for someone to have followed me. I didn’t think anyone had, but there had been times in the past I thought that, too—times when I had been wrong.
We ate; I fed Odin, and then I stepped out onto the balcony to smoke after I had cleaned up the dishes. I had to insist on it, telling Lia that the cook didn’t do the cleaning. It was a phrase I had learned in the convent, though I hadn’t used it since then.
Throughout the rest of the evening of television-watching and somewhat subdued fucking—for us, anyway—my paranoia over being followed grew. Lia seemed to sense that I was on edge, but I wouldn’t tell her why. I didn’t want her to worry about it and then not be able to sleep. If she didn’t sleep, I wouldn’t either.
She fell asleep, and I got back up and went out into the living room. I looked around at the handful of still unpacked boxes but wasn’t sure where anything in them should go, so I sat on the couch and watched Odin watch me from his bed.
I tried not to think, but it didn’t work. Memories assaulted me. My mind replayed a vision of myself looking down the scope of my Barrett and squeezing the trigger.
“What the hell was that, sergeant?” My captain’s voice comes from behind me, and I turn to look at him.
“Insurgent,” I say quietly. “I could see the explosives under his shirt—he was heading in our direction. As soon as I hit him, his hand must have release the detonator.”
I feel his hand on my shoulder.
“Keep watch,” he says. “He may not have been the only one. I’ll send a couple of our boys out to check what’s left.”
“Stupid fucking kid. What made him do something like that? They knew we were on the watch.”
Odin’s wet nose came in contact with my bare leg, and he snuffed at me. I reached down and thanked him for his observation skills with a scratch behind the ears.
As much as I tried not to let it seep into me, the stress was just too much. Eventually, I pushed myself off the couch, pulled on a pair of jeans, slipped into my shoulder holster, and tucked my Beretta in it. I grabbed the assault rifle and a magazine of hollow-tipped rounds from the closet. Out on the balcony, I leaned my back against the rails and watched.
It was a quiet night—too quiet for my preferences. I liked the noise of the city, but there wasn’t much to be heard here. Quiet gave me the advantage if someone was approaching, but it also made me a bit jumpy every time a bird landed in a tree. I had a decent view of the river and tried to focus down the rifle’s barrel in that direction, but there wasn’t a scope on it, so I couldn’t see much.
I’d have to get it fitted with a scope.
I sat out there for a long time, just looking down to the street and watching for anything that didn’t look right to me. With my fingers curled around the AR, I felt a bit more in control. In the morning, I’d find Lenny Yates and do a little dirty work.
If I were going to admit it, I would have to say I was looking forward to it, not because of who it was, but because I hadn’t taken anyone out in a while. I was eager to get back to work and to show Gavino I was serious about joining up with him. It would also get me that much closer to getting Trent what he wanted so I could get Lia out of town.
Nothing was going to stop me from getting this job done.
Chapter 14—Heated Argument
On the northwest side of Chicago, next to a low-rent school district’s transportation department, there was a two-story building where Rinaldo’s underlings were often found. The area was used for a variety of activities. There were a handful of ancient, broken down school buses that looked to be long forgotten. They made for quick and easy temporary storage, and the area was an out-of-the-way place to conduct some of the smaller transfers of goods for money. The building also served as an occasional residence for those who didn’t have anywhere else to live.
It was simply referred to as the warehouse by Rinaldo’s crew. I’d never lived there myself, but I’d been there plenty of times. When someone in the organization got out of line, I’d killed there a few times as well. It was right by the river, which made dumping the bodies quick and easy.
From the rooftop of the warehouse, I watched a lot full of parked school buses as the sun rose over the trees and shone down on my back. It was a beautiful summer morning but too early for people to actually be working on the buses in need of repair. That didn’t mean the lot was empty though.
Lenny Yates and a dark-haired, greasy guy in faded jeans and a plain white T-shirt had just entered one of the buses. I didn’t recognize the other guy, but Lenny was easy enough to spot. He was tall, lanky, and was probably recruited for basketball in his younger days. Too bad he had such a coke habit, or he might have been good player. Instead, he worked the shit end of Moretti’s business and snorted most of his earnings.
I was glad my information was still fresh enough from before I had been locked up to remember he had been spending a lot of time at the warehouse, smuggling weapons in the back of the buses. I observed for a while as the two of them unloaded several small crates from the back of a U-Haul trailer attached to a pickup truck and took them through a hole in the fence and into one of the buses off by itself. They were right next to a group of trees lining the Chicago River, which would be convenient enough if I wanted a place to dump the trash when I was done taking it out.
I moved silently to the side of the building and positioned myself behind an air conditioning unit. It was decent cover as long as no one from higher up happened to look down. The air conditioner also provided a little cover noise, but there wasn’t a silencer for the AR, so it wouldn’t make much difference once I fired.
The vantage point from the roof wasn’t a great angle, so I moved quickly to the south side of the warehouse where there were a couple of trees right up against the building. I tossed the AR over my shoulder and reached for the closest branch. It was sturdy, and I gripped the limb tightly as I tossed my leg over the side and shimmied down the trunk.
I looked back over toward the bus, but they were still inside.
The tree right next to me had a nice fork in the trunk, and I jumped up to settle myself in the middle of it. The view was perfect from here and gave me more cover if there was someone in one of the taller buildings nearby. No one would be able to see me where I was.
I reached behind my neck and carefully secured a set of earplugs in my ears. While I looked toward the pickup, I reached to my side with my right hand, grabbed the pistol grip, and brought the assault rifle around slowly. With my left hand wrapped around the magazine, I moved the gun to eye level and lined up the rear and front sights on top of the barrel.
The greasy guy in jeans came out first with Lenny right behind him. They moved over to the side of the pickup truck and right into my line of vision. I breathed in, then let the air out slowly. My finger pulled back against the trigger.