“I don’t know nothing about that. All I know is that is what the man say do…”
“You mean the woman, don’t you?”
“Whoever,” Anderson said anxiously as Cervantes returned with their drinks. Once he had placed the drinks on the bar, he disappeared.
“Look, man. I hear what you’re sayin’. But they wouldn’t be doing it if it wasn’t cool with our new Skipper,” Anderson said sarcastically.
“I don’t think he even knows about this,” Hill said.
“Why you think that?”
“It’s the look that bitch-boy gets on his face when anybody mentions his name.”
“Yeah, I noticed that too,” Anderson cosigned. “I just thought it was…”
“Shut up, here they come,” Hill said as Munoz and Camacho came out of one of the back rooms of the now almost empty club.
There was only one other man in the club, but he was just sitting quietly at the bar, sipping tequila and watching boxing on TV.
Camacho was carrying a metal case, which he placed on the table. Munoz signaled for Hill and Anderson to come over and Camacho opened the case the second they stepped up.
“Slow down, Cowboy.” Hill turned and pointed to the man at the bar. “What about him?”
“Don’t worry about him, he’s harmless,” Camacho said.
But he was far from harmless. The man was actually Damián Custodio. But the head of El Decreto de Guerra wasn’t the only one listening to the meeting.
FBI Agents Matthews and McCullough were listening because of El Decreto de Guerra’s ties to Marietta Dynamics. The company is suspected to be involved in the theft of the schematics for an electromagnetic pulse weapon.
Munoz stepped to Hill. “You don’t trust me, do you?”
“No. I don’t trust none of you.”
Munoz nodded his head. “Good. Because I don’t trust you either.”
“Good. I think a healthy amount of distrust is a good thing in any business relationship.”
“I agree one hundred percent. But I cannot trust you, Cabrón, and be nice about it.”
“Good for you,” Hill said. “Now let’s see what you got.”
“The QBZ-03 assault rifle, Chinese gas operated, selective-fire weapon,” Munoz said as Camacho handed the weapon to Anderson.
“Two-piece receiver made up of forged aluminum alloy with the stock, pistol grip, and handguards made of a polymer compound.”
Anderson looked over the weapon. “That’s lightweight.”
“About eight pounds,” Munoz said as Anderson handed the weapon to Hill.
“The gas block has a two position regulator, one for firing standard ammunition, the other to allow the use of rifle grenades,” Camacho said.
Hill looked it over, pointed it in Munoz’s face before handing it back to Camacho.
“The sights are of a hooded front sight with a flip up rear diopter sight similar to the American M16 rifle.”
“What do you think?” Munoz asked.
“Nice piece of hardware,” Anderson said. “I think we might be able to work with these. I’ll talk it over with my people and get back to you,” he said, and Camacho closed the case and took it to the back. When he did, Damián Custodio got up from the bar and followed him to the back of Salsa Con Tarifa.