25
The moon hovers high in the sky as we barrel down the road, speeding through the twisty streets of the dodgiest area in town. My gaze lingers on the dark sky, watching the way the moon seems to travel with us, though I seem to get stalked by everything else, why not get stalked by the big old cheese ball in the sky?
“Why do we always have to do this shit in the middle of the night?” I question, my gaze flicking back to the guys.
Levi glances at me as Marcus silently sleeps like the living dead on my right. “You’re kidding, right?” he questions. “You’re not seriously asking us why we do shit at night.”
My eyes roll so hard that I fear they might roll straight out of my eye sockets. “Of course I know why you have to do this at night, I’m just over it. I don’t think I’ve had a proper night’s sleep since meeting you guys. Like, can’t you just wear a disguise? Grow a mustache or something?”
Roman’s irritated huff from the front seat has me wanting to reach through the front and nut punch the bastard, but when he turns off into an area that has every single streetlight shot out, I forget what the hell we were talking about. “Well, this ain’t shady at all,” I murmur, my eyes wide as the need to lock the door slams through my chest. “Where are we?”
Roman drives toward a big warehouse and pulls up around back, keeping the SUV hidden in the shadows. “This is my father’s warehouse,” Roman says as Levi reaches back and gives Marcus a shove to wake him. “Anything you need in this world, I can guarantee you’ll find it here. Drugs, guns, dirty money. This is the heart and soul of my father’s operation. Sure, he has other warehouses in case this one gets raided, but without this, he’s got nothing.”
Levi’s eyes flash with something dark as he slowly turns to meet my stare, and I see the twisted need to destroy his father glowing deep in his gaze. “And now, it’s all ours.”
Damn fucking straight!
The four of us pile out of the car and the boys fall in around me as though this is somewhere I need to be protected. The warehouse looks as though a good huff and puff could blow the fucker down, but something tells me that looks are deceiving. Giovanni DeAngelis is a smart businessman, and he’s not going to allow his whole operation to come undone with a simple storm. There’s more to the picture here, I’m just not seeing it yet.
The boys look left to right as though they’re expecting someone to jump out at them, but after Roman’s announcement during the party and the whole family divided, I wouldn’t be surprised. Feathers are ruffled, people are on edge and want to align themselves with who they think will come out on top, and everyone who chooses wrong will be punished. The boys were lenient, giving the family a few days to think it over and make the right decision, because in the end, anyone who stands against these three assholes is already considered dead.
We approach a back door and my gaze scans over it. At first glimpse, it looks just like any shitty old back door on an abandoned warehouse, but looking closer, it’s hard metal with an advanced tech locking system that my brain can’t even begin to work out. “What the hell?” I breathe, taking a step back to get a wider view, realizing that the whole building is made out of this stuff, but to the naked eye, it appears as anything but.
Levi scoffs and steps in front of a keypad before entering a code and leaning down. My mouth drops open as it scans his eyes and I gape in wonder. “That did not just scan his eye,” I say, unable to wrap my head around all of this. I mean, fuck! It looks like the kind of shit you see in a James Bond movie.
Marcus grins as the door unlocks and automatically slides back, allowing us entry. “The retinal scanner was my idea,” he says proudly. “Pretty fucking cool, right?”
“Super cool, and not over the top at all,” I smirk, following the boys inside.
“You do what you gotta do,” Levi says, walking out in front of us as though he knows the place like the back of his hand. “People like Gia Moretti would do anything to find a place like this. We have to keep it protected.”
My brows shoot up. “Then why would your father allow you access? Wouldn’t he have scrubbed your eyeballs from the system to keep you out?”
Roman shrugs his shoulders. “If the old bastard could, he would have.”
We walk into a dark room and go through a second security check before another big door slides open, spilling light out into the dark space. My eyes bug out of my head seeing the insanity before me. It’s like a shopping mall at Christmas time. People working like slaves with stacks upon stacks of product.
“What the ever-loving fuck is this?” I breathe, following the boys lead as they walk into the clinical space. I can’t help but notice just how cold it is, and as I glance around, I realize that all I see is products perfectly stacked and ready to go, each one of them labeled with Giovanni’s mark. “How does all of this stuff get here?” I ask, unable to tear my gaze away from everything as I slink after the boys.
Marcus glances back at me. “It doesn’t. Everything is manufactured right here.”
“What?” I grunt, pausing as I scan the giant room again. Maybe I missed something. “Where?”
“Downstairs,” Marcus says. “This fucker is three levels deep. We keep everything stacked up here for easy distribution.”
“No shit.”
A cocky grin pulls at his lips as I roll my eyes, realizing that these guys are so much deeper into their father’s business than I originally thought. Hell, they even seem like the brains of the operation.
We stop in front of a big metal door and Roman enters a code into a keypad. A little light flicks red three times before turning green. We hear big metal locks unlatching, and with that, Roman pushes against the door and walks in.
I follow with wide eyes as we step through to a computer tech’s holy trinity. Computers line every desk, big, small, even ones with rounded screens. There are things I’ve never even seen before or know what they do, but damn, they look expensive. I doubt even the FBI or CIA have this kind of technology. No wonder the boys have gotten away with the type of shit they do for so long.
“Hey, Mick,” Roman says, walking up to the guy running the world’s most elaborate computer lab. “How’s it going?”
The guy, Mick, pushes back from his desk chair, and as he turns to face us, his eyes come straight to mine. He clearly wasn’t expecting a tag along. He eyes me warily but quickly decides that if I’d been welcomed in by the boys, all is good. “Hey man,” he says, leaning into Roman and doing that weird hand thing that guys do before reaching around and clapping him on the back. He gives Levi and Marcus a welcoming nod before turning and facing a big, frosted glass wall.
I watch him with a curious stare as he steps around his impressive desk and moves toward the wall, pressing a button that has my mouth dropping open again. The frost on the glass fades away, showing off the massive warehouse with the best vantage point to see every angle of the room.
The workers all go about their jobs and I inch closer to the glass wall. “Nobody even blinked,” I mutter, knowing damn well that had I been on the other side of the glass and the boss’ three sons just walked in, I’d at least risk a sneaky glance. “Are they just that disciplined, or do they not give a shit?”