I look up at Ado. “Keep an eye on it.”
“What?”
I stand up. “You saw something was short and you fucking put it away anyway?”
“I was just moving things,” Ado says. “Keep my mental count. When the fuck are things off, right? It never happens.”
“Until it does,” I say.
“What are you going to do?” he asks.
“I’ll handle it,” I say. “Just don’t be so fucking stupid.” I walk to the door and unlock it. I look back. “How’s your mother?”
“She’s okay,” he says. “She’s willing to get treatments now. Only what she can get though. Not the treatments I want her to get. But it’s better than nothing.” Ado rubs the back of his neck. “If you have anything extra I can do, Mac…”
“I’ll let you know,” I say.
I open the door and whistle for Ado to follow.
He locks the door behind him and I walk into the meeting room.
“You fucking held her hand, bro,” Taz says to Les.
“Slow and steady, Taz,” Les says. “You just fucking pounce. That’s why you blow your load so quick.”
“Fuck you,” Taz says. “That was one time. And you know she was so fucking hot you would have done the same thing too.”
I walk by Taz and pat his back. “Happens to the best of us. As long as you came, right?”
“Exactly,” Taz says. “Les over here wants to fucking build a castle with a moat for Violet.”
I look at Les.
He shakes his head.
I look at Taz. “And what do you want?”
“I want to dip my tongue into her moat and then… I don’t know… fuck her moat?”
“Fuck her moat?” Aric asks. “What are you talking about?”
“I want to fuck Violet,” Taz yells.
“Okay, now that we got that off our chest,” I say.
Taz and Les sit down.
I sit down.
“Today is going to be interesting,” I say. “We have to split up to make this all work.”
“Split up how far?” Raf asks.
“I got wind that something might be going on, on the other side of BC,” I say.
“We care about that?” Ado asks.
“It’s something extra,” I say to Ado.
He nods.
“You should check it out, Ado,” I say. “Just work your way through. Everyone knows you. Talk. Get info. Make a few deals. Flex a little too. Why not?”
“Got it,” Ado says.
“I need Taz with me today,” I say.
“Can’t wait,” Taz says.
“Les, you need to check in with Peg Leg Mikey.”
“Anything going on?” Les asks.
“No. Just check in. Get all the info you can on what’s happening. What he’s seeing.”
“What about me?” Aric asks.
“What do you need, Mac?” Raf asks.
“You two will take the back end of this,” I say. “There’s a meeting that’s going to happen. Jeff is meeting with his guys. We don’t know who his guys are. If he’s working for them. Or if they’re working for him. That’s where the line gets blurry. That’s what we’re going to find out today.”
I stand up and draw an invisible map with my finger on the table.
The meeting is going down near the beach.
But at a part where you don’t want to hang around or go swimming.
The exact kind of part where you’d expect some kind of dirty deal to go down.
Now, Jeff being Jeff, everything will be played off as a possible real estate investment. Why not, right?
Buy a shitty piece of land that everyone hates and drop some condos or a hotel or some bullshit on it and call it a day.
To me, I’d rather be walking around campus, dealing with that normal shit.
Looking at the pretty girls in short skirts.
Taking care of business.
Navigating my way through passing classes without showing up.
But everything is different now.
Who would have thought… one second of looking at Jolie would mess it all up. And then breaking into her parent’s house to send a message…
“We keep in touch when we can,” I say. “If everything goes to plan, we’ll either meet here or over at Mama’s.”
“I vote Mama’s,” Taz says. “Better food.”
“Violet won’t be there, bro,” I say.
“I’ll just wish really hard for it,” Taz says.
“You do that,” I say.
I pat Taz on the back again.
Something tells me he and Les are going to end up going at it over Violet.
I leave the room and light up a cigarette.
I take a drag and then look at the cigarette and I smile.
Everything makes me think of Jolie.
I decide on the motorcycles.
They’re super-fast, and it helps me burn off some steam.
You’d think Taz would look weird on a street ride, but he knows how to move the motorcycle better than anyone I’ve ever seen.
He can take a turn in a way where his knee is a few inches from the ground and he holds it steady.
He and I alone are dangerous on the roads too.
I don’t like being outdone.
Neither does Taz.
We race each other, moving in and out of other cars going way too fast for our own good.
Cars beep at us, but fuck them. They can’t do shit about it.
Red lights don’t count either.
It’s a split second between life and death, but we ride that line with smiles on our faces.
The cops know they can’t catch us either.
They can try, but they can’t make it a minute before dropping off.
They know it’s better to just let us be.
Worse case, we ending up killing ourselves.
Except we don’t.
We cut off the main road and cruise along a few of the side roads that are twisty and empty.
That’s where Taz gets to show off.
I do a little of the same.
For me, I like to lift the front end of the motorcycle and speed up.
It’s funny because it’s just Taz and I.
Nobody else sees us, yet we keep going back and forth at each other like we’re trying to impress some pretty girl on the beach.
I drop the front wheel of my ride back down and then stand up.
I slow and move to the side of the road.
When Taz sees me, he slams on his brakes and turns.
The back wheel of his ride skids around, then he speeds up, leaving a cloud of smoke behind him.
He does the same turn near me and then is next to me.
We both kill the engines and take off our helmets.
“What’s the plan?” he asks.
I look at my phone. “We have about five minutes to go. Let them get out and start talking. They’re already there. That’s why I wanted to stop here. Less attention.”
“Perfect,” Taz says. “Have a smoke? You give me pointers on how to get my fingers down the front of Violet’s panties?”
“What if she doesn’t wear panties?” I ask.
Taz’s eyes go wide. “Now why would you say that?”
“Just throwing it out there. Crazy girls like that usually don’t.”