If they’re second guessing his smarts for this shit then… good. Better to be underestimated, for everyone else to underestimate us. It makes them sloppy and it’ll only help weed out the rats.
At my silence, Luis huffs and says, “There’s something you should know.”
I sigh and nod. “I was guessing this wasn’t a fucking circle jerk.”
He scoffs as he lights up a cigarette and offers me one. I have enough vices in my life so I wave him off and keep my eyes on the doors.
“The last shipment that came through. I usually don’t get a look at ‘em, I leave it to the boys and let them earn their cuts but shit went down and I decided to ride along.”
That gets my attention.
The shipments go from us to various drop off points around the country. Luis and his boys take care of Louisiana and we move a lotta goods that way. The last shipment had been overseen by Hellion, Rue, Vic, and I. It was stored in the warehouse for two days before we moved it along, everything had gone smoothly.
“What about it? Something missing?”
He takes a long drag and then pegs me with a look. “Nah. Something extra was in the container. Six dead bodies.”
I turn to face him completely, forgetting the fucking door. “What the hell do you mean, dead bodies? Demons? Or Unseen? I think I’d have noticed if six of our boys were missing.”
He drops the butt of his cigarette and lights up another, keen to just fucking chain-smoke this conversation through to the end. “Neither. They were kids. Six little girls, all dead and huddled together like they were being fucking smuggled.”
Jesus fucking Christ.
“Someone is pulling extra cash by smuggling little girls across the borders and we’re the ones doing the dirty work. Smells like the fucking rats to me.”
I spin away from him ready to stalk my ass up those stairs and start fucking swinging until I find the asshole doing it.
Smuggling fucking kids.
That’s never been our style, not something we’d ever get into, and the thought of some fucking gutless turncoat rat making cash off of some guy raping a kid that’s been moved by me and my fucking family? Nope. Not today and not on my fucking dime.
“You can’t just go in there and start shooting. We need to know who the fuck is doing it. We need to start mixing shit up around here, changing our paths and timetables. Only way to figure this out. You gotta lock it down tight. You think this ain’t killing me? I’ve got kids around the same age as the girls in that fucking box.”
Typical fucking dead-beat dad, he has four kids to four different bitches. Diego is the oldest and I’m fucking hoping he’s the worst of the lot because he’s definitely on the road to being fucking taken out.
He’s not exactly a fan of being lower on the food chain than anyone else and even being the future Prez of the Shreveport charter isn’t enough because it’s not the mother charter. He’ll never be an Original because he’s not a Callaghan and that’s something that eats him up inside.
I blow out a frustrated breath and give him a nod. “Leave it with me, I have eyes on that situation and I’ll find the fucking rat.”
First, I have a chapel to sweep.
Chapter Five
Angel
The truck is hot overnight. Too fucking hot to handle but short of finding a homeless shelter or spending some of my cash on a motel room I have no other options. I’m not at that extreme point of exhaustion yet so I just don’t want to spend the cash on a room yet.
I tell myself I’m only going to do that once a month at most, the rest of the money being spent sparingly on food and new outfits for the themed nights at the Boulevard.
All the remainder is being stuffed into my bag.
I get it, that’s a terrible way of keeping my money but I can’t open up a bank account in my real name without setting off some alarms and opening a bank account with a fake ID is just… too risky. Too fucking risky for me right now so I keep that shit on me or locked up while I dance.
The more it grows the more terrified I get about having it on hand but it’s not so much at the moment that I have to immediately worry about it. I just need to keep an eye out for another solution.
My college classes start up again and I find myself set up at the Coldstone library to work during the day. The lady at the front desk is a nightmare, a total fucking bitch the second she lays her eyes on me, but I grit my teeth and put up with it.
My laptop is old and beat to hell so I price up getting a new one the second I connect to the library’s slow-ass wifi.
There’s no way I’m parting with that much cash.
No freaking way.
I guess that’s the real problem with being a stripper and knowing exactly what your time is worth, there’s no way I’m wasting a whole fucking dance on getting a new MacBook when this one will do for now.
So I set up on one of the desks with my headphones on to watch hours and hours of lectures, taking notes until I think my hands are going to fall off of my arms. The library is quiet enough, even when a small group of little old ladies set up a book club session in the meeting rooms, and I get everything I need done for the week in a single session. There’s assignments to start working on and I make a detailed plan to get that shit done tomorrow morning, and by the time I have to leave because it’s closing the tightness in my chest eases off a little.
I can do this.
I can work three or four nights a week, study during the day, sleep in my car, cut my food costs so I’m only eating when I feel like I’m going to pass the hell out, and I can pay cash for fucking everything.
A house, college, and a buffer so I never have to rely on anyone ever again. I can fucking do it.
My shift at The Boulevard doesn’t start for another four hours so I grab my shit and drive to the next town over to shop for some more outfits. Fuck, it feels wrong to even call them outfits. Thongs and bras and a shit ton of pasties. There’s a couple of sex shops with decent options and the girls there are nice enough. They stare at me a little when I go through every rack, the list of themes on my phone as I work through all of the choices until I find enough shit to get me through the next week.
The total is fucking heartbreaking.
I pay for it with my stacks of bills and the girl behind the counter grins at me. “Fuck girl, you must be raking it in! The other girls only buy half what you do.”
I blush and shrug. “I like having a big collection, I’m fussy like that.”
She grins at me and fills a bag up with the scraps of lace, tucking a sampler perfume in there with it. “Have fun girl! I wish I had the goods to make the same green!”
I duck my head with a grin. Fuck, it’s the first time someone has spoken to me about dancing without it being a fucking problem. I get into my car with a smile on my face for the first time in forever.
Maybe it’s not so fucking bad.
Three weeks into working at The Boulevard and I hit a wall.
I’m tired.
There’s never a time where I’m not exhausted now that I’m working until four in the morning every other day and I have to be out of the carpark by seven. There are places I can park during the day but there’s a lot more danger with that and none of those places will be dark like the carpark.