What passed between them now, unspoken, reflected their bond.
One of the things she admired about Aiden was that he never called Charlie out on her BS or razzed her in front of the others, at least not in a language they understood. He’d never divulge her secrets, never betray her trust.
That was just between them, only for them—the real intimacy she treasured. And the only kind she needed. The depth of their friendship ran deeper than blood ties and she’d never do anything to jeopardize it, especially something as reckless as date him.
“Prove it.” She cocked her head to the side in challenge.
“Trust me, I intend to.” He gifted her with a devastating smile, flashing his annoyingly attractive dimples.
It was a punch to the gut...to her heart and, unfortunately, to her libido.
Pull yourself together. She averted her gaze and moved her hand from his, tossing the bloody gauze in a disposable motion-sickness bag.
“Did you find anything on the cell phone?” Charlie threw a glance at the device in his hand.
“Looks like a burner. With texts from only one number. Apparently, Eugene is worth two million dollars, if he’s killed. An extra four million if he’s brought in breathing so he can be tortured.”
“Jesus, Bill,” Eugene muttered low, but Charlie caught it.
He knew who was after him all right.
“That’s a first,” she said. “You’re worth more alive than dead.”
“And if any sensitive information in his possession is recovered...it’s worth another four million,” Aiden said.
Torres let out a low whistle. “Wow. Ten million. There’s a whopper of a bull’s-eye painted on your forehead,” he said to Eugene. “Let’s hope it’s smooth sailing picking up Mrs. Potter and getting them to the SSPC.”
Eugene’s eyes bulged from his head as he clutched his stomach.
Charlie handed him a sick bag and turned to Aiden. “Please, tell me your bad feeling has gone away.” Two assassins and one darn good deputy marshal were already dead. Not to mention close calls for the rest of them. That had to be the end of it. Right?
“I wish.” Aiden lowered his eyes. “The feeling has only gotten worse.”
Great. Why did she have to ask?
Chapter Three
William “Big Bill” Walsh was a creature of habit.
Every afternoon he sat down behind his desk to have lunch in his office at Avido’s, his James Beard Award–winning restaurant on Bourbon Street.
The place was quiet at this time of day, before they opened later in the afternoon and welcomed customers until 3:00 a.m. Unlike the Windfall, the 24/7 casino he co-owned, which stayed hopping around the clock.
Overseeing operations, ensuring the sex trafficking ring ran without a hitch and the drugs flowed smoothly, and keeping a close eye on his business partner, Vincenzo Romero, demanded his attention the rest of his waking hours.
This was his one respite. From work. From his hostile partner, Enzo. From his clingy mistress.
In here, he could hear himself think.
He looked up from his computer as Colette, the hostess, strutted in carrying a tray with his lunch. A medium-rare rib eye and a side salad that he’d ordered in place of his regular fully loaded baked potato. He was trying to cut back calories lately. Slim down the waistline that’d only grown more robust with stress eating.
Colette had been there three years. Easy on the eyes with a tight hourglass figure. She minded her business and earned extra by selling his drugs at the eleven universities in the area. A true hustler who never missed a day of work. He liked her.
She took the plate from the tray and set it down in front of him, along with ceramic salt and pepper shakers and utensils rolled up in a napkin.
He nodded his thanks.
“Can I get you anything else, Big Bill?” she asked in a tone that straddled the line between sweet and flirty.
He licked his lips as he undressed her in his mind. “A beer, sugar.”
“Tommy is pouring it.”
Even though Bill was cutting back and could forgo all the fixings, he wasn’t giving up his Baltic porter. There were many things in this world he was capable of doing. Abstaining from sex and alcohol wasn’t among them.
Colette flashed a small smile, tucked the tray under her arm and headed for the door. He loved watching her leave. Her body-hugging black dress fit her like a second skin, skimming all her curves, framing her nicely.
His gaze fell to his plate. Damn if that steak didn’t smell delicious, but Bill had no appetite for it. The only thing he hungered for, the one thing that’d satisfy him, was Edgar Plinski’s head on a silver platter.
Correction. Torturing that traitor for hours, no, no, for days, if they could keep him alive that long through the punishment Bill was going to mete out, then see his head on a platter.
Tommy Guillory, his right-hand man and his late sister Irene’s eldest, walked in with the beer. His nephew’s demeanor was low-key but could quickly shift to menacing, like flipping a switch. A good attribute for a gangster.
“Yo, yo, here you go.” Tommy set the pint of dark, frothy porter beside the plate.
Bill shook his head. Today’s youth had a flagrant disregard for old-school decorum. His nephew might be a classless millennial, but he loved the kid like a son. One day Tommy would run the organization.
“The game has begun,” Tommy said, with the enthusiasm of a kickoff on Super Bowl Sunday, referring to the hunt for Edgar.
The news gave Bill a much-needed jolt of hope. “It’s about time.”
“D checked in.” Frank Devlin was in charge of the secondary team. The fail-safe. “You were right, Uncle Bill. You won the bet.” He reached into his pocket, pulled out a rolled-up wad of hundred-dollar bills and set it on the desk. “Those two Cajuns bit the dust.”
The hit men brothers from the bayou were dead. They’d looked sharp enough, seemed capable and had an excellent reputation for specializing in Colombian necktie executions, but Bill had suspected that it’d take more than two backwater contract killers to get the job done.
Edgar was a slippery sucker, tougher to wrangle than an alligator and harder to hold on to than an eel in the dark.
But he wouldn’t slip out of Devlin’s snare.
Bill tugged on a self-assured smile. He was always right. Tommy was a fool to have doubted him in the first place and an even bigger fool to have taken the bet and staked his money on those bayou boys.
In his gut, Bill knew this would come down to the A-Team. “Nothing wrong with outsourcing, but this is why it’s important to have a contingency. Our local fellas will get the job done and collect the fee.”