Total pages in book: 80
Estimated words: 76381 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 382(@200wpm)___ 306(@250wpm)___ 255(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 76381 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 382(@200wpm)___ 306(@250wpm)___ 255(@300wpm)
“Are you sure this is the right way?” I asked, glancing over to where Raff had the map spread out across his lap.
The thing with being career criminals is you have to live a bit like a luddite. No social media. No suspicious search histories. No using map apps on your phone. Hell, no cell phones at all on a job. That shit had to be turned off.
So my brother and I had had a car full of fucking old school paper maps, and had gotten good at reading the damn things.
But nothing about this route seemed like it was actually going where we needed to go as the trees closed in on either side of the dirt road, the forest thick on both sides.
Fall was in full swing, turning the trees vibrant shades of copper and red, but the underbrush was still thick and green.
But there didn’t seem to be any place in the distance where a house might be hiding.
“This is the way, man,” Raff said, shrugging, his finger stabbed onto the map to hold our place as we kept driving.
We didn’t often have reason to drive through Northwestern Arkansas. It wasn’t exactly the most direct route from Florida to California. And, normally, we wouldn’t even entertain a meeting so far off of our usual track, unless there was a big gun show on the way.
But this crew claimed to have quite a few of the specialty guns that were suddenly very in demand for our connections out in California. So since this wasn’t more than a day or so out of the way, Slash had decided it was worth our time to take the trip.
Raff was excited about seeing some different sights on the way back, since this route was going to take us through Colorado and Utah instead of the usual Texas and New Mexico route we’d been doing for years.
At this point, I didn’t give a fuck about the sights. I just wanted to get home for a while, unwind, figure out why I was so restless on the road when it had been my life for so many years without an issue.
“There,” Raff said, lifting his other hand toward the windshield. “Looks like a chimney,” he said.
In mid-November, the temperature in this area seemed to be struggling to stay in the upper fifties. Cool enough for a fire for sure.
“Thank fuck,” I said, feeling oddly claustrophobic with the narrowness of the road and the trees boxing us in.
The sooner we could get this over with, the better.
“What’s the move?” Raff asked as we kept moving toward the puffs of white smoke, the road getting more and more uneven as we went, rocking the car from side to side, making me grit my teeth. “Bring the money, leave it in the car?”
“Easier to protect it if we bring it,” I said, suddenly wishing we’d chosen to meet at some random location instead of their house. I didn’t realize it would be this secluded, this far away from the rest of the world. According to the map, this property backed up to acres and acres of preserved land occupied by nothing but a few hunting cabins and all the various wildlife.
“Yeah,” Raff agreed, uncharacteristically quiet.
“You have your set of car keys, right?” I asked.
Raff reached for his belt hoop, pulling away a set of keys on a retractable keychain.
“I’m not planning on getting separated,” I said. “But you know the deal if we do.”
The deal was always to get to the car, to relative safety. Then wait for the other one.
Unless shit had really hit the fan.
In which case, the agreement was that the person in the car took off, but tried to circle back, or waited for the other on the closest cross street.
If the risk was too much even for that, the agreement was to get somewhere safe, turn on your phone, and wait for the other to call with a location.
We’d needed to separate once in all of our years doing this. And Raff had been able to run beside the car and jump in the window before we peeled off.
Still, I felt like it was my job as the older sibling—even if it was only by a couple of minutes—to always go over the plan, make sure we were prepared for unforeseen possibilities.
“All I know is when all this shit is done, I’m gonna be happy to have a meal cooked by Detroit, then go flirt with my girl,” Raff said.
‘His girl’ was actually Detroit’s cousin, Lula, who worked for the local Irish mafia. And had absolutely no interest in him, regardless of how flattering she may have found his relentless flirting.
“Detroit still cooks, right?” Raff asked, looking suddenly concerned.
“Why wouldn’t he?”
“He’s with that girl now.”
“Everleigh,” I supplied. “Still, he’s a member of the club. And he likes cooking. Besides, even if he doesn’t, the options in Shady Valley might not be great, but we won’t starve.”