Page 17 of Cold Bastard
Chapter Six
Alex
The notification pinged at 2:47 AM.
I had been staring at my laptop screen for so long that my eyes burned, the VPN connection icon blinking steadily in the corner like a heartbeat. Twenty-four hours. That was how long it tookBrotherDocsto respond to my inquiry. Twenty-four hours of Oscar circling me like a shark that smelled blood in the water. Twenty-four hours of pretending everything was fine while my insides twisted into knots.
I clicked on the encrypted message, my fingers trembling slightly as I entered the decryption key.
BrotherDocs:Package available. Price increased to $150K due to expedited timeline and current market conditions. Face-to-face delivery required. Three days. Location TBD.
My stomach dropped.
One hundred and fifty thousand dollars. A hundred grand more than the original quote.
And face-to-face delivery.
Fuck.
I sat back in my desk chair, the old wood creaking under my weight. The sound was too loud in the silent clubhouse, and I froze, listening for any sign that Oscar had heard. His room was down the hall, and he had always been a light sleeper. Or maybehe wasn’t sleeping at all. Maybe he was lying awake, wondering what the hell his little sister was really doing home after four years.
The clubhouse remained quiet.
I turned back to the screen, reading the message again. And again.
Everything about this felt wrong. The price increase. The insistence on a face-to-face meet. The timing.BrotherDocshad a reputation, a solid one, built over years of successful transactions on the dark web. They didn’t do face-to-face meetings. That was the whole point. Digital delivery, anonymous transactions, zero physical contact. It was what made them reliable.
Safe. So why the sudden change in protocol?
I pulled up my research files, scanning through the forum posts and reviews I had compiled over the last few days. Nothing suggestedBrotherDocsoperated this way. Every testimonial mentioned digital delivery. Encrypted files sent through secure channels. No meetings. No physical handoffs.
My fingers hovered over the keyboard.
This could be a trap. But what choice did I have? It was only a matter of time before the owners of the money found me. And it was only a matter of time before they connected the dots back to me. Alexandra Jones, the stripper who worked at the Prancing Pussycat before disappearing the same night seventy-five million dollars vanished from existence. The girl who smiled, served drinks and stripped to appease a fucking dominant dickhead with a wicked fist.
I had been so careful. So fucking careful. But careful only bought me so much time. It didn’t buy me safety. I needed that identity. I needed to disappear before whoever owned that money came looking for me, because it sure as hell wasn’t Michael’s.
My fingers moved across the keyboard before I could second-guess myself.
MedusaX:$150K is acceptable. Two days, not three. I choose the location.
I hit send before I could change my mind.
The response came back almost immediately.
BrotherDocs:Non-negotiable. Three days. We choose the location. Take it or leave it.
My jaw clenched. They were pushing. Testing me. Seeing how desperate I was. And I was desperate. They knew it. I knew it.
But I wasn’t stupid.
MedusaX:Two days. I choose a location within 50 miles of Athens, TX. Final offer.
The cursor blinked. Once. Twice. Three times.
I counted my heartbeats, each one hammering against my ribs like it were trying to escape.
Finally, the response appeared.
