Page 67 of More Tricks

“Ha.” She laughed. “I wouldn’t go that far, mister. Let’s just say I can appreciate an alternative viewpoint.”

Cupping her face, I kissed her deeply, letting my tongue sweep the inside of her mouth, tasting her like I might never get the chance to do it again. If we were going to split up, I needed her to know how much I fucking loved her so there was nothing left unsaid between us.

When I released her mouth, I kissed her nose, then her forehead. “I love you, spitfire. Don’t you ever forget it.”

“I love you too, Bob Ross,” she teased but pushed up to give me another quick kiss. “Don’t worry about tonight. You won’t get rid of me that easily.”

“What about if something happens to me?” I questioned, unable to have her blind optimism.

She shrugged. “Then I guess I just have to make a trip to Hell and tell the devil he can’t have you because you’re mine.”

“That so? Well, for the sake of the devil and humankind, I better stay alive. No telling what kind of trouble you’d cause in Hell,” I murmured, releasing her so we could join the others as Magnus called us over.

It was easy to see why the other two brothers had no problem with Magnus taking the lead in planning their missions. He was almost at the same level as Dax with how his mind worked. Putting the two of them together while throwing Wes and Cam into the mix was just terrifying. If the four of them wanted to take over the world, I believed they could. The rest of us had our moments, but most of the heavy lifting had been done by that crew. What surprised me even more was Harper catching some important holes in the whole situation that could have left us scrambling.

“Alright, team Take Down Diego is Dax, Cam, Cognac, and Weston, along with the three of us. Team Rescue Elena is Eagle, Picasso, Void, Sprocket, and the men from Tommaso. The attacks at the other locations will start at seven on the dot, which means we need to wait until seven forty-five to make our hits. We need the police to be so overwhelmed with everything else going on that even if our marks get calls out, they can’t respond as quickly.” Magnus paused, then turned to Eagle. “You good on your plan?”

Eagle nodded. “Ours is going to be a much easier hit since he lives in an apartment building. Thanks to Dante and his connection getting us these SWAT bulletproof vests, it will make it all that much simpler.”

“The thing we don’t know, though, is who else is in that building,” Jaxson warned. “There could be more of Diego’s men there to keep an eye on his son, so keep your eyes open and don’t get tunnel vision.”

He made a good point. While we’d looked up everyone in the building, that didn’t mean whoever was living there was who they said they were. The shit stain of a son—Axel—didn’t even pay for that apartment. His daddy dearest did under a shell company name. Diego had proven he was a smart man, but I had a feeling on his home turf, where he thought he held all the strings, he’d made mistakes.

“Any last thoughts, comments, suggestions?” Ghost asked as he nuzzled into Harper’s neck.

It had been a unanimous vote that she remain here at the house as our contact person. If we needed help, then she was who we reached out to. Her and Betta would then coordinate between the two groups to send backup wherever needed. All of us would be eyeballs deep in bullets, so we couldn’t handle something like that. Harper had been less than thrilled, but when we explained it could be the difference between life and death, she realized this wasn’t a ploy just to keep her out of the fight.

When no one spoke up, we gave our goodbyes—meaning we all kissed the fucking hell out of our woman and bro-hugged it out between the guys. None of us wanted to be sappy shits, but on the other hand, we were too aware of what was about to go down. Our lives were lived on the edge of a knife and you never knew when the wrong step would land you on the blade.

The four of us climbed into our blacked-out SUV and headed off to the meet point where we would connect with Tommaso’s men. One of his lieutenants we’d met at his house, David, was going to be there ensuring the men followed orders. We would be heading up this operation since it was our family we were going after but having David there to make sure shit got done eased some of the worries.

Void leaned his head back and looked as if he was just going to nap for the twenty minutes it would take us to get where we needed to go. There were times I thought the man was unhinged, but right now, I envied that he wasn’t worried at all about tonight. If he had a gun and a body to shoot, he was a happy camper. My biggest worry was if Elena had truly turned against us and we couldn’t save her.

Had they done too much damage for us to fix? Would we ever get the sweet, brilliant woman back who wanted to write the stories of those who never got a voice? Fuck, I hope we weren’t too late.

Glancing at my watch as we pulled into the parking garage, it was 6:50 p.m. This location was five blocks away from their apartment building, so we'd be close when we needed to roll out. Dante had worked his magic and gotten us far more than just the vests, his connection even had lights for us to put in the vehicle so when we came speeding down the road, we wouldn’t be stopped or yelled at for parking in the street. People stayed out of SWAT’s way, knowing if they got called in, it was a big deal.

“Any updates?” Daniel asked when we got out of the SUV.

Eagle shook his head. “Nope, we’ve got the vests for everyone in the back of the car and everything else for that part of it. Your men strapped and ready to go?”

“Fuck yeah, we’ve been waiting for the day we finally get to make our move against Diego,” Daniel said, then gestured for us to follow. “I’ve got twenty men who are going to infiltrate with us and another fifteen or so who can be waiting as backup if we need them. If we had everyone swarming the building, it would draw too much attention. This way, when they arrive, people will assume we called for backup.”

“Wise approach,” Sprocket commented as he looked over at the men standing and chatting with each other. “They understand the plan is to keep everyone alive, right? Bodyguards, if they have any, can be taken out, but we need Axel and Elena alive. Especially Elena. She’s our family and none of us will take kindly to her being roughed up.”

“I’ll make sure to remind them, but does the same care need to be applied to the boy?” Daniel asked. “That might be hard to enforce. Axel is known for being an entitled little shit who will do just about anything to get Daddy’s approval.”

“Nah,” I answered. “As long as he’s still breathing and you can tell it’s him, we’re fine. Just let them know if he dies, it’s Two Tricks they're going to have to answer to.”

Daniel’s eyes went wide at that. “Pretty sure that threat alone is all they’re going to need to keep the bastard alive.”

Tommaso’s men snapped to attention when they saw us approaching. Eagle went over the plan again with them, Daniel adding in his two cents here and there to back him up. He seemed like a good guy and determined to make sure this went without a hitch. I think it helped that this was the first time any of Tommaso’s men were going to prove how loyal they were to their new leader. Once that was all settled, we passed out gear and got the lights hooked up to the SUV and truck we’d be taking.

By the time we’d arranged all that, we were minutes away from putting this all into action. Trying to take a page out of Void’s book, I leaned against the SUV and closed my eyes, taking deep breaths. My adrenaline was already coursing through my body, but I needed to use it in the right way, helping me zero in on what was important.

“You good, Picasso?” Sprocket asked.

Cracking open an eye, I found him standing in front of me arms crossed with a smirk on his face. “Peachy.”