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“They’re going to let…those guys…go?” I meant the Academy team, but if he was being careful about his words, I figured I needed to be also.
“Too many bodies floating in the sea become noticeable. Otherwise it might have been more.”
Huh. So as far as Sam and this investor were concerned, they had gotten rid of the biggest problem and were now just waiting for the cruise to end to get rid of the others. “Who does the…boss assume we were? He thinks the team would just walk away?”
“Cartel,” Raven said. He pushed me away lightly, making room for himself to get up. I moved away and he replaced the panel and began screwing it back into place. “Or mob. Or just thieves. Not official. They would have noticed if we were official.”
I wasn’t sure if being associated with a cartel was a good thing. As far as they knew, I was probably dead, but they couldn’t be sure.
If they thought Axel and the others were cartel and were with me, would they be targets after they left the ship?
My own fault. I’d dragged them into this. The others had tried to warn me they didn’t have enough time, and that we weren’t suited for the job. I hadn’t listened. “They know of us. We don’t know who they are.”
“They’re not as big a group as you think,” Raven said. “Sam’s an underdog. He’s following orders from someone else. But we don’t know how many are in the investor’s group. We’re outnumbered on the boat, not off.”
I tapped my foot against his side. “I don’t think Sam is normally the type to get bossed around—I think something is different on this cruise.”
Raven stopped messing with putting the panel back and looked up at me, eyebrow raised. “What?”
“That one big guy said they were waiting until all these people got off the boat, and then they could get back to normal. Sounds like they don’t like this investor running things any more than we do.”
Raven twisted his lips, nodding slowly. “Sam doesn’t want to cross him.”
“Maybe Sam would be willing to work with us to get at the investor instead. Like if we got the investor off of Sam’s back, maybe he’d stop hunting around for us.”
“Maybe. We don’t know who the investor is, though, and what he might be holding over Sam, or if they’re friends.”
“Maybe I should make friends with Sam,” I said. “He doesn’t really know me.”
He frowned. “Fuck no.” He grunted. “Maybe if we can get to the investor and shut him down, Sam will back off. If he doesn’t like the investor giving him orders, he’ll appreciate it. And if they are friends, and we handle the investor, then we’re showing we are more powerful. He might back off then.”
It sounded better to be active and on the attack, rather than passively waiting for news from upstairs. “So we’re back to looking for the investor.”
“Sounds like.” He dusted off his jumpsuit. “I doubt the investor is a maintenance guy, though. We’d have to go back upstairs.”
“Too bad we can’t get someone to tell us who it is,” I said. “It would make things easier.”
“No one knows who he is, apparently, except Sam. Mr. Smith thought you were the investor, remember? No one knows what he looks like. They just know it isn’t you now.”
Who else would know? Mr. Smith thought I was her, and he’d as much as told Colt.
Something about Mr. Smith still bugged me, though, but my foggy brain wasn’t making that connection.
“Hey.” I picked at a broken fingernail. “Bald guy might know, right?”
Raven shrugged. “Maybe. He suggests he does, but I’m not really sure.”
“Why don’t we hold him at gunpoint and ask?”
“If he goes missing, Sam will suspect something.”
“So we do it quick. Do you want to sit down here all night and—”
I stopped, suddenly hearing footsteps. Other maintenance people were heading out of the area, leaving minimal staff to supervise. Break time, or possibly dinner.
“How soon will that goon be down here again?” I asked.
Raven checked a clock on the wall. “Probably within ten minutes.”
“If Sam won’t talk, let’s talk to him.”
Raven let out a low growl but said nothing. I assumed that meant he was up for it, but didn’t like the plan.
I didn’t know much about pimps and about how they protected their territory. I wondered how loyal they were. Could we threaten this guy with jail time, or bribe him with cash just to tell us everything?
If we had ten minutes until the guy came back, we needed to set up our “interrogation area.” We luckily found several out-of-the-way storage rooms next to each other. We sourced a chair and some small bits of rope for restraints. Then we waited.
My heart pounded, and I tried to ignore the lump in my throat. Raven had explained to me what to do, but that didn’t stop me from worrying something might go wrong.
When it was about time for the bald goon to come through, I took off the hard hat, goggles, and earmuffs. I needed to look like a girl for this, but I left my hair in the braid; it was doing a great job keeping hair out of my face.
I stood, appearing to be alone, just inside the door to one of the storerooms.
On cue, Bald Dummy appeared. Luckily, he came down alone. His eyes swept around the area, possibly looking for Raven. Since most people had left, it was a skeleton crew now.
“Psst,” I said, loud enough to reach him.
He immediately turned and spotted me. He raised an eyebrow, but was uninterested. He didn’t care about me.
Yet.
I put my hand to the front of my jumpsuit and unzipped it, revealing the cleavage created by the padded bra.
He paused, watching my hands, eyeballing my boobs.
This was more Fancy’s territory, but I had to admit, it worked like a charm.
He came my way, and as he approached, he seemed more curious now.
I backed up into the room, smiling as I unzipped down to my belly button.
He stepped into the room, eyes not moving from my breasts. “What are you doing down here?” he asked. “Maybe you should be working in the spa. Girl like you could be worth a lot of money.”
I wriggled my eyebrows at him as the door closed behind him.
The click was noticeable, and bald guy turned, finding Raven locking the door and facing him full-on. His broad shoulders were pulled back, making him appear so much bigger and stronger. He stood, legs wide, defiant, a wall of muscle.
Baldy smirked. “You fucking around in here?”
“We needed to talk to you somewhere private,” Raven said as I zipped my jumpsuit back up.
“What about?” Baldy said and then decided he didn’t want to wait for an answer. “I don’t have time for this.” He moved toward the door.
He’d had his chance to play nice.
Before the guy could even put up his hands to block, Raven threw punches, striking Baldy’s torso, close to the groin, and then the guy’s neck.
Baldy groaned, bent over, coughed like he couldn’t breathe, and then fell to his knees.
Afraid he’d get up, I rushed at the goon, striking at his neck with my hands, and then, for good measure, I hit him in the ears. I kicked him in the back, too.
“Whoa, whoa,” Raven said, carefully grabbing me by the wrists as I was about to hit the guy again. “Hang on. I said only hit him if he managed to get his Taser out.”
“He hit me first,” I said. I pointed to my head. “I’ve got a concussion because of him.” I was pretty sure this was the guy. He was big enough to carry Blake down the hall to stash him and to think he could take on me and Brandon.
Still holding me back, Raven said something that sounded like a curse in Russian as he turned and kicked the guy in the shin.
Baldy was already having a hard time breathing, heaving with his hands braced on his knees, but at the kick, his entire head turned red.
“
See?” Raven said, finally letting me go. “Hit him in the head too much, and he passes out—not able to answer questions. Hit him below the belt, and he’s in pain without being worthless to us.” He backed away from me, motioning to the man’s other shin.
I smirked and used the heel of my shoe to strike him in the leg.
He turned purple and crumpled.
Raven hooked an arm around my neck, brought me in, and kissed my forehead. “That’s my thief.”
Deals
It took both of us some time to get the goon in the chair and restrained properly.
“They’re going to notice I’m gone,” he said as we tested the knots of the rope to make sure they were secure. The guy was sweating and his face remained red. “They’ll come looking for me. Any minute…”
“Not if I talk to them,” Raven said. He allowed his Russian accent to come through as he spoke. “I tell them you found the girl”—he motioned to me—“and were actually working with her the whole time.”
The goon looked right at my face and frowned as he seemed to finally clue in. “Her? Wait. You’re that Kitty.”
I did a finger wave. Took him long enough, but if he’d only ever seen me in pictures or black-and-white video, it made sense that I would have been harder to spot. Still, he’d recognized me eventually, which told me they knew my face, even if they weren’t on the lookout for me right now.
He turned on Raven. “You said you got rid of her.”
“I did, but now she’s back, and she’s got a better offer. You should listen.” Raven looked at me expectantly.
