Page 9 of Fixed Asset

I yanked my hand, trying to free it from his grasp. Unfortunately, this did nothing. His grip was ironclad.

“Just so you know, your insult canceled out your compliment.”

We’d only made it a few feet down the corridor when I heard a sharp whistle.

Jack jerked to an abrupt halt and turned his head to look behind me. I craned my neck to see what had stopped us.

Pete was standing at the open doorway. Right hand up, index finger extended, circling the air.

“What’s—”

“We have company,” Jack irately announced.

“What kind of company?”

“The bad kind.”

Well, shit.

This couldn’t be good. Jack and his buddies were in Lopez’s territory. I highly doubted they asked the gang leader for permission. I was equally sure if they had, Lopez would’ve killed them on the spot. His numbers weren’t as high—those numbers being members, not kills—as some of the other local gangs. I’d been warned to stay clear of Lopez and the Calaveras. Lopez was known to be ambitious. That ambition was shrouded in brutality. There was only one way for the Calaveras to claim neighborhoods that were already controlled by a rival—war.

The Calaveras had earned their name honestly by keeping the severed heads of the rival leaders when they acquired a neighborhood.

I didn’t want my skull to be Lopez’s newest keepsake.

“Our talk’s gonna have to wait.”

I bit back my ‘no shit, Sherlock’ retort and opted for something more relevant.

“I’m unarmed.”

Jack pivoted, his strides now urgent as he towed me behind him back into the large warehouse.

“Cat needs kit.”

I heard Mason chuckle before he peeled off and disappeared behind the van.

Pete was glaring at a tablet. Fallon already had an M4 carbine hanging across his chest from a sling and was shoving a handgun into his thigh rig.

“Four tangos C-side,” Pete started, then swiped his thumb over the tablet screen. “Six coming up on A.” Another swipe. “B and D are clear.”

I glanced at Jack for an explanation.

“Side A.” He pointed to the large bay doors. “Clockwise around the building.”

In other words, side A was the front, C was the back, and B and D were the sides.

“Got it.”

“Yo, Cat,” Mason called. “You want the Beretta PX4 GS-D or the Rugger-Magpul RXM collab?”

“Is the PX4 the Langdon Tactical edition or the compact?” I asked.

“Compact.”

“I’ll take the RugPul.”

Next to me, Fallon snorted.