Page 7 of Statler

After eyes-on confirmation, Stat and his team would subsequently ascertain the level of difficulty it would take to dismantle the illicit operation, and would proceed by either taking the players down by themselves, or calling for additional back-up.

Sherbert laid the rest of it out, succinctly. “We’ll head up to Liminal, make nice with Flazer, get underway with his new factory build, and in our off hours we bust his operation wide open.”

“That sums it up,” Statler concluded. “But we have to be smart. This guy, Flazer, has been operating for a long time, and from what we’ve ascertained, he’s over-the-top paranoid. It took a year for us to win the contract to build his new factory, because in that time, he practically gave our company a colonoscopy to make sure we checked out.”

That hadn’t worried Statler.

He knew Dark’s office had everything covered.

What had kept him on edge, was the possibility that someone else might come in with a lower bid before they were awarded the contract.

Luckily, that hadn’t happened.

“Here’s the good news of which you’re probably aware since I had you pack this morning,” Stat continued. “We don’t have to wait any longer before getting the job started. Flazer wants us yesterday, and has actually had the foundation in place for over a month, waiting.”

Normally, Stat would subcontract with a reputable firm to do all the site preparation and pour the concrete, then his people would move in after the cement had cured.

But Flazer, having accomplished that, had actually done them a huge favor. He’d saved them time.

It was always nice to have substructure ready and waiting.

“Excellent. Right to work, then,” Pipes stated. “Just the way we like it. Any idea what we’re facing for a living situation?” he queried. “And is there a decent place for our large equipment to be stored?”

Statler, luckily, had the answers to those questions. Since the team would definitely need housing in a town without hotels, and they’d also be driving flatbeds to the site that held their cranes, telehandlers, skid-steers, dump trucks, and backhoes, they would need some secure locations.

“Yeah,” Stat told them. “Flazer owns five small cottages he’s allocated to us, and the excavation firm he previously hired for the foundation has already cleared and compacted a staging area for our machinery at the factory site, complete with a fence and a lockable gate. So really, all we need to do is load up and go.”

Blue chimed in. “I’ve already taken care of securing our weapons and surveillance equipment deep inside the bellies of our flatbeds,” she stated.

It wasn’t their first rodeo, by a long shot. “Nobody will be aware of anything that looks remotely suspicious,” she assured them.

“Nice,” Statler stood up. “I guess that just about does it then.”

He rubbed his hands together while everyone followed suit. “Unless there are any more questions?”

“Yeah,” Tonka replied. “Just one.”

Statler bit back a chuckle. He had a feeling he knew what was coming out of Tonka’s mouth next.

“What’s that, Tonk?”

“It’s almost a four-hour drive to get there. When do we stop to eat?”

CHAPTER TWO

Eliza sat behind her large oak desk and looked at the ancient wall clock for the hundredth time.

The morning was going by so slowly. Normally she’d take a small break and stretch her legs outside in the cool September air, but she’d been told not to leave her desk today. Apparently, the man in charge of building her father’s new factory was supposed to arrive just before lunch, and William Flazer wanted her to personally greet him and roll out the red carpet.

Eliza bent her head back to her desk and sighed.

It wasn’t that she didn’t have work to do. Her father always made sure she had more on her plate than one person could actually handle, because…

He knew she took it as a challenge, which was exactly the way to keep her in line and have her at his beck and call. It was a habit left over from long ago, when she’d actually wanted to show him another side of herself; to please him.

As if that wasn’t ancient history.

Eliza absently went back to her pile of invoices, pulling out the ones that needed William Flazer’s approval; which was the majority.