Page 30 of Cozen

“I find you interesting.”

One of Sargon’s many blessings.

And curses.

Jett pointed at the small golden ring hanging from the leather cord around Sargon’s neck. The one and only piece of jewelry he wore, and never took off. He liked to have it close, but more so, the nearest to his heart that he could get it.

“I wondered about your … necklace there, if you could call it that,” the man said. “Should I assume it comes from your lost parents?”

“Sure,” Sargon said.

The man could assume.

Assumptions meant nothing.

“What would you do,” Jett asked, “in the case where you had two organizations battling against each other—a decades long feud that has never been close to over—and both wish to work with you?”

Sargon glanced across the table where Jett seemed to be fully engrossed in a file he had pulled from his bag. Yet, there was no one else at the table, and it was only Sargon he could be conversing with.

Another man was stationed outside the private dining area, and the other one was guarding Jett’s vehicle. One more had a seat at one of the tables on the main floor.

“It depends,” Sargon hedged.

“On what?”

“Do they know you would be working for both of them?”

Jett grinned, but never looked up from the paperwork. “No, and they both have vastly different needs in the deals they want to put forth. One being a government bribe that is far more intricate than it appears, and another is a new drug connection.”

“And I take it the separate organizations would not be pleased to find out you were working for both sides, even if it was not against the other one, per say?”

Jett’s brow lifted. “To them, working with one is automatically working against the other. What do you say, now?”

“I say it still depends.”

His boss did finally look up at him, then. “Are you one of the types with a constant death wish, Sargon?”

Sargon grinned. “No, I just have the mindset that if I can get away with it, and cleanly, then why not go for it?”

“Dangerous game.”

“It can be. What types of organizations? That would be one thing I would weigh to make my choice. I would not risk putting myself between an Irish and Italian feud, for starters. The Irish and the Italians have long had volatile issues, and Irish are known for having little care or concern for the fodder used in their wars. Russians are another one that tend to be quite extreme and violent.”

“Two Italians.”

“Cosa Nostra, Camorra, or otherwise?” Sargon asked.

“You know a lot about criminal organizations, don’t you?”

Sargon shrugged, and went back to gazing out the window. “I have lived many lives.”

That was not a lie.

“Have you left many enemies behind, too?” Jett asked.

“Don’t we all?”

“Fair enough. My issue in taking these two offers lie in the fact I don’t like to shit where I eat or sleep.”