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“What? What’s wrong?” He looks inside and…“Oh, for fuck’s sake, Vortex.”

“What? What is it?” Both women echo.

Stepping inside, I slip my weapon into my waistband and walk over to the body on the floor. Taking one look at Candi, I wait for Cannon to have his look.

“Something is going to have to be done about this, I’m afraid. This can’t continue,” he says while shaking his head.

Both women charge in and stop at Candi’s body.

“Oh my God. What the hell happened to her?” Allegra asks.

“She looks terrified. What would make her die with that look on her face?” Pattie kneels down, then continues, “There’s blood near her head. She must have cut herself when she fell off the gurney and banged her head.”

“I think if you were to examine her head more closely you’ll find rows of teeth marks,” Cannon explains.

“Teeth marks?” Now Allegra bends down and looks closer. “Oh, yeah. How would you know that? What happened to her?”

“Percy. That’s what happened to her.” I take a thorough look around the room, but see no sign of him anywhere.

Pattie stands up and steps closer to Cannon. Seeing this, Allegra gets closer to me.

“Percy? The python, Percy? He struck again? Why would he do this without trying to eat them? Don’t they just kill for food?” Allegra looks at me as though I’m some sort of expert.

“I’ve no idea, my love. I didn’t think so, but as I say, I’ve no idea. Females defend their nests. I’ve seen that on documentaries.”

“Don’t females grow larger than males, too?” Cannon asks me.

“Why does everyone think I know this stuff? Christ, Cannon, it’s your building, your pet. You should have dealt with this before now.” I’m getting aggravated because I don’t like people asking me questions and not having the answers. “Let’s get Candi out of sight and your guys can deal with her as a priority. You,” poking my finger into his chest, “need to get someone out here who knows what the fuck they are talking about. If Percy is a she and sitting on eggs, you need to get them out of here before they start hatching or whatever snake eggs do.”

“Holy crap, these things lay up to a hundred eggs, and they incubate in sixty to ninety days.” Pattie suddenly has a mountain of knowledge, and when I turn to ask her how she knows, I see her on her phone, obviously Googling. “Babies can be around a foot long, but can reach ten feet by their first birthday if food is plentiful. This could be a tremendous problem, guys. Our only saving grace is that there isn’t an open water source nearby. They like water, apparently. Like the Everglades.”

“There’s a pond at the back of the plot next door. You can hear the frogs calling all night. Plentiful food and water. Fuck me. Vortex, grab her legs. Let’s dump her ass in the prep room. I’ll get onto Prophet and read him in, then I’ll find someone discreet to come and sort out Percy or Priscilla. You guys get back to the clubhouse and fill in Pres. What a fucking mess. This is all Winger’s doing!”

Sitting in Pres’s office, we’re waiting for him to stop laughing. Allegra is just sitting quietly, Pattie is still Googling shit about snakes, I think and , well, Pres just can’t stop laughing. It has tickled him in some way that I don’t share, and he shows no sign of stopping anytime soon. I asked Bull to check the CCTV just to confirm that we’re correct in our thinking, but I don’t know what else could’ve killed Candi.

Pres wipes the tears from his eyes and takes several deep breaths. “Well, that’s just made my day. That snake should become a prospect, or one of those fuckers could take her as an old lady.” This sets him off again. We’re gonna be here all day at this rate.

“We need to move fast now though, Pres. We were going to ask Candi a few questions, but now that we know she was a part of it, her going missing will raise questions at Cottonwood.” I hope this will sober him up a little and get us back on track.

“I took care of that as soon as we knew she was on their books. Anya took off this morning with a one-way ticket to Hawaii, in Candi’s name. She’ll land, ditch the disguise and false papers, book a flight back and be home for the weekend. Once we’ve set up Brandon, Chris will fly out to Hawaii, ostensibly to join Candi, only when he gets there, a sizeable chunk of money will have disappeared along with any trace of Candi. He’ll fly home heartbroken that she did the dirty on him and skipped with a bunch of cash.” He sits back, happy with himself, and tips his head at me.

“Okay. That sounds plausible and definitely something she would have done. So, when do we go with the rest of the plan?”

“Tomorrow. Cottonwood Glades has a shareholder meeting at its head office, so Brandon will have to be there for that. When Bull works his magic, he’ll have to play with the dates of all the transfers, but he says he has a plan for that. The team for the mission is Bull, you, Bank, Hellion, Rage, Wraith, Mateo, Allegra, and Pattie.”

“Whoa. Hang fire there. Why are the women going on this mission? The last one, yes, I understood that, even though it did turn out differently than we expected, but this is a different beast. There is a very likely chance of contact with Cottonwood Associates and some gunplay. They haven’t been in any serious contact situations yet, and they don’t know enough to be able to react in any given scenario.” I look at the two women and I know that I’m going to get a reaming from them at any moment.

“My man makes a good point, Pres.” Allegra holds up a hand to stop Pattie arguing. “We are not stupido, but neither are we trained fighters like the men. What do you expect of us?”

“I didn’t expect that, I’ll be honest. I expect you to be there as lookouts, distractions, shock troops, whatever capacity you can be. Also to obey orders from Bull. He’ll be the team leader.”

I think Pres adds this as Bull knocks and enters. “Hold fast on that team leader stuff, Pres. I may be the only officer on the team, but I’m going to have my head up my ass when the computer stuff starts. I’m not going to be able to watch out for the team while I’m doing transfers and making sure it can’t be traced to anyone except Brandon Smiles or a corporate workstation. Vortex needs to be running the show. He has the experience and knowhow for that shit.”

Pres takes this on board and adjusts his opinion accordingly. “Okay. That makes sense. Vortex, you’ll be in charge. What you say goes, but don’t underestimate these two or what they’re capable of. Don’t put Allegra before the mission, and I know how difficult that is to hear, but there are a lot of lives at stake if this goes belly up.”

“Do the others know they are on the team?” I ask Pres.

“Have you fucking told them yet? No? Then how would they know?” he smiles at me and I just shake my head.