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Kev nodded. “I can handle them. Who else?”
I opened my mouth to argue with him once again—to give all the very valid reasons why that idea sucked—but Riggs kicked my shin, and Champ shot me a shut the fuck up look from the other side of the room.
The edge of my phone dug into my clenched fist.
Fuck. Champ was clearly committed to having Kev involved in this.
Well, that was that, then. I couldn’t tell Kev that I was Smitty. Not now, anyway. If Kev got angry at me—and he would—he might decide not to participate in the mission, and Champ would kick my ass or possibly fire me for fucking things up.
It was a relief to have that decided.
I felt a slight pang of regret when I realized that this also meant SmittyKitty would have to do a vanishing act—turn down Kev’s offer of an alliance, withdraw from the Conqueror’s Tournament, probably slide away from HOG altogether—because there was no way Kev and Smitty could both be in the tournament without him finding out.
But there was a kind of relief in that too, and I felt it immediately. I’d already decided I didn’t want to deceive Kev anymore, but that felt especially important now that I’d admitted to myself that Kev wasn’t my adversary. He was my… I swallowed hard. He was my something else entirely. Maybe I didn’t need to be Smitty anymore.
I wrenched my attention back to the matter at hand as Elvo continued. “SummonerStallion is Horn Number Eight. He lives in a compound in New Mexico. Damned impossible to breach, but he also brokers thoroughbreds. I figure we can arrange to buy one of his horses and meet with him that way.”
Champ scribbled something on the notebook in his lap. “Sounds good. Jacob Horn said there’s no budget limit, so he can be the proud new owner of a horse when this is all said and done. Who’s next?”
“Horn Nine—AnarchyBarbie75. She owns a chain of beauty salons in Mobile, Alabama.”
That didn’t seem like one of the hard ones. “Why isn’t that on our easy list?” I asked.
Elvo lifted an eyebrow at me. “She also runs illegal guns from the back room of several of the salon locations. So you can get a manicure and a machine gun. Kind of a one-stop shop, if you will.”
“More like BadassBarbie, am I right?” Jordan snickered.
Champ sighed. “Fucking hell. Why? Why me?”
Elvo rolled his eyes and went on. “Meanwhile, Horn Ten is a user named HOGFireChampion, who is…”
Kev snorted. “Deluded? Because, seriously, I’ve never heard of this so-called ‘champion.’ You?”
He looked at me, and I shook my head. “Nope,” I said, popping the P. “And if neither Kev nor I have heard of them, they’re not a champion.”
“Exactly.” Kev grinned—one of his bright, powerful grins that made the recipient glow like the sun was shining directly on them. I’d never actually been on the receiving end of one before, and it scrambled my brain just slightly. “But it’s cute that they think that,” he concluded smugly.
Shit. Smug Kev was even more attractive than quirky, nerdy Kev.
Definitely, definitely screwed.
I swallowed hard and looked away. “You were saying, Elvo?”
Elvo hmphed. “I was saying that HogFire-not-a-Champion is a human resources executive at a large textile plant in Dalton, Georgia.” He shrugged. “Doesn’t scream ‘I run with drug dealers,’ I know, but like Cartel Barbie, this guy is known for being a gun nut. He owns two hundred acres of land and runs organized hunts on the regular. He also owns his own small plane and has private landing strips, both at his home and at the land.”
“We need a woman,” I said. “That kind of guy would be easily taken in by an attractive, flirty younger woman.”
Champ nodded. “Honeypot, agreed. Yolanda?”
“Yep. On it,” Yolanda said, getting out her phone.
Kev winced. “Um. I think you’d do a great job in any other circumstance, Yolanda, but… that kind of guy probably isn’t going to go for a mature Black woman.”
Yolanda’s eyes creased with her laughter. “That’s the fucking truth. But you haven’t met my wife.” She wiggled her eyebrows.
Champ grinned. “Katie is a stunning white woman who served with us in Afghanistan. She’s a personal trainer now here in the Thicket. She’d love nothing more than to pull one over on a good old Georgia boy.”
Kev’s cheeks turned pink from embarrassment. “Oh.”
Elvo tapped the next name on his whiteboard. “This one’s tough. Horn Eleven is GreenBerryTemptress… who lives at the JollyBrook Residential School for Boys, just outside Cape Camden, Missouri.”
“A kid?” Jordan demanded. “Seriously? The cartel is recruiting teenagers now?”
“More likely, an adult that lives there,” Champ said grimly. “A teacher or administrator. But if everyone there is hooked up to the school Wi-Fi, even if we gain access to the school, how will we know whose Horn it is?”
