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“AndRobin,what the hell were you doing when you should have been watching his wife’s location? Her messages?”
Robbie clears his throat nervously. O never calls him Robin. “She, uh, she drove her own vehicle, by herself. She had never done that before. I had been tracking all the vehicles on one active map simultaneously. Her vehicle was not in the system yet.”
“And her cell phone? And her ring? C’mon boys, what is this, fucking amateur hour? Mark buys her a car and you don’t install the software first fucking thing?”
“My mistake.” Robbie says. Which is terrifying. Robbie doesn’t make mistakes. And he never gets chewed out. He’s younger than the rest of us and is the most innocent, most endearing. It’s like we’re watching our baby brother get whipped.
“Yes. And that brings me to Gailo.”
“Sir.” He says next to me, tensing.
“You took his wife?”
“That was—“ I try to defend him.
O holds up a hand on the screen and that’s enough for me to close my mouth. O never gets mad. He doesn’t yell. He is the epitome of the old saying ‘speak softly and carry a big stick.’ A saying he taught all of us.
“There were many, many plays to run to handle that scenario. You all chose probably the worst possible option. Leave her there with a message pinned on her dress. Rough her up and drop her on Delgado’s doorstep.” I flinch at that idea and every single one of them notices. “Mark was the target. Mark was the hostage, the play. Now, we have to change the whole narrative. But that is not why we’re all gathered, is it.”
He takes a deep breath and exhales. He fists and then unclenches his hands three times. Then he stares at me through the screen. “How could you bring someone in without clearing it with me. An innocent? A woman, without proper motive, who loves her family? What the actual fuck, Marco?”
“She chose me, O. I ran a scenario in the basement. I’m sure you watched the footage.”
“She chose you under duress! When the truth came out, what did she say then? Because I’m sorry, my boy, but she already texted her sister!” He says, raising his voice more than he has in years. Everyone’s eyes go wide. O points to something in front of Robbie.
Robbie reads, “Hey Mia, things are going so well with Mark, it had me thinking about you and Luna and your marriages. You should really start learning the other languages now so that you are ready when the time comes. I’m glad I did, even though Mark’s Spanish is terrible LOL.”
Everyone relaxes and I jump in, “That’s hardly suspicious. In fact, she said that we’re doing well. She’s covering for me.”
“Dude, you’re both supposed to be tied up in an Italian dungeon. How’s she sending advice texts about her happy marriage right now?” Zander says, making a very good point.
“That’s what you and Robbie are for. The text never got to Mia. The point is, she didn’t turn on me.”
“Not yet.” O says sharply.
“She won’t. She’s in. Whether she wants to be or not. I told her about the fire, and I’ll explain more tomorrow, then we’ll run a new scenario.”
“Assuming, which is a huge fucking assumption based on this woman’s love for you, which, obviously we all love you here, but you are not the most lovable creature, makes me uncomfortable.”
“I think she does, though.” Robbie interrupts. O freezes and then turns to the source of interruption in almost slow motion.
“Thank you for the insight, son. You have the people skills of a goldfish in isolation, but thank you. Thank you so much.” He lets the sarcasm land before turning back to the camera to look at me. “EvenifCupid here is correct, and we assume she’s in, what scenario do you propose?”
“The Italians release her to her family, demanding a bigger piece of his pie at the border. If Delgado refuses, they’ll release a video of me confessing what I know to the DEA and Border Security.”
“If I’m Delgado, I want to see this confession video. She’ll need to show it to him.” O says. I nod. “It’ll need to be convincing. He would expect you to have a high tolerance for torture, or he wouldn’t have agreed to the marriage.”
I lean forward. “What’s the one thing that’s sure to break a man?”
“A woman.” They all say in unison.
“Gailo uses her as leverage in the video, I break early to save her from pain.” I look up and wait. Everyone thinks. Finally, O speaks.
“That only works if they believe you love her. If she’s youruntouchable,as they would call it.”
“She is.” I answer honestly and easily. She is my untouchable. No one can lay a finger on her without hell to pay. “Speaking of…”
“Arlo is being arrested in the morning. Huge child pornography bust. His name and face will be all over the news and his time in prison will be hell.” Zander answers.
