◆ Change Your Ways ◆
Lyon, France
◆ MILES ◆
"Is Kel home now?"
"Yeah."
"Busy with trainings again? She's doing surgery rounds now. Right?"
"Yeah. Her favorite department." I glanced at my cousin and reclined beside him, minding the concern in his husky voice. The lack of good lighting made it difficult to assess whether Ricchar looked as sleepy or bored as I was, but maybe he was just antsy. Like me.
It was almost ten. We'd been stuck in the backseat of this rental SUV for the past three hours now, waiting for someone from the Interpol headquarters to call us for a meet-up. Our hotel rooms were on the 20th floor.
In the front seat beside the driver, Niccolo looked busy with his laptop again. He must be tracking the newest shipments under Leandro Tomassini's name. And the ones under his aliases.
If our hunches turned out right, they would contain the 200 kilos of pure cocaine that homicidal nutjob had been expecting. For about a week now. High quality. Straight from South America. If Niccolo's secret spying the past months yielded only the most accurate information, the shipments should be sitting in one of our ships approaching the port in Caron at this moment.
It wouldn't surprise me at all if Pappa already negotiated his cut much earlier. With more access to the Tomassini's resources now, he'd think it was easy money.
"She's still hoping you'll go back to rehab soon." Ricchar sighed.
"Yeah. I know."
"I called Lorenzio," he murmured while his eyes focused on his phone's bright screen. "He said Ignazio just confirmed he's going to the party. Give or take ten guards. With pistols mostly."
Paranoid asshole. I scoffed and shook my head. "Promised him young escorts. That's why he's showin' up."
"He's still calling the shots every time Leandro's busy with something else?"
"Yeah," Niccolo replied for me. "He calls Stefano almost every day."
"You talked to Pappa again?" I looked at Ricchar.
"Yeah. Last night. You know what he said?"
"I got a few ideas."
"That I'm getting too soft," Ricchar said with a forced laugh. "Hopeless case." He weakly shook his head.
"Let's just hope that guy from HQ is legit." Niccolo tutted. He sounded quite apprehensive now. "But he's clean. Last time I checked. Not even a parking ticket."
"Too clean." I crossed my arms below my chest and made a face. The guy from Interpol we're supposed to meet today was a trusted contact of Niccolo's newest back-up plan: Magnus Roiz, Ilya's firstborn son. Unlikely, but, part of me wanted to believe Magnus actually wanted to help those trafficked victims.
If he's helping us purely out of spite, just for the sake of seeing his father's competition get prison time, then there's no point, really. We were better off without owing any favors to another greedy billionaire's son.
"The contact just exited the building." Niccolo cleared his throat as he sat up straight in the front passenger seat. "He's not alone."
"How many?" Ricchar loosened his tie and stared out the window to his right.
"Three. No. Wait. At least four."
"All armed?"
"I bet," Niccolo muttered. His fingers hastily typed something onto his computer while Ricchar and I glanced around our surroundings.
The parking lot still looked too quiet. Poor lighting. No more than 20 cars around. Our vehicles were parked near the exit. Five armed bodyguards waited for our go signal in the other SUV parked beside us.
"Where's the restaurant again? Two blocks away?" I glanced at Ricchar. "The guy seriously wants us to have dinner with him?"
"Yep. No going back the moment we set foot in there." Niccolo sighed.
"As long as we're barking at the right tree," I mumbled while massaging my aching forehead. The migraines and stomach pains were back again, but I already took painkillers. If the pain only worsened, I might have to find another dealer tonight. Shit.
"You got the names of the cops Leandro recently added to his payroll?" Ricchar scratched his brow and stared at Niccolo.
"Not yet. But I still hear enough rumors," Niccolo murmured. "I was gonna peek at their books again. But Stefano cornered me."
"He's extra paranoid lately." Ricchar heaved a sigh and stared out the window. "You know where they are right now? Is he with Leandro?"
"Not sure. Probably meeting their new prospects. Albanian syndicate."
Prospects... I scoffed.
He meant to say new business partners who would do half of the dirty work for them. That included cleaning up their filthy money before the banks got real suspicious.
Pappa was already waist-deep with Leandro in the drug and human trafficking scene. I had warned him again and again. My scheming father just wouldn't listen to any of us. His own family. That clan of billionaire crooks clearly promised him lots of money that had already corrupted what's left of his soul.
Although Ricchar did not agree to confess to drug-related crimes, he said he would rat out Pappa, Leandro, and even Ignazio Tomassini. We still had no idea whether Interpol or the courts would charge Ricchar for his small-time drug smuggling last year, but we had bigger fish to fry right now.
Excessively worrying about prison every day wouldn't help our plans succeed. Ricchar didn't want any prison time, of course, especially now that Cloe would be giving birth to their first child soon. I wished I didn't have to drag them into this mess.
Too late to back out now. But perhaps the higher authorities wouldn't be so useless this time around. If the odds stayed in our favor and with Interpol's help, Ricchar could become a protected informant and a key witness.
A great risk, but, better than just sitting on our asses, pretending those helpless victims didn't exist. Poor, abused teenagers and young women being sold over and over, suffering every single day.
"Hey. By the way..." Niccolo shifted in his seat to look behind and regard me.
"What?"
"Magnus wants to meet up this week."
"Huh?" I frowned at the same time Ricchar stopped texting on his phone to stare at me.
Nicco looked away. He focused on his laptop screen again. "Dinner meeting. With his wife, Evie. They're on their way now. He said they'll be staying in a hotel in Nice."
"Why? Why does he want to meet up?"
"I'm not going," Ricchar muttered beside me.
"Not sure," Niccolo replied. "He said it's about Kel."
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