The two men in the front seat exchanged a glance.
“Tex,” I continued. “They call me Tex for short. But my real name? It was passed down from my father.” I allowed for a long pause. “Vito Nicio Campisi, Junior.”
“Shut up!” the man next to me yelled.
“It’s a mouthful,” I added, spreading my legs wide enough to push both bastards further against the doors of the car. “And the minute I got to the States, I became obsessed with everything Texas had to offer, big cows, big hats, big hair, big—” I earned another punch to the stomach. It hurt like hell but I kept talking once I could catch my breath. “So you can imagine that the minute I hit puberty and noticed how big I was — and how much I had to offer the big bad world, I asked to be called Tex. Though to be fair, in the bedroom the ladies just call me Big.”
“Does this kid ever stop talking?” The guy to the right muttered.
“Would you rather I shit my pants and rock back and forth?” I spat in a low tone. “I’m the son to one of the most powerful men in your sad, pathetic, little world. He owns you, therefore, I own you. I’m a trained assassin.” I purposefully narrowed my gaze as if I was looking down on all of them and thought them beneath me, which technically they were. “By your silence I can assume you were told I was a half-assed village idiot who smiled more than he talked and screwed women for fun.” I rolled my eyes. “I could kill all of you like this.” I snapped. “I wouldn’t even blink and neither would my father. The only reason you guys are still alive is because the longer my father takes with me, the longer that fun little contracted hit hangs over his head. Hell, he may be dead by the time we get to the location.”
The guy to my right held a gun to my head. “Still confident you could kill us? Shit, you talk a lot.”
I smirked. “You irritate me.” I turned to the guy on my left. “And you smell like you ate shit for breakfast, and I don’t mean that as an exaggeration. You actually smell like you woke up at six a.m., took a crap in the toilet, dipped your grubby little hands into your own bowl and fished out a prize.”
“That’s it!” The guy to my left lunged for me, which really was unfortunate for him, considering I’d already managed to saw the zip ties off my hands.
I used the same knife to slice his throat. His eyes went wide and he gurgled something as a crimson waterfall gushed from his neck. Pity. It was hell getting stains out of white. Then I wrestled his gun out of his clenched fist and fired it right-handed at the guy next to me. Poor bastard slumped in his seat, a look of pure horror crossed his face before his body stilled.
Two seconds.
That’s how long it took me.
The one choked his last breath while the other slumped against the window. The driver slammed on the brakes, while the guy in the passenger seat turned around and aimed a gun for my head.
I was too busy wiping my hands on the guy next to me to care. Once they were semi-clean, I looked up and shrugged. “Please, don’t stop on my account. Like I said, the one kept punching me and the other smelled. Tell me you didn’t smell him. I did you a favor. Is it my imagination, or are the made men these days lacking in the hygiene department?”
The guy in the front seat took his gun off of me. “He was right about you.”
“Who?” I asked innocently as the car started going again.
“Your father.”
“Oh, and what did Papa have to say about his abandoned son?”
The guy smirked in the rearview mirror. “He said he should have killed you when you were an infant.”
I smirked right back. “For once, he’s right.”
Chapter Forty-Three
Chase
“He kept his GPS on.” I muttered tapping my phone as it found Tex’s location. He was at Lake Mead. Though his signal was fading. Either they were tossing him into the water or he was going underground. “Are there any tunnels? Old abandoned buildings?” I asked Sergio.
He clicked the keyboard into his iPad and began going to town. “I’m not seeing anything glaring other than a few old houses, some old caves.”
“Wait.” Frank held up his hand. “He’s superstitious.”
“What?”
“Albatross,” Luca said for him. “And houses on the lake are another superstition. The man has a thing about bad omens and curses. My bet is he went underground or into an abandoned cave.”
“Searching.” Sergio’s hands flew across the keyboard. “Okay, so the only thing I’m finding is an old abandoned boathouse. Everything else is either a nice house, hotel, or restaurant. None of those places are even close to the location he disappeared at.”
“Old boathouse it is.”
Sergio smirked.
“What?” I asked.
He looked up from his computer. “The old boathouse. It’s called The Albatross.”
“Good work.” Nixon exhaled. “Girls, you’re going to drive separate with Frank. You’re safer with us than hiding out at the hotel. They could be drawing us out to kill us or drawing us out to get to you. I’m not taking any chances.” He turned to Frank. “Follow, but not too close. If you don’t hear from us within a few hours, call this number.”
“What is it?” Frank asked.
Nixon’s eyes fell. “The airline. If you don’t hear from us, you go off-grid, you go to the first location stated in Trace’s plan. She has the information you guys would need to go into hiding. If we make it out, we’ll meet you there. If we don’t…” His voice died off.
“You’ve thought of everything,” Mo said, her voice sounding hollow.
Nixon pulled her into his arms. “We’re blood. We protect blood.”
When he released her, I stepped up to him and held out my hand. “Blood in. Blood out.”
Luca and Frank shook our hands, repeating the sentiment as each of us kissed one another’s cheeks.
I’d never been one to think about the whole patron saint thing, but in that moment, I pulled out the cross that I’d made when I was fifteen. It had Saint Paul scribbled across it.
“May God protect us,” Nixon mumbled, making a cross motion with his fingers in front of him.
Frank nodded. “He protects the just.”
Mil leaned against me. “And those who rape little girls, sell their virginity, or worse yet, purchase it for their own gain? What does he do to them?”