The Infiltrators by Daniel Lawlis Page B

hopin’ you’d drop
by.”
     

Chapter 17
     
    At 10:50 p.m., as Rob strode into the
alley next to Georgie’s Pub, ten bodyguards leading the way, five
bodyguards on either side, and around thirty toughs scouring a
block in each direction from the entrance to the alley, looking for
sign of any faces that spelled trouble, Rob told himself he
shouldn’t feel particularly vulnerable.
     
    He had ten men on top of each building
adjacent to the alley, and though he suspected it to be overkill,
he had even sent ten men on top of the building on the opposite
side of the street. All men on top of the buildings had searched
every nook and cranny starting an hour before he even began heading
this way, and they gave an “all’s clear” whistle as he approached
the entrance of the alley.
     
    They were all armed with crossbows, and
while they were no crack shots, he had only selected them for the
mission after they demonstrated reasonable proficiency shooting
melons at around twenty yards. Nonetheless, he had warned them not
to shoot at anyone closer than three feet to him. He would rather
die by an assassin’s knife than a crossbow bolt from one of his
underlings.
     
    But in spite of all these precautions,
he felt butterflies he hadn’t felt since he had ambushed Fred
Pfeiffer, the man who used to hold his current position. These guys
Thin Tim had described seemed like something from a campfire ghost
story. But having seen the slashed throats and the entry wounds of
some sharp projectiles in the vitals of the numerous guards in his
stash house, passing it all off as a ghost story wouldn’t
fly.
     
    And yet the fact the men had stolen
none of the several hundred pounds of Smokeless Green stashed there
seemed to pull the story back into the realm of fantasy, as no
thugs he could imagine would have left that much wealth
untouched.
     
    He had a lot more men with him than
there had been guarding the stash house, and all of his crew
tonight was primed for action. He looked in disgust at a man passed
out drunk lying next to the wall. Vomit surrounded his head, and a
nearly finished bottle of rum was still clutched in his hand, like
a toy clutched by a baby. He had long hair and looked around sixty
years old.
     
    “What’s this place comin’ to?” Rob
piped self-righteously. He had spent his share of nights passed out
drunk on the street in his teenage years and even a few times in
his twenties, but he had found his calling in life with the passage
of SISA and had gotten serious about his future.
     
    He had cut his alcohol consumption to a
shadow of its former glory, and he sure as hell didn’t plan on
spending the rest of his life with a couple minor wholesalers
underneath him. He was looking to move up in the world. He was
pulling in over a million falons per month, but he knew he hadn’t
reached the ceiling yet.
     
    He visualized himself one
day sitting at a table with Mr. Brass himself, offering advice on
where they should focus their shipments to avoid police. Mr. Brass
would nod gratefully at his wisdom and end every conversation with
the phrase: My right hand man.
     
    He didn’t know whether Mr. Ritmer
represented a serious bump in the road, or whether the elusive man
might somehow propel his career. His claim he could provide
Smokeless Green twenty percent cheaper than his going rate couldn’t
be passed off as mere puffery. It seemed consistent with the fact
he didn’t deign to touch a single gram from the hundreds of pounds
he had at his fingertips at the stash house.
     
    But what was really behind
all those deaths . . . if he just wanted to talk
business?
     
    Maybe he just wanted to get
your attention and show he was the real deal.
     
    Maybe he had started out
killin’ people for Lefty and then decided it would be better to do
business with you?
     
    Rob was anxious regardless of which
path this meeting took. If the guy was for real, and he offered
Smokeless Green twenty percent cheaper than what he got