Page 38 of Lawbreaker
He nodded at the men in suits.
“This isn’t how it’s supposed to go!” the man sobbed.
Tony glared at him. “You really think you can get at us that easily?” he asked, and the softness of his voice chilled. “We’re more powerful than you know, in darker places than you’ll ever look. Even underground, we can reciprocate harm. You aligned yourself with a man who’s already digging himself a grave. He has more blood on his hands than you even know. He’ll pay for it. After you do.”
“I don’t know anybody, I don’t know anybody. I was just told to set you up and get you out of the way!”
“With a couple of feds in a location out in the sticks, toting a gun that’s never been fired, an operative in a cheap brand-new suit and shoes?” Tony scoffed. “I made you the minute I walked in the door.” He cocked his head. “And the underboss who set up this meeting for you works for me,” he added softly, “not your vindictive pal in DC!”
“Please, I just did what I was told to do!” the man whimpered.
“That was the Gestapo’s excuse. Did it work for them?”
“Please!”
He was still wailing until they put him out. He was trussed up nicely, bagged and tossed into the back of a sedan. Ready for delivery.
“Now that we’ve taken care of business, let’s get back to the airport and head down to Jacobsville, Texas,” Tony said as he got in the car. “My other adopted daughter is visiting her sister, with the new little girl. I can’t wait to see them!”
“What about that package we left back there?”
Tony chuckled. “They’ll deliver it to the right office in DC. That will be an interesting story to tell one day,” he said simply, and he leaned back in his seat with his eyes closed. “Some guys watch way too many old movies and television shows.”
“You got that right,” Ben agreed.
Odalie was delighted with her own brand-new goddaughter at the Big Spur near Branntville, Texas. The child was a delight to hold. She fell in love with her at first sight.
“You’ll spoil her rotten,” Maddie Brannt accused with glee as she watched Penelope gurgle up at her godmother.
“She’s just adorable,” Odalie said. “I can’t decide which one of you she favors yet.”
“She’ll look like her daddy,” Maddie said, still madly in love with Cort, her husband.
“I think her eyes will be more like yours,” Odalie replied, “except the shape is what I’m talking about, not the color.” She looked up. “When you’re up to it, Tony wants you to take a picture out of one of the art books I gave you and make him a fairy of it. We all agreed that he’s never going to put the one of him in any gallery,” she added with a grin.
Maddie laughed. “Actually, I figured that out for myself. I picked one of the fantasy paintings and made a little redheaded fairy with big blue eyes. She doesn’t look like anyone we know, so she’ll be easy to let go of. I’m just thrilled that Tony’s willing to exhibit my babies in his gallery. The cattle business is having some issues lately.”
“Tell me about it,” Odalie agreed. “Dad’s having problems, too. If the government would just get its fingers out of the cattle business...”
“...and doctors’ offices and everything else that it regulates, and oversees, and taxes to death, people might find a way to pay their bills!”
“Two kindred spirits,” Odalie laughed.
“Rural people don’t think like city people,” Maddie said simply. “I actually heard one woman in an interview say that we didn’t need ranchers to provide meat or farmers to provide vegetables because we had, and I quote her, supermarkets!”
“Don’t they know that food is only in supermarkets because of farmers and ranchers?”
“I think they’d decided that we shouldn’t have either, that we should all eat bugs and be happy.”
“I don’t know about you, but I’m pretty tired of having billionaires make rules and laws and designate even the food we eat. We don’t even have a voice anymore.”
“Time to get out and vote,” Maddie said. “It’s the only thing that might save us now.”
“God is the only thing that can save us,” Odalie replied with a smile. “But so many people don’t believe these days. It makes me sad.”
“That’s their problem,” Maddie replied on a sigh. “But eternity is forever. It’s something to consider. If they’re sure there’s nothing after death, they’d better be right.”
“Amen.”