Geek Mafia: Mile Zero by Rick Dakan (reading tree txt) 📖

and Marco had later told Paul that she’d been disgusted with Eddie’s behavior, giving Marco even more data to convince his fellow Crewmembers that keeping Eddie around would be a grave error.

Paul looked at the time on his phone. Just past two in the afternoon. He wished they had room service here, but they didn’t. A dip in the pool sounded nice. Maybe lie out in the sun for an hour or so. He looked down at Chloe’s naked body, spread out on her stomach below him as he caressed her back. On second thought, it would be a shame to put clothes on. Maybe they could order a pizza to their room…

“We need to go soon,” Chloe said. And she was right. They were supposed to meet Isaiah and everyone else at 5:00 p.m..

“Pretty soon,” he agreed, “but not yet. How’s your hearing?”

“Fine. When I woke up, the ringing was gone. That shotgun is fucking loud.”

“I told you.”

“Yeah, but I didn’t believe you.”

“Why not?”

“Because you’ve never fired a shotgun,” she said.

“Yeah, but I’ve seen movies. Read books. I was right, wasn’t I?”

“Yes, dear, you were right.” She smiled. “I - I who have shot a shotgun before, mind you, just not indoors - I for some reason didn’t think the beanbag load would be as loud.”

“Is it the same amount of gunpowder?” Paul asked. The gun, which belonged to Party bartender Jesse, had been loaded with beanbag rounds. Instead of slugs or buckshot, it fired a small beanbag with tremendous force. Chloe had hit Eddie in the face from about fifteen feet away, breaking his nose and knocking him on his ass. She was lucky she hadn’t blinded him, but she’d been aiming at his chest and he ducked.

“I don’t know,” she said. “I didn’t ask. It was enough to be loud. And to leave my shoulder a little sore. Is there a bruise?” She rolled over onto her back and pointed to the barely visible bruise. Paul kissed the sore spot gently and then moved his mouth down to her nipple.

“I know that’s not bruised,” she said softly, running a hand through his hair.

He gave her a playful bite, just the way she liked it. “Not yet,” he said.

“You’re a bad man,” she replied.

“The worst,” he agreed and then moved to her other nipple.

“The worst?” she asked.

Another light bite. “Yep.”

She spread her legs and pushed his head south. “Well then, do your worst.”

“Gladly,” he said, kissing his way down her stomach.

THEY were ten minutes late to the meeting at Isaiah’s. For once it was actually at a location which could be described as “Isaiah’s.” The house was in the southeast corner of Old Town, an unassuming place that no one would look at twice as they walked down the street. Paul himself must’ve walked the street a dozen or more times without paying it any mind. He wondered who it belonged to.

Inside, it was larger than he’d thought it would be, with a single great room along its south side that ran the length of the house. It was one of the bigger and more beautiful sunrooms Paul had ever seen. Blonde, hardwood floors waxed to a glossy sheen with a scattering of Persian rugs to break up the space into discreet areas. The room contained four different couches and numerous, low padded chairs. It reminded Paul of the lounge in some tropical gentlemen’s club from the 19th century.

Isaiah was standing at the far end of the room, by the bar, watching them as they walked down the length of the room. Nearby stood Marco, Jeanie and Winston, along with Amelia. Throughout the room were an alarming number of people Paul had never seen before. Although he recognized the man who’d met them at the door as the same Crewmember who’d stood guard at the La Concha on the first night, Paul had never seen any of these others before. There were eleven other men and women scattered around the room, none of whom he recognized. All of them wore similar clothes - khaki pants, dark olive or black shirts, black boots. They looked like an army at ease. How many people did Isaiah bring with him to Key West? Paul had to assume there were still more out of sight.

“Quite a show of force,” Chloe whispered into his ear.

Paul nodded, looking at Isaiah and smiling as he did so. He was nervous all of a sudden. No one was armed, no one looked unusually dangerous, but the whole atmosphere had just taken on an air of real menace. That didn’t make any sense did it? Paul couldn’t think of any flaws in his plan that might have left them exposed to Isaiah’s wrath. Then again, it’s not like he actually knew much about Isaiah…

“Come on in, friends,” Isaiah said to them from across the room. “Join the party.”

“This is quite a place,” Chloe said as they strode past Isaiah’s cadre of similarly dressed Crewmembers. “Sorry we didn’t get the message about the dress code.”

Isaiah cracked the slightest of smiles. “No dress code required. We’re all very informal here.”

Paul and Chloe reached the other end of the room and joined Winston, Marco and Jeanie where they stood around Isaiah and Amelia. Marco nodded at Paul, but his face was an emotionless mask, as were those of everyone else.

“How is our friend Eddie?” Isaiah asked Paul.

“He’s on a slow boat to the Bahamas,” said Paul. “Well, I guess not too slow. It’s a cruise ship. But he’s on his way.”

“The steward helped you out?” Marco asked.

“Just like you said he would,” Paul affirmed. “Eddie’s locked in one of the crew cabins and will be tossed ashore with a couple hundred bucks in cash.”

“We left him a perfectly fair severance package in one of the Crew accounts,” Marco interjected. “The rest of our assets have all been moved out of his reach. Once he finds a way to get to Grand Cayman, he can get his money.”

“And you’re sure he poses no future risk to the rest of us?” Isaiah asked. “The man’s going to want to get even, especially with you and Paul here. Revenge is a powerful motivator.”

“I’m sure he’s pissed off,” said Marco. “But there’s not much he can do. For the past year I’ve been building a buffer between him and all our contacts. He doesn’t know who they are exactly, and they don’t know him. He called the shots, but I made the business happen. Without me, he’s going to be lost out there.”

“And we shall all endeavor to be very hard to find,” Isaiah concluded. “Ultimately this little internecine struggle between you two is none of my business. I know why it happened, and while I find it all more than a little distasteful, I’m not going to argue with the results.”

Paul suspected that what Isaiah found distasteful was the fact that Eddie hadn’t actually done anything wrong. It was the false accusations Paul and Winston had leveled against him that drove him to respond with violence and general prickishness in the first place. He knew that if Eddie had been a nicer guy or if Marco hadn’t proved so cooperative, Isaiah would never have accepted their little coup so easily. That’s what you get for being a dick.

Isaiah continued, “But this is all largely irrelevant to the larger issues at hand. The first issue being, of course, justice for Raquel’s murderer. I understand that you have the responsible party?”

“Yes,” said Paul. “As I told you. And as I’m sure Eddie told you as well. We took the man into custody yesterday and we’re currently holding him at a safe house of ours.”

Isaiah turned to Winston, “And this man worked for you, right?”

“With me, yes,” said Winston. “And he’s a good man.”

“He’s a murderer,” Isaiah replied.

“It was a confrontation that spiraled out of control,” Winston insisted. “He never intended to kill her. He followed her, she set a trap for him, they fought, and in the course of things, she hit her head.”

“He hit her head,” said Isaiah.

“Her head was hit and, sadly, she died. He then, without my knowledge, moved the body to her hotel room with the help of another compatriot, and he went into hiding, afraid of becoming involved with the police.”

Isaiah’s cold eyes lingered on Winston, appraising his story. Then he said, “And when Paul showed us his picture, you didn’t bother to inform us that he was one of your people.”

“I was surprised to see him, certainly. But no, I didn’t tell you because I didn’t know myself what had really happened. Jake was in hiding, and I needed to hear his side of the story first. I’ve no duty to any of you, but Jake was one of my own. I was protecting him.”

“So your withholding this information was not an attempt to sabotage our plans? You weren’t trying to subvert the entire negotiation process?”

“Of course not,” said Winston. “If that were the case, then why would I come here at all?”

“Then why did you try to shift blame for the murders to Eddie?” Isaiah asked.

“Because Eddie was a thuggish, hubristic lout,” said Winston. “And because he was working with Raff, who betrayed my friends Paul and Chloe and was responsible for me being shot. I did not trust him, and I’ll admit to being guilty of trying to subvert his position in the group. An unpleasant necessity in my estimation, but a necessity nonetheless.”

Isaiah moved his gaze from Winston to Jeanie, “But now you’ve come to an accord with Jeanie and her Crew. Why is that?”

“Raff seems to be out of the picture,” said Winston. “He’s disappeared. And now that Jeanie and I have had a chance to meet, we’ve resolved any differences we might have had.”

Isaiah raised a questioning eyebrow toward Jeanie, who said in response, “We’ve settled things. Assuming I get Raquel’s seat at the organizing table and everyone’s comfortable with that, then I’m prepared to let bygones be bygones between me and Winston.”

“And what do we propose be done with this murderer, Jacob?” Isaiah asked.

“We cut him out,” said Paul, who’d negotiated this alliance. “Marco, Jeanie, Win and I all talked about it, and that’s our suggestion. Winston promises to cut him out of his Crew, and he no longer has anything to do with any of us. He goes back to his little hometown in Oregon and we never see him again. He’s got to find his own way in the world.”

Isaiah frowned. “Just let him go. That’s your idea of punishment.”

“He’s sorry for what happened,” said Winston. “But it was an accident. He did not mean to kill her.”

“So you have said,” Isaiah replied, his voice dripping with uncharacteristic sarcasm.

“Yes. So I have said. So he has said. You’ll have to take our words for it.”

“Leaving aside his attempt to kill Jeanie as well - if she’s ok with this, then who am I to argue - leaving that aside, what do you think Raquel would say to this arrangement? Doesn’t she deserve justice?”

All of them just sort of stared at Isaiah in confusion. Justice was something for the police and the courts. They were criminals and con artists. They weren’t in the justice business, at least not in the traditional way.

“This is our version of justice,” Paul was surprised to hear himself say. “This is all we have. We don’t have jails. We don’t do executions. All we can do is banish someone from our presence. Cut them out of the life.”

“Maybe you don’t do executions,” Isaiah said. “But maybe I do. Maybe the person responsible