“Roger that, boss,” Fury radioed.

“Keep us informed, Sue. Everyone else maintain radio silence unless you got an emergency.” Justice’s voice grew strained. His pacing intensified.

“Dude, relax. You’re fucking with my system’s reception. You’ve covered every angle—it’s a good plan. Just chill out,” Rage implored. Fingers jabbed at mosquitoes and dust as Rage watched his screens carefully.

Sue broke squelch, “Contact. They’re talking. Patting each other down. Shaking hands.” His descriptions to the rest of the team flowed as Fury and Geneti danced cautiously until the deal was done. “Fury gave the hand signal. All the weapons are delivered as agreed.”

Justice chewed on his top lip. “Damn, that’s a lot of money to let walk.”

“No shit, but your call,” Rage added.

“That’s why we’re here. The Mexicans are willing to pay top dollar for rifles, and the military is stupid enough to let them walk out of armories. It’s our duty to make a profit from it.”

“Is Vengeance clear to move?” Sue radioed.

“Go,” Justice snapped back.

Everyone held their positions as the older model Harley Davidson Dyna-Glide sputtered to life. It left an arid trail as Ricky Geneti hauled ass back to Las Vegas, two hundred and thirty thousand dollars richer.

“All clear,” called Sue from his northwest ridge position.

“Hold tight,” Justice said. “Vengeance and Fury clear the deck in case it’s a rip-off play for the guns.” Criminals could be double-crossing assholes. The binoculars were jerked from their strap as a glower pinched his brow together. He scanned the area.

“Looks clean, boss,” Fury’s tone had lightened considerably since completing the high-stakes transaction.

Eerily, the silence almost echoed from the endless points of light overhead. The view of the stars from high on the mountain was like nowhere else. Justice couldn’t help contrasting the tranquility of the outdoors against the potential violence contained in the weapons’ metal cargo containers.

With an extended inhale of fresh mountain air, he bounced on the balls of his feet and pumped his fist. He reached across the pile of plastic computer carrying cases with an open hand to high-five Rage.

“What the fuck?” Rage’s wooden expression blanked. He bent to within an inch of his computer’s radar surveillance screen. Justice froze.

A faint hum and flutter became more distinct. The blip on the computer screen made no sense—it wasn’t a motorcycle’s signature. The men looked up as the whirr of rotor wash sounded from a small helicopter cresting the northeast ridge.

Justice swung his binoculars toward the sound then toward Sue, who was still on the northeast ridge where he maintained surveillance for approaching traffic. The binos flexed beneath the powerful vice of his palms as Justice saw Sue flip onto his back. It looked like his brother had tried to fix the rifle’s scope onto the helicopter, but had been caught off guard by its sudden stealth appearance.

“What the fuck? Is that the feds?” Justice screamed into the small walkie-talkie.

The two-seater Bell JetRanger swooped toward the Jeep and, in an orchestrated descent, released a hook that snatched the tie-straps over the weapons’ metal container. Within seconds it fought to climb out of the valley—cargo case attached—and disappeared.

His fully automatic AR-15 rifle ripping off .223 caliber high-velocity bullets, Justice roared, “You’re fucking dead, Geneti.”

The truth was, Justice Boudreaux might be the next to die.

Chapter 2

Las Vegas isn’t the glimmer and glitz seen by tourists. There’s just a new strip and an old strip, which tried to become a newer old strip. That strip is still just as much bullshit as it was before the new strip. Vegas, the real Las Vegas is littered with working class poor, homeless, and whores.

Abigail Black had been homeless. She hated it, so she worked three jobs to avoid ever being on the streets again. The run-down stucco apartment where she lived currently was her first real home. She’d spent her junior and high school years bumming places to place. Nomadic, her folks followed the trash bins; the more garbage, the better the pickings, and those glamorous casino resorts threw away the best food.

Abigail spent years at the glamorous casinos. Actually¸ she spent years diving into the dumpsters behind them. The kindest thing she could say about her parents was that they taught her to pick through the condoms and piss-covered bed sheets to find the tossed out filet mignons.

One week after graduating from Rancho High School, Abigail marched away from her shit-bag parents and found a job. Over the next few years, the gangly blue-eyed girl developed into a tall, slender, sun-kissed blonde. Some even considered her stunning. Most of those people were strip club owners and pimps.

She’d seen what selling pussy got since Abigail’s mother worked as a whore. Just because Nevada made prostitution legal, didn’t make it right. And her heroin-shooting father wasn’t even her biological dad. His limp dick would nod out while her mother rode the erect ones for cash. Abigail’s DNA belonged to some other John, not John Black.

Hard working and loyal, she’d established a solid reputation among her employers. Never failed a surprise drug test. Always returned cash if the customer miscalculated the totals. Soon, she was able to apply for an apartment with one month’s rent down as a deposit. But it wasn’t so much the deposit that prevented her from finding a place to crash, as it was the apartment managers who always wanted their sweat-soaked cocks sucked before considering letting a vacancy. She’d rather stay homeless.

Like anything good in a woman’s life, men fucked it up. And then along came Ricky Geneti. Straight from Brooklyn, he’d been stationed out of Nellis Air Force Base. Young, dumb, and full of big ideas to hit it big in the world, his passion energized Abigail. His dreams extended beyond the incorporated city limits of Las Vegas.

He’d travelled across the country after all. She still felt like the lanky teenager compared to his worldliness. Abigail loved that he didn’t make her feel stupid. He promised her the moon—and she already had stars in her sweet, wet baby blues.

Her apartment set atop a pawnshop and a liquor store. The rooms sucked, but it was clean—there’d be no garbage cans serving as her pantry. The place was safe because it was high off the filth-infested streets, and the owners of both stores carried weapons for their personal protection.

Ricky sneaked off the military base as often as possible. His older brother’s borrowed Z-28 Camaro made it from his base to her home in under thirty minutes. His enlistment would end soon, and their life—together forever—would begin.

Soon after Ricky was dishonorably discharged by the Air Force for being habitually AWOL, Abigail got knocked up. When she shared the wonderful news with her burgeoning entrepreneur, Ricky’s Z-28 Camaro somehow couldn’t seem to find the pawnshop apartment anymore.

Forced from the safety of her elevated abode, Abigail moved further outside of the incorporated city limits and into a minority housing area made up of mostly Hispanic families and migrant American Indian workers who shuffled on and off the Paiute Tribe’s reservation to live in the adobe-looking flats lining Highway 578.

Named after Abigail’s favorite actor, her son, Jack, had grown up in that housing area. Mother and son were befriended by many of the families; wives often babysat Jack so Abigail could continue working two of her remaining jobs. It wasn’t until his third birthday party that Ricky arrived in his brother’s borrowed Z-28 Camaro to play daddy.

Chapter 3