“I can do that,” I say.
“I want to start soon. I’m tired, Peter. Really fucking tired.”
“Come out of the shower and go to bed. You’ll feel better in the morning.”
“I’m not sure I will.”
I want to tell her everything will be okay, but why lie to her? We’re trying to set up a heroin smuggling connection between Greece and France. It’s extremely possible we’re going to end up dead in the street or thrown into prison to rot for the rest of our lives.
“We’re meeting with Reina tomorrow. Make sure you get some sleep.” I step back, close the door and linger for a moment, listening.
After a second, the water stops running.
I smile to myself.
She wants to learn how to fight. She’s tired of being a victim.
I can do that for her, but I’m not sure she understands what it means to fight and what you lose when you win.
Chapter8
Adrienne
Reina takes a long drag on her cigarette and points at me. “This is bullshit. C’est des foutaises. I never agreed to working with her.”
“You don’t have any other choice,” Peter says, leaning forward to cut me off before I can bite off all the nasty insults I have rattling around in my head.
Reina looks tired. Thick black bags hang under her eyes. She’s thin, athletic, normally pretty, but her hair is messy and her clothes look slept-in, like she’s perpetually on the run and hungover.
“Even if you get me on board, my bosses in Le Milieu might not be okay with sharing their plans and secrets with this—” She waves her hand at me and takes another drag. “You know what you are asking then, yes? You want to risk the whole job for her?”
“Adrienne is my employee now,” Peter says calmly. “I suggest you put aside your personal feelings and deal with it.”
I smile at her sweetly. “It’ll be so nice to work with you, sister.”
Reina rolls her eyes.
“D’accord,” she says and slumps back. “Fine. You win. The girl stays. Can we get down to business then, s’il vous plait?”
“By all means,” Peter says, giving her a smug smirk that quickly fades. “We need to talk about what happened last night.”
“What, did you and my sister finally make love?” Her eyebrows quirk.
I feel myself blush. “No,” I say quickly, and the look she levels at me makes my jaw snap shut, like I’m some foolish prude that can’t take a joke.
“We were jumped leaving Balaska’s club,” Peter says, ignoring her comment. “Two guys. Local Greeks. Balaska says he doesn’t know who they are.”
“Tried to kill you?”
“More or less. I shot one and he bled out. Balaska says he caught the other.”
“Bon, that’s good. He’ll make him talk.” Reina scowls at the table. “I’ve been getting harassed ever since I came to this damn country. The cops mostly. Following me everywhere, haunting me like fucking ghosts.”
“I can talk to Balaska about it.”
“Fine, do what you need to do, but I can take care of myself.” She shoots him a poisonous look. “Only saying, you’re right that someone has it out for us. Someone in Greece doesn’t want us to become friends.”
“We’ll figure out who and make sure we stop them.”