Presidential Deal Read Online Free Page B

in places where they could do some good should anything go wrong, then kill time all alone, out there on the edge of civilization, in the middle of tall pines and sawgrass a couple of miles from where the Everglades began for real, just chill out, watch the clouds scud by the moon, by the time whoever it was showed up, they’d find Ray Brisa all alone in the middle of nowhere, composed, in control, ready to do any kind of business at hand.
    Like right now, for instance. Ray lounging with his back against the warm grillwork of the Suburban, arms folded across his chest, watching some kind of owl whisk across the night sky like a big bat, light on a tree branch twenty yards away, take up his own post. Ray couldn’t see the creature’s eyes, of course, but he could feel them. The owl staring right down at him when it was supposed to be hunting the rats that favored the area. Ray cocked his head, staring back at the blunt-shouldered silhouette, and swore he saw the owl copy his motion. There was a soft coughing sound from somewhere, and Ray glanced off in the direction where Luis was supposed to be. He listened intently for a moment, but there was nothing else. When he turned back, the owl was gone.
    He heard the distant sound of an engine then, the sound rising and falling as the driver made his way through the twists and turns of the route that Ray had provided. It was another full minute at least before he saw headlights, saw the late-model sedan, an off-white top-end Chevy with smoked glass—except for the windows, the kind of car a cop with some suck might ride.
    The front doors opened then and two short guys got out on either side of the car, careful to keep what they could of steel and glass in front of them. After a moment, the guy who’d been driving turned and said something into the back. A rear door opened then and a taller guy in dark jeans and a turtleneck got out. The tall guy looked around, smiled, held his hands out from his body as if to show the owls and the looming trees that there was nothing to be afraid of.
    A couple more moments of silence, the guy reached into the car, came out with a briefcase, put it on top of the Chevy, opened it up. He turned back, making a slow semicircle before all the nothingness in front of him: a warren of U-Store-It warehouses connected by a maze of alleyways. He held the briefcase by the lid with one hand, shone a light down on the contents with the other.
    Ray could see the guy’s face in the reflection. Handsome guy himself, shiny scar up the side of his neck just like Ray had been told. Fine. Right guy, right time, the money looked right. All that remained was to live through the rest.
    Ray stepped out then, and one of the guys at the front of the Chevy whirled around, just about shit himself. The guy dropped onto a knee behind the hood of the Chevy, pistol out, all kinds of excited Spanish coming out of his mouth, most of it having to do with the fact that there was a cop coming out of the darkness toward them.
    “Shut up,” the tall guy said, and Ray felt an instant identification. The gunman’s excited rattle stopped.
    Ray came straight ahead, ignoring the two thugs, both of whom had drawn down on him now, edging in a jerky, sole-grinding way a safe distance alongside him, pistols raised in two-handed stances. Sawed-off, banty-rooster versions of something they’d seen on American TV, was what Ray thought.
    Ray stopped a couple of paces from the boss, jerked his head at the two thugs. “They still watching
Scarface
down where you come from?”
    The tall man glanced at the gunmen, turned back to Ray. “Policemen make them nervous,” he said.
    Ray nodded, took off the uniform cap, unpinned the badge, tossed it in the cap, handed both items to the tall man. He gave the two thugs a significant look, then moved his hands to his gun belt, undid the clasps, handed that to the tall man as well. The tall man checked the mobile phone resting in its pocket, beeped it on