Page 24 of Great White
“That’s too bad,Tiburona. I think we can create some beautiful chaos together.”
5
Tate
I’ve been promotedfrom ice bitch to bar bitch. Which isn’t saying much, 'cause now along with filling ice bins, I stock beer, liquor, cups, straws, and whatever else the bartenders demand of me at any given moment. I’m earning my spot — that’s the bottom line. I’m being watched. Being evaluated and judged whether I’m deemed worthy. My little drug run with Dove was a test, and I passed. Barely, according to her. But I think Stefania holds a higher opinion of me than Dove does.
I’ve done odds-and-ends jobs for the cartel the last few weeks, but nothing major. I haven’t seen any operations or met any major players, but Stefania keeps encouraging me that my time will come. If I had to guess, Dove is cock-blocking my climb up the ladder. I may have come on a little too strong. But damn, I don’t know what it is about her. She makes me lose all rhyme and reason. A woman has never enamored me the way she does. Never given me such a run for my money either. She definitely lives up to her name. Not Dove, no, that is sweet and feminine and pure.La Tiburona. That is solitary, calculating, and deadly. Just like her. She never seems to sleep, or stop moving, for that matter. She prowls the club floor all night every night, hardly interacting, but always observing from the shadows.
Just like she’s doing now. I spy as she creeps along the perimeter of the dance floor, her attention trained on someone. I follow her gaze as I pull plastic cups out of their sleeves and stack them for Tweety, the bartender. He’s kind of a dick, between me and you. He knows I am the low man on the totem pole and likes to treat me as such. I also think he has a thing for Dove, but like with me, she doesn't give him the time of day. Somehow the path of our eyes meet across the room. I don’t look away and neither does she. My heart does this stupid little skip-beat. But I can’t ignore it. My attraction is just too strong. It’s like it has a life of its own, to which I have no say. She nods her head to the left, signaling me to follow. I hand Tweety his own damn cups without a word. He curses at me in Spanish. I thoroughly ignore him, only concerned with Dove and what she needs. She waits just like a predator under the lights. The strobes highlighting her face with red, then silver. One moment a demon, the next an angel. An enigma of a woman. A puzzle I am determined to solve.
“See that man,” she asks when I sidle up to her.
“The one in the white shirt hitting on the woman way out of his league?”
“That’d be the one. He’s not supposed to be here. He’s one of Raffi Rayas’s foot soldiers.”
“You think he’s here to cause trouble?”
“I know it. The Rayas cartel is supposed to steer clear of anyone and anything Deltoro.”
“What do you think he wants?”
“I don’t know, but I’m going to find out.”
“How are you going to do that?”
“Watch.” She snaps, catching the attention of two very large, rippled bouncers. She points to the man and does this gesture over her head with her thumb. They move immediately. “Let’s go,Guapo.” Dove begins to push me backward. We disappear into an alcove of the club and through a hidden door. Moments later, the two bouncers and the man burst into the room from an adjoining door. This place has all kinds of secret ins and outs.
They throw the Rayas foot soldier on the floor at Dove’s feet.
“What are you doing here, Santo?” She steps on his chest with her chunky combat boot. Her wardrobe is a far cry from what it was on our run to Oklahoma.Dark versus light.
“Just here having a little fun.”
“Fun? You can have fun in any one of Raffi’s bars and clubs. You don’t need to come here.”
“I didn’t think there would be a problem, given Marco and Stefania’sfriendliness.”
“Friendliness?” Dove slides her foot up and rests it on Santo’s throat. “What friendliness?”
Santo garbles as he tries to speak, the air thin in his windpipe. “The little love affair they think no one knows about.”
“And just how many people know?” Dove interrogates him.
“No one. Just me. I saw them.”
“So you thought it would be a good idea to what? Come here and blackmail her?”
“I was just looking for a good time.”
Not one person in the room believes him.
“Who else knows?” Dove presses harder on his jugular, and he begins to turn blue.
“No . . . one,” he strains.
She holds him there for too many long seconds, the tension flooding like water in the tiny space.
