CHAPTER FOURTEEN

ATLAS

Over the years, I'd grown accustomed to way of waking Jasiel. The best way to wake him was with breakfast, already made. It was easy to do, and I only had to deal with a little bit of his bratty behavior, but I didn't mind it because when he was locked away and I couldn't get to him, I'd told myself in little promises that I would do absolutely anything he wanted when we were reconnected. It was nice, having the two of us together again. I drank my black coffee, he ate his pancakes, and we stared into each other's eyes.

"Trojan has the layout for the house," I said.

Jasiel's pinched, sleepy face glared at me. "I know the house already."

"This one shows everything," I told him. "The water systems, electrical, the vents. It's like the central nervous system of the body. We know the rooms and the layout, but we also need to know their security cameras too."

He scoffed, cutting up his pancakes with the side of his spoon. "We know that."

"We knew that," I corrected him. A lot had changed, I was sure of that. Plus, while we worked for the family, they made it a habit of changing the security functions often, which meant increasing cameras and different alert systems.

"Where are they?" he asked, looking around.

"They're at the storage unit cataloging everything," I told him. "It's almost twelve." I could've woken him earlier, but in honesty, I didn't want to wake him. He was so peaceful when he was sleeping, and after everything we'd both been through, I knew how important sleep was to getting back to that place we were.

"They best not touch my explosives," he grumbled.

There wasn't any that could be done about that, we were both possessive, and we both liked control. No amount of sleep could solve that issue in either of us, ever.

Jasiel ate while I mentally planned everything out. The plan changed often, and each change was progress. We were making progress by going through the change, every time it crossed my mind, I'd add something new, or flesh something out a little better.

The first plan, which I enjoyed parts of included pouring a noxious sleeping gas into the vents, putting everyone into a deep sleep. I'd gather everyone up, and then one-by-one, while Benicio watched, I'd kill his children off. The idea of that still put a smile on my face, but that idea was something I'd do alone, and since this was a four-man operation, there was much more we could do.

Death was theatrical in my eyes. If I could stage a death to look beautiful, I absolutely would. It's part of why I could fake my death, the way I fell back into the muddy waters and allowed myself to contain the bleeding. It was a work of art. I was painting Goya's with bodies, while others painted amateur Jackson Pollock's.

Trojan and Midas came in, mid-argument.

Jasiel flicked through the TV channels as I was busy in my thoughts, fleshing out our plans.

"The news," Trojan said, nodding to Jasiel.

On the TV, the news channel spoke about the events of last night. Turf war, it was listed as, and how crime needed to be cleaned up from our streets. I had to agree with the female news presenter. We needed to clean these criminals up off the street, and there was only one way of doing that, putting them to death. The prison system could only do so much when they were the ones who owned it. If you had something they wanted, and wouldn't give it to them, you were imprisoned, and if you had something they could take, you were killed. It was some fucked up type of ecosystem I'd allowed myself to be bought for. Of all the places I could've been, I ended up here.

Midas laid out the blueprints of the large Coronado family home on the table. "We know they're hiring from Vincenzo's Catering," he said. "So, we have our in. Trojan has us both down on their system as employees."

I nodded at him. This was the current working plan. "Good," I said. "What did you find out about the bullets?" I asked. "And anything on the C4?" Jasiel's sharp gaze locked onto me as I mentioned his precious explosives.

"You were right," Trojan said. "It's foreign military. It's high grade. Armor piercing stuff."

"I doubt we'll need it," I said. "So best save it, who knows what job you'll have after this?"

Midas let out a deep cackle from the back of his throat. "After this, we're taking a long break, maybe find an island."

"No," Jasiel snipped. "That's our plan." He held him his hand with the engagement ring on. "See. We're engaged. We're leaving this entire life behind us."

"There's enough beaches out there for everyone," Midas said.

Jasiel glared at me, pouting.

"Don't copy us," I said, although I knew they weren't.

Jasiel tucked his hand into mine and sighed. "I knew they were." He continued to pout. "So, you three all know what you're doing, but what about me?"

"You know what you're doing," I told him. "You're charging the explosives and you get to level the house like you wanted." But I knew he wanted more than that. "And you get to kill Jesus too." He continued to nod, requesting more from me. "And—"

Midas and Trojan stared, wondering what I had in mind for Jasiel. I'd just assumed he would've been with me; I didn't want him leaving my side where the potential for him getting hurt was high.

"Well, I have the best aim out of everyone here," Jasiel scoffed.

I squeezed his hand, tight. "Not everyone."

"I once killed a man wearing full body armor, and he had the teeny, tiniest space on his face, and I threw the blade. It spun around and landed right in his eye. It went all the way down into his brain and killed him," he said. "It took me forever to get that blade back. So much blood, brain, and eye goo everywhere."

It was futile, trying to argue with Jasiel, and sometimes I enjoyed doing it because of how it wound him up. I gave him a small applause of claps. "We can't all be as talented as you, baby."

"I think I'll sharpen my knives," he said, slipping his hand away from mine. "Considering I can't set any fires until everyone is dead anyway."

The risk of people surviving was too high if we were to just set fire to the place. He knew that already, so I wasn't going to argue with him. We would have to stick to the old methods of murder, through blade or bullet, or brute force with hands at a neck.

I continued to tell them a variation of the plan. We all knew about our attempt to safeguard the innocent people. This wasn't a paid hit, this was personal, and I wasn't going to have the blood of innocent workers on my hands, at least not this time.

"So," I began. "I think it's important not to stray from the plan."

Midas nodded. "I have a contact who can get me some pills to put in their drinks," he said.

"And I can make sure that those drinks aren't taken by anyone else," Trojan added.

"Now I'm thirsty." Jasiel stuck his tongue out. "Like, I'm really thirsty now because you're all talking about drinks." He sighed. "And I don't have a slushie."

Jasiel only drank slushies and anything he could get full of sugar and fizz. His insides were probably allergic to water which I found sweet. "I'll take you to a 7-Eleven once we're done," I told him. "Let's finish up these plans first. We have just over a week before we'll be there, and we need to know every single minute of the plan."

I knew plans weren't Jasiel's favorite part of anything. He was a wild card, a loose cannon, and he added a variable to everything we did together, and ninety-nine per cent of the time, that worked out in our favor. I didn't want to take the chance to think that the one per cent of the time when it didn't work, would be when it mattered the most.

"I have the C4, I plan the C4 around the building, hitting all the major spots, and then viola, I detonate," he said, listing out the plan on a hand. "Simple."

"No. What else do you need to do?"

"Ok, fine," he grumbled. "I also need to wait until everyone has done their part. The blowing things up doesn't happen until right at the end."

"That's right, baby," I said, holding his hand tight. Jasiel wasn't trained like Midas and Trojan, and not like I was. Jasiel was trained by carnies, and their lessons included some of the wildest and messiest murders I'd ever seen. A whole host of animals, mauling enemies to death, chopped bodies, a putrid stink of plastic and body parts in the humidity. It wasn't pleasant. I liked my method to be bleached clean with precision at every angle.

"I'll help you rig the C4 up to a timer, or a trigger," Trojan said. "I—I've done them before, if you need help."

Jasiel looked at me, almost for gauging my expression on what I thought about the offer. Jasiel didn't like accepting help, ever. "I think you said you wanted to learn more about that," I said. "I think the two of you working together on the explosives would be good."

"Ok," he said, standing and pulling his hand out of mine. "But I'm still in charge, obviously."

We all looked around at each other, then up at Jasiel, nodding and smiling. "Obviously," I said.