Hitman vs Hitman - L.A. Witt Page 0,65

lowered his voice. “I’ve got a burner phone for you. There’s just one number in it. That’s the one you’ll want to use,” he added helpfully, pushing the phone across the table.

Silva looked a little like he wanted to drown August in the glass of water in front of him. August grinned.

“Thanks,” Silva said after a moment, taking the phone and putting it in his pocket. “I think that’s everything, don’t you?” He pushed back his chair.

“Wait.” August held up a hand. “How do I know you’re going to give me a quality connection? I’m not in this to hire any old jackass with a gun. If the guy who screwed over my life is a pro like you said, then I need to know the person you put me in touch with is legit.”

“Oh, he’s legit,” Silva said with a half-smile. “You can verify that on Rate Your Hit dot-com.”

August’s heart beat a little faster. Holy shit, this was really going to work. “That cannot be a real website,” he said incredulously. “You’re fucking with me.”

“I swear to the Madonna I’m not. But even if I was…” His smile spread. “What could you do about it, Mr. Mason? You’re struggling to stay afloat right now, and I’m giving you this information out of the goodness of my heart. But.” He leaned back in and rested his hands on the table, broad palms flat. “It would be a real shame if you took advantage of my kindness and talked to the wrong people about our little conversation. You got me? This is between us, and only us.”

The air of menace was so thick it was almost choking. August swallowed back a laugh, hoping that the action made him look nervous instead. “Got it,” he said quietly.

“Good. Have a nice rest of your day, Mr. Mason.” Silva walked off, and August made a show of pulling himself together before he followed suit.

“Aww, there she is, lovely as ever! Thanks, Donnie,” he said cheekily to the scowling doorman before sliding back into the borrowed Lamborghini. He pulled out into the street, and once he was sure he wasn’t being followed, he headed back to the dealership to drop off the car before making his way back to Ricardo.

Chapter 15

Ricardo didn’t like waiting. He didn’t like waiting for anything. If there was a hell, he was probably going to it, and he had a strong suspicion he’d wind up in a version that was an airport terminal where he spent eternity waiting for a perpetually delayed flight. Just thinking about that was almost enough to persuade him to put his life back on the straight and narrow and get back in his mother’s good graces by returning to church. Almost.

Right now, he was waiting for August, and he was miserable.

The asshole was still out there, and Ricardo had no way of knowing how things had gone with Silva. It had been too risky to use even a burner phone to make contact afterward because if the Cavalcantes (or the ever-present FBI busybodies perpetually surveilling the Cavalcantes) caught the signal, they could trace Ricardo and August back to the lair.

In the name of not giving off a digital smoke signal to someone who’d prefer them dead, they had to do this the old-fashioned way—wait for August to get back and tell him how things had gone down.

August hadn’t seemed nervous about that, which told Ricardo he was nervous as hell about it. The asshole was good at hiding any fear he had beneath a layer of smarmy dismissiveness and dramatic snark.

“I’ll be back as soon as I can, darling,” he’d said as he’d headed for the door. “If I don’t return within four hours, then I’m probably dead.” With that, he’d whipped around, expression as overly serious as his voice. “Move on without me. Find love again. Don’t—”

“If you don’t leave in the next thirty seconds, you won’t be ‘probably’ dead,” Ricardo had grumbled.

That had naturally prompted a cheeky grin from the little shit. “You’ll miss me. I know you will.”

“My aim is better than that.”

The grin turned into a satisfying pout. “Ugh. You’re no fun.” Then he’d stalked out of the lair, slamming the door behind him.

Then and only then, Ricardo had let himself chuckle. August’s theatrics were seriously annoying sometimes, but when Ricardo was alone and absolutely out of anyone’s earshot (especially August’s), he could admit that they were sort of entertaining.

And the kind of annoying, kind of entertaining fucker been gone