Lego castle.
Brannigan leaned in and asked in a low tone, “Is this typical?”
“Pretty par for the course,” Aiden confirmed cheerfully, the smile lighting up his face and turning his clean-cut appearance into something that hinted at impish amusement. “Sometimes they do this just for the fun of it. Pick out some insane target and theoretically plan how they’d take it on. Right now they’re serious, though. Ivan’s just enjoying it.”
He probably should have left it there, but Brannigan was far too curious. “You said a little about how you and Ivan met?”
“Ah, yes. That’s a story in and of itself. The short version is, he can be utterly charming when he puts his mind to it. I didn’t stand much of a chance.” Aiden laughed saying this, hazel eyes sparkling. “He moved to protect me very quickly, and I ended up spending a lot of time with him and the others. I liked them. Ivan unapologetically seduced me, which I happily went along with, but it was the package as a whole that did me in. Having him, and Remi, and amazing friends who automatically have my back. I’d never had that before. I fell in love so fast I’m still a little dizzy with it.”
“And it never bothered you once that you’d fallen for a thief?”
“No. Because, you see, my family stole everything from me. They did it through bribing judges and lawyers, so it was completely unfair, but they got away with it. They were worse thieves. At least with Ivan, he was stealing for me. He never steals from someone who can’t afford the loss. It’s a moral grey area, but I’m pretty comfortable with it.”
He had to be, if he was married to Ivan.
Aiden’s eyes sharpened, studying Brannigan with unapologetic frankness. “Does it bother you? What Kyou does.”
“Hell no. I’m from criminal roots myself, although we’re legit now. Kyou’s saved my hide far too many times for it to bother me. I’m not sure if Kyou’s convinced of that, though.”
That satisfied Aiden, and he went back to being the genial, smiling doctor again. “I’m glad. Kyou’s not good at peopling. Just be persistent, that’s my advice.”
“I’ll take it.”
Aiden cocked his head at him in question. “I’d half-expected a business man like you to be in the thick of the planning.”
“I know absolutely nothing about staging a full-scale attack on a Mob family. Part of being a businessman is knowing how to call in experts and letting them do their jobs.”
With a nod, Aiden agreed, “That’s sensible.”
From the head of the table, Kyou called, “Bran. I think we’ve got a plan.”
Brannigan dried his hands off quickly and joined them. “I’m all ears.”
“Three stage attack.” Carter tapped a finger to the paper filled with scribbles and messy handwriting on the table. “First, Kyou hacks their banks and phones. We start tracing everything they’re doing and where everyone is. We do this for two days until we find the time when the most people are at HQ. Probably sometime in the wee hours of the morning. Even hardened criminals tend to sleep by then. While Kyou’s working his magic, Ivan and Ari will do theirs. They’ll sneak into HQ and start planting bombs, something with a trigger remote. We’ll be careful to keep this just powerful enough to limit damage to the surrounding area. Third stage is cleanup. We’ll take anyone on that isn’t in the building at the time of the explosion. I expect this to take about four days. How does that sound to you?”
Ruthless. That’s what it sounded like. Brannigan felt only vaguely uneasy about the idea of massacring an entire family. In truth, they were very bad people, so it was hard to dredge up true sympathy. He had only one real concern. Two, really. “Do we know if there are any innocents in the line of fire?”
“Njet,” Ivan answered readily.
“By that he means, yes we do know,” Carter clarified. “And no, there aren’t. No kids, at least. These are all adults.”
Okay, that was a relief. “Second question, doing it this quickly isn’t going to put any of you in danger, is it?”
For some reason, everyone smiled at him as if he’d just said something sweet.
“No,” Kyou assured him dryly. “It wouldn’t even take four days if we had explosives on hand. That’s what’s adding a day on to this.”
That gave him some relief. “Good. Uhh…not sure how to bring this up, but I feel that I should be paying for some of this? As