Dave awaited orders from me. He wasn’t one to formulate opinions. He pointed and I said shoot was his job title. Reaper knew more because he’d been with us a long time—I heard he was freshly out of the military not long before we took him into our company. I was young.

Reaper was the one to respond. “Mr. Vaughn authorized whatever means necessary to do what we need to do. He has a lot of interest in preserving the Montgomery Group. Chamberlain Industries depends on it.”

“So, we just grab this guy and terrorize him with no way to know anything?”

“You can use me,” Fallon piped in.

“Fallon, you are out of the question. You’re here by the grace of God right now.”

She picked up the file from the table and flipped through it. “There’s no notes. Just his picture and what he does at my company.”

“Standard practice. We ask no questions and bring knives.” Reaper brandished his ka-bar from his vest and picked his nails with the tip.

Gawking at him, she turned back to me. “Then how do we broach this without alarming those who might be watching? Jason told me he has been surveilling me for years. Who knows who may be watching me now?”

“Since you’re so smart,” Dave cut in, “what do you suppose we do now?”

She rubbed her face, clearly torn. Years in this world, I was numb to what she was dealing with. I was trigger happy myself.

“I don’t know. I just have a feeling we shouldn’t be going in with so little information.”

“Boss, we have to make a move—quickly.”

“Look, Blondie. We have to make our moves. There’s no time for a jury deliberation here.”

“Time’s up. Let’s move.”

We rolled into Allen’s late night working evening at a Montgomery Group field office. I could smell the anxiety coming from my Blondie.

A big, bald fucking slob sat there while some poor woman was sucking him off. Yeah, I would kill him just for putting that woman through that. Reaper burst through the door.

“Allen? Is that you? Are you cheating on me?”

Jesus Christ, Reaper.

Allen shoved the girl off of him and stood up with his hands up, dick still out. The sight of a fat man, sweaty with his dick hanging out like that was enough to give me nightmares for the rest of my life.

The girl scrambled out, holding her dress up to her body.

“Get out of here, girl. This is my man,” he mocked.

“Wh—what do you want? I’ll give you anything you want. My wallet is in my briefcase.”

“Your boss has some questions about this. It’s an HR nightmare in here,” I called out. I nodded to Dave who stomped over and set Allen down in his chair, covering up the unsightly scene we walked into.