The Joy of Revenge

CHAPTER 33 What if? Sebastian During our first few months in New Salem, it was hard to move around. The weather was bad and the Sheriff was always doing his rounds around town at night. When we were at the pub, Jack would always be there with his friends.

One night, Xavier and | decided to go to the diner for sgreasy cheeseburgers, but the Sheriff was at the entrance, blocking us from entering. He told us to go on hbecause there was ssort of meeting going on. We tried to peek inside, but the curtains were down, blocking our view.

Xavier installed a CCTV camera in front of the diner, but nothing out of the ordinary popped up. We did notice certain folks would cin at the stduring a particular part of the day and they all had a black sling bag with them. I tried peaking into a bag of one of those people who happened to enter my shop, but there wasn't anything out of the ordinary. Xavier did the same, but he didn’t find anything to go with.

Since we couldn't use our cars or motorcycles to do surveillance at night, we would go on foot, dressed in white to blend with the snow if we needed to hide. This is the reason why we’ decided we would stay in our offices once Joy moved in. It was an eight minute jog to get to her house.

Xavier and | arrived at his secret office at the warehouse section of his grocery store from the pub. Since Joy was already in town, we were going to start spending the night in our respective offices.

| sat down on Xavier's leather couch, deep in thought. After Xavier and | arrived in New Salem, Cristos called after two weeks informing us someone had asked about us. For Joy, it was a matter of hours.

“Sebastian, someone called asking about Virtue, Cristos said while we were in his office earlier this evening. “My team intercepted and answered all the questions that a certain Tom Smith asked.” “The people who run this town don’t like to be caught off-guard especially by someone young,” | said. “For the past six months, I've noticed that the people who've been moving. into this town are either middle-aged or older, people who like to stay at hor won't put up a fight. Before they even move into their respective homes, the whole town knows them by their names.” Hl x was a section of New Salem that was now a sprawling residential area 1/4 13:32 Mon, Mar 25 M du CHAPTER 33 What If? with its own clubhouse and church.

“Cristos, how are Benny and Leo doing at the Cohen Mansion?” Xavier asked, hoping they had found sadditional information that we could use.

Bernard and Leonard Primo were two of Cristos closest cousins and have been working as guards for the past three months at the Cohen Mansion on Prairie’s Peak. We heard through De Luca’s contacts that the Cohens were hiring new guards and asked them to go undercover. They were younger than us, muscular, tall, and didn’t resemble Cristos in any way. Bernard was a blonde while Leonard was a redhead.

“They're on compound duty most of the time, but cargo comes in every two weeks as usual. They don’t know what's in the crates although the other guards say the crates are filled with bottles of wine. They overheard Liam saying they will be moving the cargo celection,” Cristos said. “I told them if they need to kill someone to get into Liam’s good graces, then do ie.” “Who among the people on our watch has gone to the mansion?” | asked.

“Nicole, Cris, Jack, Dan and Noah,” Cristos enumerated. “The usual.” There was something | noticed a while ago at Liam's office. Nicole's palms becsweaty ter she and Noah made eye contact. It's my first tto ever see Nicole react that way to Noah,” | told them. “I know Noah is one of the handful of people who has the privilege of entering the Cohen Mansion. I've always suspected he was on Liam’s payroll, but | assumed for odd jobs. What if Noah is a hitman?” Xavier began to laugh hysterically. It did seem a bit farfetched. Noah obviously didn’t fit the profile. But then again, I've seen Xavier go out of his way to pretend he was a homeless man just to get close to his mark.

What if? “And what makes you think that?” Xavier asked after he stopped laughing. “He doesn’t have the balls to kill someone, Sebastian. You know what | think? Noah's a snitch. He keeps an eye on people and if they as much as think of betraying Liam, all Liam has to do is make life unpleasant for them.” “But what do these people do for Liam exactly? Cargo comes in at the Cohen Mansion looking like crates filled with wine bottles. People going to the diner with black sling bags. This is a well-planned schthey have going on,” | said, frustrated. “The only crimes that have happened in this town, that we actually know of, is the one involving Joy, which | may 2/4 13:32 Mon, Mar 25 Ju CHAPTER 33 What if? 82% add is practically non-existent, and the death of Joan. Other than that, this town is squeaky clean.” “I told you we should put a bug in the diner,” Xavier said, annoyed. “Wait, Virtue said she’s planning to have a housewarming party. Why don’t we ask her to go to the diner and order. food for her party? Cristos, you go with her and plant a bug.” “Alright. | know the perfect spot. If we're able to enter the office of the diner, I'll get one in there too,” Cristos said. “By the way, my team found a document from all the files | sent them from this office. It's a blueprint of the Cohen Mansion.” He clicked on his laptop and showed us a photo of the blueprint which was hard to read. | zoomed in on a portion and pointed at it.

“There seems to be a tunnel leading towards town hall. Can you see it, Xavier?” | asked him. He inched his face closer to the screen for a better look.

e crates “It seems to lead to the basement of town hall,” Xavier answered. “It's possible those will be moved there. But the question remains, what is in those crates? Firearms perhaps?” *Firearms being shipped here every two weeks? For what? To go deer hunting? No, it has to be something else,” | said.

“Well, Theodore Cohen will be leaving this weekend according to Leo. He'll be going to the Cohen cabin in the woods near the lake,” Cristos informed us.

“Have Leo place a tracker on his car. After you've pinged on his location, try and get satellite images. This is actually one of those rare times Theodore Cohen will be out on his own. If he’s still running the show, he’ll probably meet with someone...hopefully someone who can give us answers.” The sound of Xavier's phone ringing interrupted my thoughts, bringingback to the present.

“He’s here with me. We'll be there in ten minutes, Xavier said before hanging up. “Get dressed. Liam's car is parked in front of Joy's house. They need back up.” “We'll take my car,” | said without thinking. | quickly stood up from Xavier's couch, banging my knee against the small coffee table.

The pain from hitting the edge of the table didn’t register. Instead, my pulse was beating so fast against my chest while my body had beccold and clammy. For the first tin my life, | was afraid.

3/4 13:32 Mon, Mar 25 dC CHAPTER 33 What if? | knew | wouldn't be able to live with myself if something happened to Joy.

If | was panicking, Xavier was all business. He had already taken off his jeans and was putting on a pair of black pants while | just stood there. After zipping up his pants, he threw. a black long sleeved shirt with a pair of matching pants at me.

“Sebastian, we go on foot. This might be a test. If they see us coming to her aid, they'll know something's up,” Xavier said matter-of factly while putting on a black long sleeved shirt. “Get dressed and take whatever weapon you want.” He nudged his head towards his weapons cache while putting on a pair of boots.

We quietly exited his grocery store dressed head to foot in black. Xavier was carrying his s niper rifle in a black bag slung over his back while | had a Nighthawk Custom GRP with a suppressor. We ran towards the old Taylor house as fast as we could.

We were already in position, hiding in the woods, when a dark gray RAM truck parked behind Liam's black BMW.

Crouching down, | slowly crept my way towards the two vehicles, hoping to eavesdrop on Liam and the Undersheriff. | needed to know....

“What was Liam doing here? Chapter Comments Luna-Mom Another great chapter Morgan | can’t believe | actually feel bad for her....

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