Jesus, she was fucking hot, and she had no clue at all. She was clearly used to being conservative and Little Miss FBI most of the time, but when she walked out of my bedroom wearing those tight leather pants and that backless shirt she’d tried on earlier, I wanted to bend her over my fake kitchen table. That short hair of hers meant I had a complete view of the porcelain skin of her back, all the way down to the string that held the shirt together at her waist. One little pull was all it would take to untie it. Fuck. We’re on a case, we’re on a case, we’re on a case, I repeated in my head over and over.

I seated myself right up against her in the back of the cab, where I could faintly smell her perfume. It reminded me of fresh cut grass in the spring, and felt a bit like home. The job had to be getting to me, I’d decided, because the thoughts I was having about her were way over the line of appropriate. For all I knew, she had a husband waiting for her at home. We never talked about our personal lives to that extent.

I tried to shake off my desire for her while getting myself into character. We’d come up with a vague cover story for her, as it was unlikely anyone would ask her too many questions; other than about me, if that. They weren’t exactly the deepest bunch, and once I’d established she was my territory, nobody would talk to her much anyway. My only hope was that she’d be able to observe and possibly overhear something I might have missed, but other than that, her role was strictly for show.

When we pulled up to Lucky’s, the band playing was just getting ready to take a break thankfully. The place was small and smoky - exactly what you’d expect for a dive bar - and when a band was onstage, it was almost deafening.

“It’s showtime,” I whispered in her ear, before taking her hand and pulling her behind me out of the cab. “You good?” I asked her one last time as we headed in.

“I’m good,” she said quietly, not letting go of my hand.

As we entered the bar, the stench of stale cigarettes hit, and it flipped the “get into character” switch. I dragged Portia behind me as I wove us through the crowd, heading to the back of the bar where the crew would surely already be saddled up. The first to spot me, of course, was Robbie.

“Bro! There you are! I was beginning to wonder if you were coming!” He hopped up, and a woman I’d never seen before jostled from his lap dramatically and without care. As I watched her stumble, I gripped Portia’s hand and gave the customary bro shake to Robbie.

“Wouldn’t miss it. Needed a night out anyway,” I replied.

“And I see you brought your lady friend?” He motioned to Portia, a gleam in his eye.

“Her name is Portia. And she’s off limits,” I growled at him.

“Ok, ok, bro.” Turning to Portia and putting his chubby hand out to her, he introduced himself. “We have not formally met. I’m Robbie.”

“Portia. Nice to meet you.” She took his hand briefly. I was already annoyed, and we’d only been there for five minutes. Maybe just explaining her away would have been a better idea, because watching these scumbags drool over her was giving me an angry pain in my chest that could only be satisfied by asserting my dominance violently, which I obviously couldn’t do.

Turning to Portia, I said, “Honey, why don’t you go get us a couple drinks while I talk to Robbie here for a minute?” I handed her a twenty-dollar bill from my pocket.

“Sure, no problem,” she smiled, taking the bill and letting go of my hand. “What would you like?”

“Vodka soda. You know what I like,” I said, hoping she would know that I wanted club soda that looked like a cocktail. I was never much of a drinker to begin with, and I definitely didn’t want to drink in these types of situations, where I needed my wits about me. We both watched her walk away, and when I caught Robbie staring at her ass, I smacked him right in the forehead to snap him out of it.

“Mine! I told you!” I hissed at him.

“Alright bro. I get it, sorry. You better tell that other guy who’s chatting her up at the bar.” He pointed behind me in her direction.

A dude I didn’t know had moved in on her as she leaned in to talk to the bartender. He wasn’t even part of the fucking crew of douchebags I was with; he was some other piece of shit. I should have left her at home. When I saw his hand raise to touch her back as she stood at the bar, my heart pounded against my chest, and I saw red. But before I reached her, she’d already put him in a wrist lock that made him yelp like a puppy.

As I reached her, I heard her say, “Now say it. We don’t touch things that don’t belong to us.”

“Fuck you!” he grunted, completely under her control.

She bent his wrist back further, and as he let out another squeal, he finally did as she said. “We don’t touch things that don’t belong to us! Ok? Ok!?”

As she released him, he righted himself, looking like he was going to confront her again and then thought better of it. “Fucking bitch,” he mumbled as he staggered away.

Completely in awe, and never turned on so much in my life, I stood before her with my jaw to the floor.

“Your drink?” She handed me a glass and flashed me a knowing grin.

“Uh, thank you. I see you’ve got everything under control over here?” I took a sip of the clear carbonated beverage, thankful she knew exactly what I wanted.

“Oh yes. He just needed a little lesson in what you’re allowed to touch, is all.” She continued to smile, taking a sip of her own beverage, identical to mine. Our eyes locked and we hadn’t stopped staring at each other. Suddenly, it was the two of us in the room. My look was one of awe and she was clearly pleased with herself, which was fucking adorable. “I guess we should get back, now that we’ve put on a show?” she suggested.

“I think you’re right,” I grinned. She was something else. Hot, cute, sexy, and could take care of herself, even if I was enjoying pretending it was my job, for some reason. She was an adventure, and I was loving it. Mostly, it was a nice reprieve from the mundane that had become my everyday.

Robbie waved me over; he’d moved to a small group of guys, most of which I’d met before. Originally, I was able to befriend him hanging out at that very bar, which was filled with criminals. Sometimes, you have to turn a blind eye to what’s in front of you for the bigger picture, and that was the case here. They were running a small poker game in the back room of the bar for a while, basically taking people’s money, cheating all along the way. Our intel had indicated that he specifically had a connection to Diego’s gang, and that was enough to send me under, to try to get in on what was happening.

Drink in one hand, Portia’s hand in the other, I made my way over to him. “What’s going on, man?”

“There’s been a change of plans,” he uttered quietly, then nodded in Portia’s direction, indicating he wanted to talk in private.

Picking up his queue, Portia said, “I’m gonna go to the ladies’ room. I’ll be back.” I pulled her in for a kiss, because our relationship was real, for all intents and purposes, and I was a possessive, jealous gang member, after all. Her soft lips left just a hint of strawberry behind on mine. I licked my lips as I watched her walk away, then turned my attention back to Robbie.

“So, what’s up?” I put my professional gang member face back on and crossed my arms over my chest.

“It’s going down tomorrow. There’s no meeting. Diego wants to move the shipment without any warning. He thinks the element of surprise will keep the feds off our back, and Carpio won’t know what happened because we’ll beat him at his own game.” He looked excited.

“Tomorrow?” I repeated.

“Yea. Tomorrow, bro. Finally. We’re gonna make so much money, bro.” His greed had him almost salivating.

Rubbing my chin thoughtfully to cover my concern for the lack of time I had to handle this change of plans, I glanced in the direction of the ladies’ room, looking for Portia. There was no way that I could get a team assembled with so little detail, to make something happen by the next day.

“So, what’s the plan?”

“Well, apparently Carpio is planning to send his shipment across the border into Texas over the weekend, so Diego wants to beat him to it, so he has nobody to sell to. Our job is to make sure that the packages get unloaded, and then deliver them to the next drop off.”

“So, where are the pick up and drop off locations?” I asked, afraid of the answer.

“We won’t know until tomorrow.” He shrugged his shoulders. That was the answer I feared most. I wasn’t going to have enough evidence to do a fucking thing, until it was too late. There was no way I’d be able to get a team of feds on this with no real intel.

“Tomorrow? So, how are we supposed to plan?” I asked, annoyed.

“We aren’t the planning guys, Dave. We’re the ‘get shit done’ guys. Who cares? We’ve been waiting forever for this, and once we drop off the packages, we get paid!” he practically squealed with delight. The payment for this service was ten thousand dollars. For the delivery of what I was pretty sure would amount to ten million in street value dope.

“Yeah, I get that. We’re the worker bees, man, but I’m not trying to get arrested or killed this week. So, when will we know the exact location?” I was getting angry, and could feel my jaw clenching tighter. While I didn’t want to blow my top, I also needed more.

“All I know is that the freight train stops every night for ten minutes, just shy of downtown, and the goods will be on board. Me and you are supposed to make sure our vehicle gets loaded up in those ten minutes, and we haul ass to the drop off in the desert. It should be smooth as fuck, dude. No mess.” He had a foolish air of confidence.

I needed to think, and I wanted to talk to Portia. I felt like she’d been gone forever and suddenly, I got nervous something happened to her. “Alright man, I’m gonna go find my girl. Where and when are we meeting up?”

“Eight PM sharp, tomorrow. I’ll come by your place.”

“Sure. Sounds like a plan.” I set my drink down on the high top table next to us. “I’ll be back.”

I went toward the restrooms to find Portia. I had a bad feeling I couldn’t shake, and my gut wasn’t usually wrong.