Writing projects
I finished my edits on Tapdancing the Minefields. I really love that one. It's coming along to be one of my favorites. I did a little work on Dry my Dreaming (my NCIS/Aberrant Magic crossover) and then tried to settle into a new profic story. I just couldn't write.
I tried to go back to Texas Magic, but I think I need to back up on that one. I like the characters, but there's no character arc that fits. I think I need to go back and put a few more cracks in their relationship so I have somewhere to go relationship-wise with that couple.
So I stared at the file and then said screw it and started a new idea. It's still in that magic universe, but this is rougher, cruder, and I have a lot more room to try and redeem my bad boy main character. As always, feedback is welcome.
Mafia and Magics
Angel Zamora has always looked out for numero uno, even after getting sent to prison for robbing a convenience store at knife point. But now two crazy feds show up to tell him he has undeveloped magic. And they want him to inform on a group that has been recruiting and disposing of magic users. When Angel agrees, he expects to play the feds until he can make his own escape plans.
However, once he's inside the mafia and developing his Talent, he starts to realize that he's not as concerned about his own skin as he is young Matteo Burke. Matt is the cousin or nephew of one of the bosses--Angel has no idea. However, the hot temper, disdain for authority, and deeply in the closet attitudes are all so familiar that Angel aches for the young man. A relationship that starts with Angel seeking one more potential advantage quickly turns into Angel's worst nightmare--a deep sense of commitment to another human being. Escape routes are closing, and Angel fears he is going to end up one more body dumped in the river, and if Angel plays this wrong, Matt could follow.
Angel grimaced when one of the guards mangled his name. He didn't hang out with God and fight demons, so he sure as hell wasn't no angel. Ahn-hell. It was pronounced Ahn-hell. However, arguing with the guards was a fool's game, and Angel hoped he'd grown out of being a fool. So he dropped his cards on the table and headed for the guard gate. Damn. He’d had a good hand too.
"Angel Zamora?" the guard asked without looking up from his computer. Angel hated that the guards couldn’t even give him the respect to look him in the eye.
"Yeah, that's me." Angel waited as the guard typed. The asshole made Angel stand and wait, even though he could have just waited until he was ready to call Angel up.
Finally the guard looked up. "Red line, interview room fourteen." He hit his button and the heavy white gate clicked open as an alarm rang. Angel pushed it open and followed the red line. Behind him, another guard followed. Angel's life was all about routine, so all this change made the hair on the back of his arms stand up. He hadn't been to the interview rooms since he'd been convicted. Oh, his lawyer had visited once to tell him his appeal had been denied, but these rooms were for the guys who had an actual shot at a new trial. Angel had given up on that.
He stopped at room fourteen and glanced over at the guard, unsure about whether he should go in. The guard looked uninterested in the whole matter, so Jesus opened the door and hoped he didn't get slapped with a write up for failing to read some guard's mind. Inside, a man and woman waited, papers spread out in front of them and a laptop running. They looked like lawyers--all suits and shit. At least the man did. The lady lawyers Angel had seen in the courtrooms were all buttoned up in tailored suits, and this one looked a little on the sloppy side. Maybe she was the paralegal.
He didn’t know these two. "I think you got the wrong guy," he said.
"Close the door," the man said. Angel had been in jail for sixteen months, long enough to know to shut up and follow orders. He closed the door.
"Please, Mr. Zamora, have a seat," the woman suggested. She was a looker, but Angel had always leaned more toward the men. The lawyer had a nice body, even if he looked like he was too high maintenance for Angel's taste. His suit was definitely tailored for him, and he was trimmed and groomed within an inch of his life. He was the prettiest damn thing Angel had seen for a long time.
Angel took the seat opposite the pair.
"I'm Agent Darren Oberton of the FBI. I'll be conducting an interview on your arrest process. You were caught after robbing a convenience store on Stiles and High Street?"
A fed. Angel lost all interest in pretty boy. "I don't see my lawyer here, so I ain't talking."
"You are not under investigation," Oberton said. The woman put her hand on Oberton's arm, and he glanced over. They shared a quick look, but Angel could tell they'd reached some decision in that moment. These two had worked together a while, so that meant she was a fed too.
"Mr. Zamora," the woman said, "are you aware that you have an affinity for magic?"
"What? Don't pull no bullshit with me," Angel snapped. He hated feds and the fucking games.
The woman pulled a glowing crystal out of her lap and set it on the table. "Go on, touch it."
"No fucking way," Angel said. He stood.
"If you call for the guard, you'll be dead within six months," Oberton said loudly. Angel froze. The damn fed believed that. Angel could hear that in the tone.
He slowly turned around. "Are you threatening me?" The guards would never back him up, and the damn surveillance camera light was dark, so a fed just might have the balls to do that. It wasn’t like Angel could make a complaint and have anyone believe him.
The fed stood. "No, no I'm not. I'm here to try to keep you alive."
Angel snorted. The day a cop cared about him was the day Angel ate his shoes.
"You have untrained Talent," Oberton continued, "and we have reason to believe that when you're released in two months, you'll be put into a difficult position, and sometime after that, you will become victim number four in our latest case." Oberton opened one of the files and spread out pictures. Three men--all bloodied and faceless. Someone had shot them in the back of the head.
"Darren, you've been hanging out with Boucher too long," the woman said. She picked up her crystal and moved closer to Angel. He stood motionless, not sure how to react to crazy ass Feds with murder on their minds. She held the crystal close to his chest and the pink glow intensified, and thin threads reached out for Angel's bare arms. "This is a spell. It reveals the presence of Talent, and since the prison system has no record of you being a magic user, I assume you're untrained. If you've simply hidden your Talent, we don't care. We do care that your magic has just put you in the crosshairs of our case."
"Please," Oberton said, "sit and we will explain this.”
Angel looked from one to the other. “I don't have any talent. I'm not one of those crazy shaman people.” Angel didn’t know much about shamans, but he knew you didn’t fuck with them. They talked to invisible animals and dead people and shit like that, and they had powers. Some couldn’t do much more than cheat at cards, but others had scary-ass demonic powers.
“No, you aren't. I am one of those crazy shaman people,” Oberton said with a touch of humor. Angel immediately regretted his words and felt even more uncomfortable being trapped in a small room with these two. “If you had shamanic skill, I would've known immediately. But you do have Talent, and unfortunately, that's about to make you very interesting to the wrong people.”
“Like who?” Angel asked. He didn’t want to believe them, but his gut was screaming at him that this guy was a straight shooter.
“Let's start from the beginning,” Overton said. He took his seat again, and the pretty fed sat next to him. They both watched him.
If they had ordered him to listen, Angel would have told them to fuck themselves, but they waited in silence. Curiosity won, and Angel sat.
The woman spoke. “I’m Agent Rima Dolen from the FBI’s Talent team. I’m an incantation user, which means I use language and magical artifacts to create spells. Several months ago we were brought in to investigate a murder. The officer at the scene recognized that there was a magical signature on the body.” She looked over to the man.
Oberton pulled out one of the pictures and pushed it closer to Angel’s side of the table. “We investigated and found that our victim had been recently paroled. He had no history as a magic user, and yet we found several people who, in the months leading up to his death, had witnessed him performing magic. In the course of our investigation, we found that there had been an earlier murder follow the same pattern. A man with no history of talent was released from prison, he began showing signs of using magic, and he was then shot in the back of the head.” Oberton pushed the other two pictures closer to Angel.
The last thing Angel needed was to look at that shit. He was a bad man; he’d never lied to himself about that. But he had always avoid violence. “And you think I'm on some hit list? Do you think somebody is going to assume I have talent and put a bullet in the back of my head?” Angel knew there were plenty of hate groups. People with Talent caught just as much shit as immigrants or Chicanos. If the feds said he had a target on his back, Angel would vanish the second he walked through the prison gates. He knew how to take care of number one.
Dolen answered, “We think it's more complicated than that. We suspect someone is recruiting.”
Angel’s blood turned cold. Recruiting. That was a nice word for what some of the gangs did. Angel had grown up avoiding taking favors from anyone because that’s how you ended up getting snatched off the street and ordered to pay off that debt. Considering that Angel had gotten kicked out of school for refusing to listen to teachers, he didn’t want to get mixed up in some fucked up situation where he had to follow a gang leader or get a bullet to the head. “Not an issue. You warned me, so I won’t be anywhere that they can recruit me.”
“It’s not going to be that simple,” Oberton said. “Whoever is recruiting is finding targets in the prisons.”
Angel might not have finished school, but he wasn’t an idiot. These people had someone inside. “One of the guards?” Angel had a mental list of assholes who would sell him out or write a false behavior report just for the hell of it.
“Can’t be,” Dolen said. “They’re recruiting at different prisons. We have teams out at four different prisons.”
Angel frowned. “Someone’s going to notice all those feds.”
“That’s why we are running a cover story.” Oberton pulled a thin file from the bottom of the pile. “Here’s the deal. If you agree to help us, we can help you, both with any outstanding legal issues and with finances.” Oberton slid the file across the table. Angel knew he would be under a microscope. The detective who nailed him suspected him of other crimes. And he was right. If the ass found more evidence, Angel could end up back here for one of his older robberies. However, that was a big if. It wasn’t worth sticking his head in a noose.
“Not interested.” Angel pushed the file away.
“Mr. Zamora-”
“Listen asshole.” Angel stopped when a wind stirred all the papers in the room. Oberton threw his arms over several files, and Dolen grabbed a couple of papers that had fluttered to the ground. In a heartbeat, Angel was on his feet, looking around the room. Shaman. Right. That meant Angel probably shouldn’t insult the fed, at least not to his face. “No offense, but I don’t feel like playing the part of the bait in your little trap. You can find someone else.” The wind that had come from nowhere vanished, and Oberton sat up and started rearranging his piles.
Dolen stood. If these pendejos thought Angel would be more likely to agree with a pretty girl, they were even stupidier than he thought. Then again, Angel seen a lot of men piss their lives away over a beautiful woman. Angel wouldn’t even do that for a gorgeous man. “There’s nothing you can say to sweeten this deal. I don’t want to get in the middle of the feds and whoever is on the other end of these murders.”
“You already are in the middle,” Dolen said. We have no idea how they’re getting information on who has hidden talent, but my guess is they’ve identified you. You’re close to release. If this is a large organization that is looking to recruit and blackmail magic users, you’re vulnerable, and that means if we walk out of here, you’re screwed.”
Angel did appreciate a blunt woman, but that didn’t mean he was going to go along with some stupid ass plan. “If they know anything, it’s because you pulled me into this room. They’re recruiting people with hidden talent, so you show up and start interviewing people hidden talent? I know feds are stupid, but that takes the cake even for you idiots.” Angel crossed his arms and waited for them to explain that.
“I like him,” Dolen told Oberton.
Clearly the woman was an idiot. “I don’t give a shit if you like me or not. However I would like to go back to my card game, so I think I’m leaving.”
Oberton spoke, and Angel felt a cold chill down his back. “No, you aren’t. We have already told you enough that you are an operational security risk. You will either listen to our offer, or we will have you transferred to secure federal prison in place you in solitary confinement until this operation is concluded.”
Angel slapped both hands down on the table. “You fucking piece of shit. I’m due out in two months. Where the hell do you get off playing games with my life?” This was exactly why Angel hated cops, hated feds, basically he hated anyone who had power because humans beings turned into assholes the second they had the power to hurt someone else. Angel expected the fed to pull out handcuffs and make a show of proving his power, but he didn’t. If anything, Oberton got quieter.
“We aren’t, but someone is. We aren’t willing to get you killed, and we’re not willing to let this organization continue to manipulate and kill magic users. If you end up stuck in a prison for two more years will we run the investigation, then that’s your choice. Personally, I feel better about locking you up for a couple of extra years than I would if we let you walk free and then found your body washed up on some riverbank.”
Angel took a step backward. “Don’t pretend you give a shit about me.”
Dolen sat on the edge of the table. “That’s the thing about Darren, he gives a shit about everyone. It’s a personality flaw.” She looked at him fondly.
Goddamn feds with their good cop bad cop routine. No way was Angel falling for it. “Look, you can play your games, but this is blackmail. Don’t lie to yourself about that.” However, Angel sat at the table again. He might not want to work with feds, but he sure as hell didn’t want to get locked up for another two years. “All right, let’s hear this dumbass plan of yours.” If nothing else, Angel could better make his own plans if he knew what the feds were thinking.
“Your support is underwhelming,” Oberton said.
“Fuck you.”
Surprisingly, Oberton nodded. “Okay, you’re entitled to your opinion. So we have good reason to suspect you’ve already been identified. The second you’re released someone is going to pick you up.”
“You’re assuming I can’t take care of myself. I don’t get picked up that easy.” Angel had the triple curse of being poor, attractive, and gay. He’d been slipping away from creepers since he’d been fourteen. He could lead a man on, steal his wallet and then slip away before the victim got more than a quick grope. Those skills had served Angel well as he grew up.
Dolen spoke. “If these guys are the professionals we think they are, you will get picked up. And they will have some magic user on their staff that will offer to train you in developing your talent.”
“Now I know you’re talking shit. There is no way I would ever be stupid enough to accept a favor like that.” Angel knew the true cost of favors.
“You may not be given a choice.” Dolen sounded so damn certain, and so concerned.
“There’s always a choice. The whole way that these guys get your loyalty is by giving you a choice and making you think you chose them. That way when everything goes to shit, you can’t blame them because it was your choice. I’ve been around these sorts long enough to know how they work.”
Oberton nodded slowly. “You’re right.”
Damn straight he was right. These two had grown up in some nice suburb. Angel had lived on the streets.
“However, what you’re not taking into account is that they may do something to use your talent against you,” Oberton added.
Angel wasn’t sure he Talent, but if he did, he had shocking quantities of ignorance about how it worked. Even if he wasn’t going to help the feds, he sure didn’t mind getting a little information for free. “So what might they do to convince me I needed them?”
Oberton slid the thin file across the table again. “We’ll tell you after you signed the informants’ agreement.”
Angel pulled the thin file closer and studied Oberton’s face. The man didn’t seem particularly cruel, but it could be that his good looks were throwing Angel’s judgment off a bit. Sometimes pretty boys were like that. They seemed all soft and sugary, and then when you bit through to the center, they were raging assholes. “I don’t want favors from you anymore that I want favors from the group that did that.” Angel gestured towards the photographs of the three dead men.
“Luckily what we’re offering is not the exchange of favors. What we’re looking for is somebody who can work with us. Consider this an employment agreement,” Oberton said. “And if this is as big as we think, a very lucrative employment agreement.” Oberton gestured toward the file. Angel started reading the small print.
“I could give you a breakdown,” Dolen offered.
“No offense, sweet cheeks, but I wouldn’t trust your word if you threw in a blow job from the pretty boy.” Angel gave Oberton a lewd smile. He really was a pretty man.
Dolen chuckled. “At least this one is being sexually inappropriate with you instead of me,” she told Oberton. Angel expected the other fed to blow a gasket, but Oberton just shrugged. “Yeah well, Kavon is a jealous bastard, so I think I’ll skip the blow jobs. Besides, I’m not sure what the director’s position is on offering blow jobs in return for information.”
“Hopefully he’d be against it.”
“I assume so.”
Angel ignored their banter and read through a lot of legalese which seemed to come down to he would testify against whoever tried recruiting him and in return they would protect him from prosecution for any previous crimes that were of a nonviolent nature or any crimes that he committed with prior approval in order to complete the mission. Angel had been around enough convicts to know that was a pretty standard agreement. “I don’t see anything here that’s particularly lucrative.” Angel pushed the file back toward the center of the table.
“Then you need to read this section again.” Oberton leaned over and tapped a particular paragraph.
“You’re offering me one half of one percent of whatever might be seized. That does not sound like a lucrative payday.”
Oberton leaned back in his chair, his expression smug. “Rima, how much did the accountants confiscate and that human trafficking ring we brought down last year?”
“When we took out the main facility in El Paso, they got about fifty million dollars.”
“And what is one half of one percent of fifty million dollars?”
Dolen slowly smiled, “That would be two hundred and fifty thousand dollars.”
Angel sucked in a breath. A quarter of a million dollars. Fucking A. He had never even dreamed of a score that big. This might change things a little.
Then Dolen added, “Of course by the time we tracked down all the players involved and all the bank accounts, the final amount was six or seven times that.”
Dollar signs swam in front of Angel’s vision. Six or seven times? Greed raised its fuzzy little head and started begging with those big brown eyes. However, Angel still had a few concerns. “If there’s that much money involved, you’re talking about serious organized crime. You’re talking about one of the mafias. Who is it? Colombians? Russians? Old-school Italians?” This had so many opportunities to go disastrously wrong. As much as Angel had always avoided street gangs, they never scared the shit out of him the way the mafias did. That was like a slippery slide straight to hell.
Both agents’ expressions turned serious. “It’s dangerous. And I wish there were a way for us to get someone undercover without having to use an informant. But the fact is, our investigation suggests that your name is already on their list. It’s too late for you to keep your head down. So we aren’t bringing danger to your door as much as telling you it’s there ahead of time.”
Angel grimaced as he tried to think his way out of this trap. If his name was on a Mafia list, running wasn’t an option. Anywhere that Angel could run, they’d find them. He didn’t have enough resources or money to vanish, and he sure as hell didn’t have anything to offer the feds other than his cooperation on this case.
Oberton pushed the agreement back toward Angel. “We’re going to do everything we can to provide backup. You will get just as much support as if you were one of our agents.”
“Your agents get killed on Mafia cases,” Angel pointed out.
“Sometimes they do,” Oberton admitted. “But we have something that most FBI teams don’t.”
“Ethics that actually apply to everyone?” Angel’s sarcasm was a little thick, but he meant what he said. Maybe middle-class America had some illusion about the feds and the cops all being good guys, but Angel knew full well that they chose who to protect and serve and they chose who to screw over.
Oberton frowned, but he didn’t argue the point. “No, we have big ass magic users. Our assistant director really came down on the team when we accidentally flattened the building.”
“You’re the one that blew up a street,” Dolen said in a teasing voice. “And actually, didn’t you do several thousand dollars’ worth of damage to Arlington?”
Oberton pointed at her. “You were there for the incident with the falling building.” He turned his attention back to Angel. “But my point is that my team is good. And my boss is an unforgiving hardass who will never walk away from a case or hang someone out to dry. Even when it would be politically easier for him to do it.”
Angel had always trusted his gut. The one time he hadn’t, he’d gotten caught by two police officers who’d been having breakfast around the corner when he tried to rob a convenience store. And despite every bit of common sense that he possessed, Angel’s gut was telling him that these two were straight shooters. It didn’t hurt that there was a quarter of a million dollars dangling on the line right in front of him.
“I’ll tell you how committed we are to this case,” Dolen said. “We have four teams out interviewing everyone arrested in Baltimore during a six month period. Anyone who starts poking around is going to assume that we’re investigating dirty cops. And we’re going to keep right on investigating Baltimore arrests after you sign that agreement. We will spend thousands and thousands of dollars on interviews we don’t need, all to protect your cover.”
Angel picked up a pen and signed the confidential informant paperwork. “If you two get me killed, I will find a way to haunt your asses.”
Dolen laughed. “Deal.”
I tried to go back to Texas Magic, but I think I need to back up on that one. I like the characters, but there's no character arc that fits. I think I need to go back and put a few more cracks in their relationship so I have somewhere to go relationship-wise with that couple.
So I stared at the file and then said screw it and started a new idea. It's still in that magic universe, but this is rougher, cruder, and I have a lot more room to try and redeem my bad boy main character. As always, feedback is welcome.
Mafia and Magics
Angel Zamora has always looked out for numero uno, even after getting sent to prison for robbing a convenience store at knife point. But now two crazy feds show up to tell him he has undeveloped magic. And they want him to inform on a group that has been recruiting and disposing of magic users. When Angel agrees, he expects to play the feds until he can make his own escape plans.
However, once he's inside the mafia and developing his Talent, he starts to realize that he's not as concerned about his own skin as he is young Matteo Burke. Matt is the cousin or nephew of one of the bosses--Angel has no idea. However, the hot temper, disdain for authority, and deeply in the closet attitudes are all so familiar that Angel aches for the young man. A relationship that starts with Angel seeking one more potential advantage quickly turns into Angel's worst nightmare--a deep sense of commitment to another human being. Escape routes are closing, and Angel fears he is going to end up one more body dumped in the river, and if Angel plays this wrong, Matt could follow.
Angel grimaced when one of the guards mangled his name. He didn't hang out with God and fight demons, so he sure as hell wasn't no angel. Ahn-hell. It was pronounced Ahn-hell. However, arguing with the guards was a fool's game, and Angel hoped he'd grown out of being a fool. So he dropped his cards on the table and headed for the guard gate. Damn. He’d had a good hand too.
"Angel Zamora?" the guard asked without looking up from his computer. Angel hated that the guards couldn’t even give him the respect to look him in the eye.
"Yeah, that's me." Angel waited as the guard typed. The asshole made Angel stand and wait, even though he could have just waited until he was ready to call Angel up.
Finally the guard looked up. "Red line, interview room fourteen." He hit his button and the heavy white gate clicked open as an alarm rang. Angel pushed it open and followed the red line. Behind him, another guard followed. Angel's life was all about routine, so all this change made the hair on the back of his arms stand up. He hadn't been to the interview rooms since he'd been convicted. Oh, his lawyer had visited once to tell him his appeal had been denied, but these rooms were for the guys who had an actual shot at a new trial. Angel had given up on that.
He stopped at room fourteen and glanced over at the guard, unsure about whether he should go in. The guard looked uninterested in the whole matter, so Jesus opened the door and hoped he didn't get slapped with a write up for failing to read some guard's mind. Inside, a man and woman waited, papers spread out in front of them and a laptop running. They looked like lawyers--all suits and shit. At least the man did. The lady lawyers Angel had seen in the courtrooms were all buttoned up in tailored suits, and this one looked a little on the sloppy side. Maybe she was the paralegal.
He didn’t know these two. "I think you got the wrong guy," he said.
"Close the door," the man said. Angel had been in jail for sixteen months, long enough to know to shut up and follow orders. He closed the door.
"Please, Mr. Zamora, have a seat," the woman suggested. She was a looker, but Angel had always leaned more toward the men. The lawyer had a nice body, even if he looked like he was too high maintenance for Angel's taste. His suit was definitely tailored for him, and he was trimmed and groomed within an inch of his life. He was the prettiest damn thing Angel had seen for a long time.
Angel took the seat opposite the pair.
"I'm Agent Darren Oberton of the FBI. I'll be conducting an interview on your arrest process. You were caught after robbing a convenience store on Stiles and High Street?"
A fed. Angel lost all interest in pretty boy. "I don't see my lawyer here, so I ain't talking."
"You are not under investigation," Oberton said. The woman put her hand on Oberton's arm, and he glanced over. They shared a quick look, but Angel could tell they'd reached some decision in that moment. These two had worked together a while, so that meant she was a fed too.
"Mr. Zamora," the woman said, "are you aware that you have an affinity for magic?"
"What? Don't pull no bullshit with me," Angel snapped. He hated feds and the fucking games.
The woman pulled a glowing crystal out of her lap and set it on the table. "Go on, touch it."
"No fucking way," Angel said. He stood.
"If you call for the guard, you'll be dead within six months," Oberton said loudly. Angel froze. The damn fed believed that. Angel could hear that in the tone.
He slowly turned around. "Are you threatening me?" The guards would never back him up, and the damn surveillance camera light was dark, so a fed just might have the balls to do that. It wasn’t like Angel could make a complaint and have anyone believe him.
The fed stood. "No, no I'm not. I'm here to try to keep you alive."
Angel snorted. The day a cop cared about him was the day Angel ate his shoes.
"You have untrained Talent," Oberton continued, "and we have reason to believe that when you're released in two months, you'll be put into a difficult position, and sometime after that, you will become victim number four in our latest case." Oberton opened one of the files and spread out pictures. Three men--all bloodied and faceless. Someone had shot them in the back of the head.
"Darren, you've been hanging out with Boucher too long," the woman said. She picked up her crystal and moved closer to Angel. He stood motionless, not sure how to react to crazy ass Feds with murder on their minds. She held the crystal close to his chest and the pink glow intensified, and thin threads reached out for Angel's bare arms. "This is a spell. It reveals the presence of Talent, and since the prison system has no record of you being a magic user, I assume you're untrained. If you've simply hidden your Talent, we don't care. We do care that your magic has just put you in the crosshairs of our case."
"Please," Oberton said, "sit and we will explain this.”
Angel looked from one to the other. “I don't have any talent. I'm not one of those crazy shaman people.” Angel didn’t know much about shamans, but he knew you didn’t fuck with them. They talked to invisible animals and dead people and shit like that, and they had powers. Some couldn’t do much more than cheat at cards, but others had scary-ass demonic powers.
“No, you aren't. I am one of those crazy shaman people,” Oberton said with a touch of humor. Angel immediately regretted his words and felt even more uncomfortable being trapped in a small room with these two. “If you had shamanic skill, I would've known immediately. But you do have Talent, and unfortunately, that's about to make you very interesting to the wrong people.”
“Like who?” Angel asked. He didn’t want to believe them, but his gut was screaming at him that this guy was a straight shooter.
“Let's start from the beginning,” Overton said. He took his seat again, and the pretty fed sat next to him. They both watched him.
If they had ordered him to listen, Angel would have told them to fuck themselves, but they waited in silence. Curiosity won, and Angel sat.
The woman spoke. “I’m Agent Rima Dolen from the FBI’s Talent team. I’m an incantation user, which means I use language and magical artifacts to create spells. Several months ago we were brought in to investigate a murder. The officer at the scene recognized that there was a magical signature on the body.” She looked over to the man.
Oberton pulled out one of the pictures and pushed it closer to Angel’s side of the table. “We investigated and found that our victim had been recently paroled. He had no history as a magic user, and yet we found several people who, in the months leading up to his death, had witnessed him performing magic. In the course of our investigation, we found that there had been an earlier murder follow the same pattern. A man with no history of talent was released from prison, he began showing signs of using magic, and he was then shot in the back of the head.” Oberton pushed the other two pictures closer to Angel.
The last thing Angel needed was to look at that shit. He was a bad man; he’d never lied to himself about that. But he had always avoid violence. “And you think I'm on some hit list? Do you think somebody is going to assume I have talent and put a bullet in the back of my head?” Angel knew there were plenty of hate groups. People with Talent caught just as much shit as immigrants or Chicanos. If the feds said he had a target on his back, Angel would vanish the second he walked through the prison gates. He knew how to take care of number one.
Dolen answered, “We think it's more complicated than that. We suspect someone is recruiting.”
Angel’s blood turned cold. Recruiting. That was a nice word for what some of the gangs did. Angel had grown up avoiding taking favors from anyone because that’s how you ended up getting snatched off the street and ordered to pay off that debt. Considering that Angel had gotten kicked out of school for refusing to listen to teachers, he didn’t want to get mixed up in some fucked up situation where he had to follow a gang leader or get a bullet to the head. “Not an issue. You warned me, so I won’t be anywhere that they can recruit me.”
“It’s not going to be that simple,” Oberton said. “Whoever is recruiting is finding targets in the prisons.”
Angel might not have finished school, but he wasn’t an idiot. These people had someone inside. “One of the guards?” Angel had a mental list of assholes who would sell him out or write a false behavior report just for the hell of it.
“Can’t be,” Dolen said. “They’re recruiting at different prisons. We have teams out at four different prisons.”
Angel frowned. “Someone’s going to notice all those feds.”
“That’s why we are running a cover story.” Oberton pulled a thin file from the bottom of the pile. “Here’s the deal. If you agree to help us, we can help you, both with any outstanding legal issues and with finances.” Oberton slid the file across the table. Angel knew he would be under a microscope. The detective who nailed him suspected him of other crimes. And he was right. If the ass found more evidence, Angel could end up back here for one of his older robberies. However, that was a big if. It wasn’t worth sticking his head in a noose.
“Not interested.” Angel pushed the file away.
“Mr. Zamora-”
“Listen asshole.” Angel stopped when a wind stirred all the papers in the room. Oberton threw his arms over several files, and Dolen grabbed a couple of papers that had fluttered to the ground. In a heartbeat, Angel was on his feet, looking around the room. Shaman. Right. That meant Angel probably shouldn’t insult the fed, at least not to his face. “No offense, but I don’t feel like playing the part of the bait in your little trap. You can find someone else.” The wind that had come from nowhere vanished, and Oberton sat up and started rearranging his piles.
Dolen stood. If these pendejos thought Angel would be more likely to agree with a pretty girl, they were even stupidier than he thought. Then again, Angel seen a lot of men piss their lives away over a beautiful woman. Angel wouldn’t even do that for a gorgeous man. “There’s nothing you can say to sweeten this deal. I don’t want to get in the middle of the feds and whoever is on the other end of these murders.”
“You already are in the middle,” Dolen said. We have no idea how they’re getting information on who has hidden talent, but my guess is they’ve identified you. You’re close to release. If this is a large organization that is looking to recruit and blackmail magic users, you’re vulnerable, and that means if we walk out of here, you’re screwed.”
Angel did appreciate a blunt woman, but that didn’t mean he was going to go along with some stupid ass plan. “If they know anything, it’s because you pulled me into this room. They’re recruiting people with hidden talent, so you show up and start interviewing people hidden talent? I know feds are stupid, but that takes the cake even for you idiots.” Angel crossed his arms and waited for them to explain that.
“I like him,” Dolen told Oberton.
Clearly the woman was an idiot. “I don’t give a shit if you like me or not. However I would like to go back to my card game, so I think I’m leaving.”
Oberton spoke, and Angel felt a cold chill down his back. “No, you aren’t. We have already told you enough that you are an operational security risk. You will either listen to our offer, or we will have you transferred to secure federal prison in place you in solitary confinement until this operation is concluded.”
Angel slapped both hands down on the table. “You fucking piece of shit. I’m due out in two months. Where the hell do you get off playing games with my life?” This was exactly why Angel hated cops, hated feds, basically he hated anyone who had power because humans beings turned into assholes the second they had the power to hurt someone else. Angel expected the fed to pull out handcuffs and make a show of proving his power, but he didn’t. If anything, Oberton got quieter.
“We aren’t, but someone is. We aren’t willing to get you killed, and we’re not willing to let this organization continue to manipulate and kill magic users. If you end up stuck in a prison for two more years will we run the investigation, then that’s your choice. Personally, I feel better about locking you up for a couple of extra years than I would if we let you walk free and then found your body washed up on some riverbank.”
Angel took a step backward. “Don’t pretend you give a shit about me.”
Dolen sat on the edge of the table. “That’s the thing about Darren, he gives a shit about everyone. It’s a personality flaw.” She looked at him fondly.
Goddamn feds with their good cop bad cop routine. No way was Angel falling for it. “Look, you can play your games, but this is blackmail. Don’t lie to yourself about that.” However, Angel sat at the table again. He might not want to work with feds, but he sure as hell didn’t want to get locked up for another two years. “All right, let’s hear this dumbass plan of yours.” If nothing else, Angel could better make his own plans if he knew what the feds were thinking.
“Your support is underwhelming,” Oberton said.
“Fuck you.”
Surprisingly, Oberton nodded. “Okay, you’re entitled to your opinion. So we have good reason to suspect you’ve already been identified. The second you’re released someone is going to pick you up.”
“You’re assuming I can’t take care of myself. I don’t get picked up that easy.” Angel had the triple curse of being poor, attractive, and gay. He’d been slipping away from creepers since he’d been fourteen. He could lead a man on, steal his wallet and then slip away before the victim got more than a quick grope. Those skills had served Angel well as he grew up.
Dolen spoke. “If these guys are the professionals we think they are, you will get picked up. And they will have some magic user on their staff that will offer to train you in developing your talent.”
“Now I know you’re talking shit. There is no way I would ever be stupid enough to accept a favor like that.” Angel knew the true cost of favors.
“You may not be given a choice.” Dolen sounded so damn certain, and so concerned.
“There’s always a choice. The whole way that these guys get your loyalty is by giving you a choice and making you think you chose them. That way when everything goes to shit, you can’t blame them because it was your choice. I’ve been around these sorts long enough to know how they work.”
Oberton nodded slowly. “You’re right.”
Damn straight he was right. These two had grown up in some nice suburb. Angel had lived on the streets.
“However, what you’re not taking into account is that they may do something to use your talent against you,” Oberton added.
Angel wasn’t sure he Talent, but if he did, he had shocking quantities of ignorance about how it worked. Even if he wasn’t going to help the feds, he sure didn’t mind getting a little information for free. “So what might they do to convince me I needed them?”
Oberton slid the thin file across the table again. “We’ll tell you after you signed the informants’ agreement.”
Angel pulled the thin file closer and studied Oberton’s face. The man didn’t seem particularly cruel, but it could be that his good looks were throwing Angel’s judgment off a bit. Sometimes pretty boys were like that. They seemed all soft and sugary, and then when you bit through to the center, they were raging assholes. “I don’t want favors from you anymore that I want favors from the group that did that.” Angel gestured towards the photographs of the three dead men.
“Luckily what we’re offering is not the exchange of favors. What we’re looking for is somebody who can work with us. Consider this an employment agreement,” Oberton said. “And if this is as big as we think, a very lucrative employment agreement.” Oberton gestured toward the file. Angel started reading the small print.
“I could give you a breakdown,” Dolen offered.
“No offense, sweet cheeks, but I wouldn’t trust your word if you threw in a blow job from the pretty boy.” Angel gave Oberton a lewd smile. He really was a pretty man.
Dolen chuckled. “At least this one is being sexually inappropriate with you instead of me,” she told Oberton. Angel expected the other fed to blow a gasket, but Oberton just shrugged. “Yeah well, Kavon is a jealous bastard, so I think I’ll skip the blow jobs. Besides, I’m not sure what the director’s position is on offering blow jobs in return for information.”
“Hopefully he’d be against it.”
“I assume so.”
Angel ignored their banter and read through a lot of legalese which seemed to come down to he would testify against whoever tried recruiting him and in return they would protect him from prosecution for any previous crimes that were of a nonviolent nature or any crimes that he committed with prior approval in order to complete the mission. Angel had been around enough convicts to know that was a pretty standard agreement. “I don’t see anything here that’s particularly lucrative.” Angel pushed the file back toward the center of the table.
“Then you need to read this section again.” Oberton leaned over and tapped a particular paragraph.
“You’re offering me one half of one percent of whatever might be seized. That does not sound like a lucrative payday.”
Oberton leaned back in his chair, his expression smug. “Rima, how much did the accountants confiscate and that human trafficking ring we brought down last year?”
“When we took out the main facility in El Paso, they got about fifty million dollars.”
“And what is one half of one percent of fifty million dollars?”
Dolen slowly smiled, “That would be two hundred and fifty thousand dollars.”
Angel sucked in a breath. A quarter of a million dollars. Fucking A. He had never even dreamed of a score that big. This might change things a little.
Then Dolen added, “Of course by the time we tracked down all the players involved and all the bank accounts, the final amount was six or seven times that.”
Dollar signs swam in front of Angel’s vision. Six or seven times? Greed raised its fuzzy little head and started begging with those big brown eyes. However, Angel still had a few concerns. “If there’s that much money involved, you’re talking about serious organized crime. You’re talking about one of the mafias. Who is it? Colombians? Russians? Old-school Italians?” This had so many opportunities to go disastrously wrong. As much as Angel had always avoided street gangs, they never scared the shit out of him the way the mafias did. That was like a slippery slide straight to hell.
Both agents’ expressions turned serious. “It’s dangerous. And I wish there were a way for us to get someone undercover without having to use an informant. But the fact is, our investigation suggests that your name is already on their list. It’s too late for you to keep your head down. So we aren’t bringing danger to your door as much as telling you it’s there ahead of time.”
Angel grimaced as he tried to think his way out of this trap. If his name was on a Mafia list, running wasn’t an option. Anywhere that Angel could run, they’d find them. He didn’t have enough resources or money to vanish, and he sure as hell didn’t have anything to offer the feds other than his cooperation on this case.
Oberton pushed the agreement back toward Angel. “We’re going to do everything we can to provide backup. You will get just as much support as if you were one of our agents.”
“Your agents get killed on Mafia cases,” Angel pointed out.
“Sometimes they do,” Oberton admitted. “But we have something that most FBI teams don’t.”
“Ethics that actually apply to everyone?” Angel’s sarcasm was a little thick, but he meant what he said. Maybe middle-class America had some illusion about the feds and the cops all being good guys, but Angel knew full well that they chose who to protect and serve and they chose who to screw over.
Oberton frowned, but he didn’t argue the point. “No, we have big ass magic users. Our assistant director really came down on the team when we accidentally flattened the building.”
“You’re the one that blew up a street,” Dolen said in a teasing voice. “And actually, didn’t you do several thousand dollars’ worth of damage to Arlington?”
Oberton pointed at her. “You were there for the incident with the falling building.” He turned his attention back to Angel. “But my point is that my team is good. And my boss is an unforgiving hardass who will never walk away from a case or hang someone out to dry. Even when it would be politically easier for him to do it.”
Angel had always trusted his gut. The one time he hadn’t, he’d gotten caught by two police officers who’d been having breakfast around the corner when he tried to rob a convenience store. And despite every bit of common sense that he possessed, Angel’s gut was telling him that these two were straight shooters. It didn’t hurt that there was a quarter of a million dollars dangling on the line right in front of him.
“I’ll tell you how committed we are to this case,” Dolen said. “We have four teams out interviewing everyone arrested in Baltimore during a six month period. Anyone who starts poking around is going to assume that we’re investigating dirty cops. And we’re going to keep right on investigating Baltimore arrests after you sign that agreement. We will spend thousands and thousands of dollars on interviews we don’t need, all to protect your cover.”
Angel picked up a pen and signed the confidential informant paperwork. “If you two get me killed, I will find a way to haunt your asses.”
Dolen laughed. “Deal.”