A chubby middle aged man has joined Georgia, her husband and Phil at her favorite restaurant. ”Well,” said the gentleman, “I will be willing to help you rid yourself of this Rockwood fellow, once and for all. He is my enemy too, and he was a friend of your brother Toledo. Unfortunately he learned much from Toledo, such as disappearing at just the right moment before his enemies can catch him. 

That has been a source of great frustration for me.” ”So, how does this help us?” asked Phil, “If he manages to get away from you all the time, it seems you do not have much to offer.” ”Yes, my thoughts exactly,” said Georgia, “so why don’t you run along before you get hurt, or worse.” ”Perhaps you do not know this yet,” the man continued, “but those police officers you have on your payroll are no longer available to you, so what does that leave you for help against Rockwood?” 

“I do not believe you,” she said sneering at him, “I will check with one of my people.” She called someone who came into the restaurant after a few minutes. ”Is it true our cops are gone?” she asked him. ”Yeah, sure is,” he said nervously, “the state police came and arrested all of them and now they will be staying here to look after the town until they deal with all the corruption and crime going on here. 

I talked with one of them just to find out.” ”That is just great,” said Robert, “well, what is your proposition?” ”My name is Mandar,” he said, “I have built up a worldwide empire and Rockwood has been giving me headaches for too long now. But I can never quite catch him, he always disappears just when I am ready to close in on him. 

But I do have the resources to stop him and now I have him trapped in this city. Your choice of killing the lieutenant’s girlfriend was incredibly foolish for you, but very beneficial for me, since now he will stay here until he kills you. I could wait until he does that, then swoop down on him like a hundred hungry vultures and be rid of him. 

But I will not be so cruel to you dear Georgia. I want you for bait, but I will protect you so no harm will come to you. I know Rockwood well enough that he will not kill you right away, nice and quick shall we say, but he will take you and subject you to numerous atrocities, then kill you. But if you bring him into the open, then I can deal with him and with his lieutenant, that will kill his organization. 

You should have been satisfied with killing the sister of that lieutenants girlfriend, s.he was not worth fighting for anyway. After all, it was her that tipped you off about her father dipping into the profits so you could kill the parents. All because her father would not share those profits he took with her at a 50/50 deal. 

Then she turned on her other sister to foil her plans to escape which would have finished you as well. Apparently that Adoncia creature was cheering while your hired men killed her sister. Now, let yourself be the bait and I will finish off Rockwood. Of course there is my usual fee for helping you which is a mere $500,000. A small price to pay for your lives. I will guarantee your safety. 

By the way, trying something foolish right now would not end well for you. My people are all through this restaurant, and outside too.” The trio looked around the room and saw several people sitting, staring at them. ”I accept your terms,” she said, “you will be paid immediately after you take care of Rockwood.” 

“You do not understand the procedure,” said Mandar, “I get paid beforehand or I cannot guarantee you safety.” ”I say we do it,” said Robert, “we have the money.” ”If your people did anything to me, you would be dead,” said Georgia defiantly. ”Can you be so sure, dear woman?” asked Mandar, “I have a gun aimed at your stomach right now, and unfortunately for you, it would be rather messy.” 

She gave in and told Phil to get the money. Off he went back to their secret (though now it was not so secret) hideout, retrieved the money and went back to the restaurant. Meanwhile, we had followed Phil and in we went to the hideout. It was located underground, below a barbershop. Mac and Tiger had the place open in no time for us. 

We began looking around, not knowing how long Mandar could keep them busy. Rock and his team were with us now too. Alfred and Dawn had their two computers open quickly and began searching for any information they could find. 

They then sent that information to Annelie, unless it was something we could use right away. Aoife had borrowed Tandi from Mandar and began searching for other stuff. The other cats joined in looking around, except for Rusty, who was with Kat outside watching for trouble. Meowsy!=Find something here! 

To Be Continued.

©2023 Steve McLeod.