We shot in abandoned old buildings, and backwoods areas that nobody would come to bother us. Eastern Germany and Croatia were full of them, and we kept on the move often enough that no local police would get curious about us anyway. It was basic training, laying the foundations for a new life, and a vacation all rolled into one.
That night, we went back to the small inn where we were staying for a hearty dinner of what the locals called zagreba?ki odrezak, a veal steak that had ham and cheese stuffed inside before it was breaded and grilled. Absolutely delicious, and the glutton inside of me was well satiated. I looked at Mark, who was steadily working his way through his own, along with a bowl of the local polenta that the locals called zganci. "Is living this life going to mean I can eat like this every day and still lose weight?" I asked, patting my much firmer stomach. "This is amazing."
Mark chuckled and shook his head. "Sorry my love, but no. Eventually, your body will adapt, and we'll be back to eating normally. However, we should be back in the States by then, so I wouldn't worry about it for now."
It was the only undecided part of our plan. While Mark and I both wanted to launch our two person war on organized crime in our city, the fact of the matter was, I wasn't ready. I may have already killed a man, but that was more due to chance than anything else. The longer we could stay out of the city, and me training, the better off we'd be later on. It wasn't that we were lacking for funds, Mark had millions stashed in various accounts along with a core seed of money that he had invested in stocks, bonds, and various companies through aliases, shell corporations, and numbered accounts.
After dinner, we went back to our room. Croatian inns are not the same as American ones. Our bed was rustic, with a handmade comforter on top that most likely had been made by the owner's wife or mother. It had beautiful patterns interwoven into it, and smelled like it had been stored in a cedar chest when it wasn't being used. The bed itself was soft and thick, suspended on a real rope frame that actually worked better than any metal springs or frame I'd ever had.
Mark pulled out our tablet and turned on our little satellite uplink system. The speed wasn't exactly good enough to stream high definition video, but we didn't use it for such. Instead, we used it for keeping track of Mark's financial packages, read news, and keep in touch with certain people via e-mail. Tabby Williams, my best friend who we had saved from the Confederation, sometimes e-mailed us information about goings on in the city that you couldn't get from the local television stations. She'd become a good little intelligence officer. I hated involving her, but once Tabby sets her mind to something, you might as well agree or you're wasting your breath. The rest of the time we just swapped stories, although we were careful not to give away too many details.
"Anything new?" I asked as I quickly washed up and changed into light shorts and a tank top, not wanting to go to bed with the smell of gunpowder on my hands.
Mark sat silently for a minute, his brow furrowed. Finally, he turned to look at me, and nodded. "We need to go back. Take a look." He passed the tablet over, open to our secured e-mail. What I read shocked me. "See what I mean?"
Dear guys, the message began. Tabby was careful not to use names at all in the messages she sent us, and the address was nothing more than random numbers and letters. We had sent her the e-mail link through one of our burner phones, so there couldn't be any way to trace it back to us.
There’s rumors that a certain party is about to bring in some interesting imports from out of town. Apparently, the current market share with his nearest competitor wasn't enough for him, and he wants to have the entire market to himself. The people I know don't have a lot of details, they just know it's going to be big, and it's coming into town soon. I'd say sweeps week is upon us!
That was another thing about Tabby, she always tried to write using circumspect language. Not that it helped, even a beginner could see what she was talking about. "So what do you think she means?"
Mark thought about it for a second while he turned the tablet off and shut down the satellite link. "Most likely Owen Lynch is making a play. The Confederation doesn't trust each other enough for them to allow a member to bring in an outside party into town, it would disrupt their own internal balance as much as the city-wide balance. And they have enough ears amongst their own that nobody could pull it off without the knowledge of the rest of the Confederation. But Owen Lynch operates his group with him at the top. He doesn't need to answer to anyone. I'm not saying the Confederation couldn't be doing it, but more than likely it's Lynch."