Coffee & Criminals

17. It's Just Rock Candy

There was the usual stuff in the cellar. You know, like the couch, the Monopoly board game underneath the coffee table, a whole bunch of boxes of extra cups and silverware by the corner and the little cat figurine standing on one of them (his name was Oreo and he guarded the stuff), some crayon drawings on the brick walls I once did because I was bored, two metric tons of plastic wrapped crystal meth near the tunnels, and a cute heart-shaped trash bin from Walmart. 

Dan, Jasper, and Brice were coming in and out of the tunnels, carrying more of the packages.

"Okay." I uttered, because I could find nothing else to say in that moment. You ever experience something so surprising and unexpected that you just stand there and stare at it open-mouthed for a few seconds? Like when you accidentally drop that new eyeshadow palette and it breaks into a million pieces, just like your heart? That's kinda how I was feeling. Except this was magnified on a much worse platform.

"Huh." Ade had the same monotone voice as I did, out of shock.

I felt numb. "One of these things is not like the others."

"Huh." Ade said again. His eyes were wide and pinned to the enormous pile of drugs sitting across the room. "Maybe it's the trashcan. The red doesn't really color coordinate with the rest of the room."

"Right." I nodded, my eyes wide. I was afraid to blink because I thought my eyes would start filling up with tears. A mere affiliation with the Brooklyn Crowns was enough to put someone away for a lifetime. But to aide and assist (no matter how unwillingly) on one of the biggest drug smuggles in US history was horrifyingly dangerous. It was even more dangerous than being attracted to Wolfe Sterling. Not that I was attracted to him. I didn't mean it like that. Terrible analogy. 

No. Attraction. No. Feelings. None. Squat. Zero.

Once again, the deflated feeling tightened my chest. At this point, I felt the need to let out a long, deep breath that ended in a soft whistle to complete my whole 'sad balloon' appearance. I felt defeated. And cheated. And mistreated. And pleated. Okay, now I'm just adding words that rhyme. I don't know, I felt very sad. Brice seemed like such a nice dude. So did Jasper and Dan. Wolfe, not so much. I knew he was a terrible person from the start. The capacity of what they did and were actually capable of didn't really settle in with me until now. Because now, I was staring at a pile of crystal meth taller than I was and I was at a loss of what to do anymore. I was stuck. Yeah, that's the word. 

Stuck.

I didn't even have the energy to throw a temper tantrum. Sighing deeply again, I walked up to Brice.

He was writing something down on a clipboard. It looked like a log sheet with lots of numbers on it. The word 'ninety million' was written near the bottom margin and was circled in red ink. I didn't even want to think about what they'd do with the money. Wolfe Sterling was a billionaire. No, actually, he was like a trillionaire. A gazillionaire. And infinitionaire. It's not like he actually needed the money. 

Oh, they were so pretentious.

"Hello, Brice. " I reached up and began absentmindedly running my fingers through his beard. It was coarse and almost ginger in color. Totally braidable, too. Not to stereotype on lumberjacks, but he looked like a lumberjack. A pretty cute one, too. But that's not important. "You want to explain what's going on here? Please tell me all of that is just rock candy."

"If it helps you to think it's rock candy-" Brice politely grabbed my wrists and pulled my hands off his face. "-then sure, it's rock candy. The best there is. Got it shipped from Willy Wonka's."