illicit funds • j cody

TWO

💸 J STRIKES A DEAL 💸

I enter the fight in the fourth round. Hunter stands in one of the corners with her back to me. She looks completely different than she did last time. Her skin glistens with sweat, and I can see the rippling muscles of her now exposed back.

I see a man in his late forties or early fifties wearing a nice suit murmuring something in her ear and she takes heaving breaths. Her trainer slaps her arm and she gets back up. The man sits back down in a ringside seat. As her head turns I can see a fresh cut on her cheek. She has an animalistic look in her eyes.

"Finish it!" The man in the suit calls out. That must be her father.

She flexes her shoulders and readies herself. In that moment, as her opponent rises, I remember she isn't fighting another woman, she's fighting a full grown man. The man throws a punch at her, she easily ducks out of the way and lands a hit right in the middle of his chest. The man seems taken aback. Not much later, she has the man on the ground, and just like that, she wins. The referee holds her arm up and she musters a weak smile. Blood drips down her face from the cut. Her father enters the ring and gleefully puts an arm over his daughter's shoulders, and holds up the belt that she won. Some people cheer for her, others scowl. She wasn't the favorite for this match, and the odds were by no means in her favor, but she managed to hold out until the last round and win it.

She sees me, but she seems too exhausted to react. She just mouths something to her father and gestures towards me with a nod. He looks on me with narrow eyes. He presses a kiss to his daughter's temple and exits the ring. She too exits and walks to the locker room.

"I heard you came to visit my daughter the other day," he says in a tone so low that it's powerful.

"I did," I answer.

"I don't know why you would want my services, and I doubt you have enough money to work with me."

"I need someone new and secure to move my cash, and I think I do have enough."

"How much?"

"Millions."

He nods respectfully, "I heard the last person who defied your grandmother got shot."

"He didn't move his cash through you."

He rolls his eyes, "Listen, I don't trust you one bit kid, and you don't have nearly enough money to buy my trust, but since I see my ambitious younger self in you, I'm willing to cut a deal. You earn my daughter's trust, and I will move your small sum."

"Deal," I shake his hand.

"And I suggest you make a better impression on her, you had her a bit rattled last time."

"When can I see her?" I ask, the place is beginning to clear out.

"You'll be able to catch her at the gym after she's a had a few days rest. I'm not helping you out here." Of course he isn't. "Although I suppose I could tell you that she does like peonies and sushi."

"So you're saying I should ask her out to dinner."

He smirks, "If she'll go out to dinner with you."

He thinks he's setting me up to fail. He thinks he's making a deal with me that I can't uphold, but he's wrong. "She'll do it, you just wait."

"Sure..." he's completely blowing me off, "now get out."

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"Since when did you buy flowers?" Craig asks casually as I get ready to leave for LA to see Hunter.