Chapter 80 The warning
Axel's POV
It was hard to leave Lisa especially since she'd expressed just how much she'd miss me for the next three days that I'll be focused solely on the shipment. She had no idea just how much I would miss her while we were apart but I loved how affectionate she'd been recent, she didn't hold back and she was the cutest version of herself with me and I loved it because I knew no one else had access to her in that way, it was priceless.
As I drove off, the one thought that dominated my mind was that I couldn't wait to get both our fathers to approve of our relationship. I didn't want to sneak around with her, I wanted to be with her with the blessing of our families and while resting assured that we could confidently look forward to a future together without fear of our families' rivalry separating us prematurely. The plan I'd crafted to pull this off was brilliant but first of all, I had to ensure that the shipment's pickup and delivery were perfectly smooth.
In no time I was at Prince's office and I pulled into my usual parking space and stepped out of the car. I glanced anxiously at my wristwatch because I felt like I was a few minutes behind schedule and these last few days of the shipment were too crucial for me to slip up in any way. As I raised my eyes from my wristwatch, my focus was blocked by Roman who had approached me while I was bothered about timing and I'm sure he was about to waste some of my precious time, how fucking perfect.
As he stood in my way, all I could think of was what the hell he had to say now that I couldn't be bothered to deal with any of his petty bullshit, his timing was always horribly wrong and I hoped to get rid of him and back to the business that concerned me as soon as possible.
I started walking off but he followed me with determination and after a while, I halted and stared at him hoping he'd finally spit out whatever he had in mind.
"Let me work with you on this shipment, even if I'll be one of the men in charge of security or procurement rather than dealing directly with the heads of the operation" He suggested boldly and I almost laughed in his face because of his sheer audacity.
"What on earth makes you think that you can throw around requests like that?" I asked him as my patience grew thin because he shouldn't have been wasting my time on that for fuck's sake. "You didn't include me in the process of preparing for the shipment, you completely cut me off and now I want in" He said and it all sounded pointless rambling to me because he had no right to act as though he deserved to have worked on this shipment with me.
"You're really dumb if you think it makes any sense to join a mission when it's merely three days to the D-day. I've got work to do, excuse me" I said and walked away from him towards my initial destination but he caught up with me in a few strides and made me halt again, what the fuck was it this time? My head spun with frustration at this point.
"Is this how bad you want to take the glory and all the points for this mission? So bad that you won't let me in? Go ahead then, but if you're not careful, this mission might flop and it'll end up being what gives me a huge edge over your ass" He said with his usual egoistic poise and I shook my head at him in disbelief, he'd stooped low enough this time and his jealousy had got him spewing rubbish as well.
"Don't give me shit for this, I don't need that. Go and keep organizing your meaningless orgies since that's the only thing you're good at apparently." With that, I walked away from him as fast as I could and I was relieved that I didn't hear his footsteps trailing behind me.
Despite flipping him off to my satisfaction, I couldn't shake off an impending feeling of doom and uncertainty concerning the mission and it made my thoughts align towards the possibility of sabotage for a brief moment. I tried to strike out the possible threats but I could only think of Roman, I knew he was an asshole but he wouldn't ever jeopardize the family's missions just to prove a point and he was an empty barrel that didn't have the balls to pull it off anyways.
However, I still couldn't quite shake off the feeling that something was wrong somewhere, deep in my guts I knew that everything wasn't right and I couldn't figure out why after I'd canceled all the possible threats to the mission. Maybe, it's the fact that this is one of the biggest missions I've ever been put in charge of and I'm getting the jitters as the days draw closer. I hoped deeply that that was all it was and nothing that would cause any hitches in my well-thought-out plan and execution.
There was an underground basement in Prince's office building that only a select few knew and even fewer persons could possibly access it because of the top-notch security that was put in place. I walked into the elevator that would take me underground to the door of the basement and I took a deep breath as I shook off my feelings of anxiety and I assured myself that everything would work out fine, mostly because I couldn't imagine it going any other way as a lot was on the line, even my relationship with Lisa.
The elevator finally dinged to indicate that I'd arrived at my destination and I walked out and headed for the door of the basement, the first door only needed facial recognition to open and I quickly scanned my face and I was allowed access into the building in no time. As soon as I stepped into the building, I found Prince leaning against a wall and waiting for me and I shot him a small smile while he shook his head at me for being a few minutes later than the time we'd agreed on.
"Better late than never, yeah? You're taking the saying too seriously man, I've been waiting a while for you you know?" Prince said as he moved off the wall and walked towards me, a serious expression that I couldn't quite place was plastered across his face.
"No good day? No hello? No, were you robbed to have come this late? Nothing? "I teased lightly in hopes that it would ease the atmosphere and I saw a smile form slowly on his face and I mentally patted myself on the back for succeeding.
"I know damn well you weren't robbed, immediately anyone laid a finger on any of your belongings I'd have gotten a security alert. And you don't deserve the hellos or pleasantries you're asking for, tell me why you were really late" He asked and stared straight at me while he waited for my response.
"Roman figured today would be the best day to come out of the blue and demand to be let into the mission and he even wanted to work on the field on the D-day, shit pissed me off for real and dragged on longer than it should've," I said and watched him shake his head in amusement, we were used to Roman's tantrums already and they did nothing to move either of us at this point so I'm sure he understood my frustration.
"Man, does he ever give up? Nah, he's not even getting any near this mission as long as I'm in charge of security, I can't have him zoning out and messing up shit we've worked our asses off to put together" He laughed as he spoke and I knew his amusement was from a place of experience, Roman wasn't easy to work with and no one liked that about him.
"Yeah well, there's no way under this earth it's happening and that's settled" I concluded the conversation as we walked towards the main door.
"We've wasted enough time as it is then, let's go in and get to discussing more critical issues concerning the shipment," He said as we finally approached the most important security screening door and halted in front of it.
"Ladies first, Prince" I teased and bowed to give him enough space to get into the screening door and he laughed and shot me a glare.
"We're both going through this door, you know? No exceptions, we've got to be thorough to the letter" Prince said sternly and I wondered what was going through his mind this time around. "Why aren't I excluded from the screening? I'm the boss in charge of this operation and I'll never bring anything that would sabotage the mission" I asked jokingly and his stern expression from earlier had eased slightly as he turned to face me after we had stepped into the screening door.
"We're going through the door together, Axel. And no, you're not the problem but there's a possibility that your clothes might've been tempered with or wired by random people that know your identity and want to interfere with the mission" He said confidently and I shook my head in disbelief at the mere thought of it.
"Nah, man. Please give me more credit, will you? I doubt there's any way someone would tamper with my clothes and I'd have no idea whatsoever" I chuckled and he looked at me with a puzzled expression as though I wasn't being clear enough, I knew that simply meant he wanted to oppose me some more.
"You can't be too sure of something like this, you come in contact with several people and someone might've been a mole and you wouldn't suspect that shit was going down behind your back," He said and I scoffed in disbelief because I couldn't place my hand on anyone that would know my reputation in the mafia and still dare to fuck with me regardless of it.
At that same moment, I realized that the screen door had been taking forever to simply screen us so we could get inside and it bothered me for some reason. "Why on earth is this taking forever to screen us though? Any ideas?" I turned to ask Prince and he simply frowned and looked around the area as though we'd been compromised. The red screening line seemed to be stuck at a particular point while it screened us but we didn't notice it while we spoke. At this point, the red line was still transfixed at the same point it had been in for a few minutes and if it didn't turn green in the next few minutes that followed, it would begin to beep loudly to indicate that we weren't cleared to enter the building.
It seemed as though we'd both held our breaths at this point while we stared blankly at the red line and hoped that it would finally turn green to give us a go-ahead to enter the building. I couldn't imagine what would be likely to cause a panic such that the screening system would fail to clear us, this had never happened before, we'd normally get in after a few seconds but this had taken unnecessarily longer.
Just as my heart began to pick up its pace, the red light turned green and the main door opened showing that we'd been cleared to enter finally.
"Phewww, I thought that would never end" I exclaimed and let out a breath I didn't know I'd been holding in earlier, Prince, on the other hand, had a look of uncertainty on his pause as we walked into the dark room where the meeting was meant to hold.
As soon as we stepped into the room, all the men that had been seated stood up and acknowledged our presence with formal bows before they took their seats again.
I walked up to the seat at the head of the meeting table and got seated while all eyes became fixed on me and spoke.
"Shall we begin?"