"Why's she here?" Lincoln asked Clyde, both of them now stood outside Gus Fring's Games n Grub. "She said she's a part of it now." Clyde shrugged as Lincoln eyed his girlfriend, Jordan who stood there staring at Lincoln, looking unimpressed. "Like it or not, I'm a part of this now. Besides, this is the only way I even get to see you these days. We can consider them dates." Lincoln rolled his eyes. He didn't have the energy to argue with her after last night's events. "Fine, whatever. Just help me and Clyde move these boxes back to my place so we can stash them in the garage." Jordan raised an eyebrow. "Huh. You put up no fight at all. You doing okay?" Lincoln moved past Clyde while continuing to talk. "Yeah, just... last night didn't go quite as planned, let's leave it at that." He could tell that his words would cause Clyde to worry but right now all he cared about was moving these boxes and going right back to sleep.
"No... No NO NO!" Lincoln ran over to the boxes the moment they had come into view. Panic rose within Lincoln. Nearly half of the boxes were gone. "Lincoln... surely, this isn't all Carl gave you last night is it?" Clyde asked whilst Jordan observed her boyfriend from a small distance. "No, Clyde! This isn't all Carl-" That was when it all clicked. "Carl... Carl took the boxes! he's trying to fucking sabotage me!" he whispered to himself so the other two couldn't hear. It all made sense, didn't it? Carl wanted Lincoln dead and if he failed to meet the Casagrande quota, it'd give Carl an excuse to kill him. Lincoln started moving the remaining boxes until he got to the last one. He quickly opened it and breathed a sigh of relief to find the bucket and broken mop still in there, untouched. "LINCOLN!" a voice from behind startled him to his feet. "Lincoln, are you going to tell us what the hell's going on here?" Jordan asked, tapping her foot and looking into Lincoln's eyes. "Uh... No, Clyde, these weren't all the boxes I was given. We've been robbed." Clyde slid down the wall and put his head in his hands. "Fuck. Fuck! Lincoln, what're we gonna do?!" He looked desperately at his best friend, hoping for some kind of answer. "Clyde, just... just give me a few minutes to think about this-"
"What's with this bucket and mop?" Jordan picked up the two pieces of the mop and examined them. "What're you not telling us, Lincoln?" With Jordan's inquiries and Clyde freaking out, Lincoln wished he could be anywhere else in the world right now. Somewhere away from this hellhole of a state and this mess he'd gotten himself into. Lincoln shut his eyes and his mind wandered back to the words of his sister, Luna. "You know that sooner or later, this thing with the Casagrandes is going to go to shit. You're going to need to prepare for the storm that's coming your way and I'm going to help you with that." Help... Did he have no other choice left? Was bringing others into this mess his only chance of surviving? He wouldn't mind it so much if only he suffered but if he died, he knew what it would do to his family. He wanted to protect them even Luna despite his hate-filled feelings toward her. "Alright, just calm DOWN!" Lincoln raised his voice to shut up Clyde and Jordan. "Listen, here's what we're going to do. We're going to take those boxes to my garage and on the way, I'll explain everything as best I can. Then, we decide what comes next, got it?" He could see the unease on their faces but they both gave him a nod of approval.
Thud. The last of the boxes lay on the ground at Jordan's feet. "So... you let your anger issues get the better of you yet again and you've killed a member of the most powerful drug family in human history. Marvelous." Lincoln cringed and quickly ran over to Jordan, putting his hand over her mouth despite it already being too late. "Listen to me very carefully." His voice was barely higher than a whisper. "I know you're new to all this but even the dumbest criminal knows not to go blabbing their fat mouth inside their own home which could be bugged. And if my house is bugged then they can hear all of this so you need to shut. The fuck. Up."Lincoln removed his hand, staring into Jordan's eyes which were full of annoyance. "Got it." Lincoln cleared his throat and began to speak loudly again. "As I told you Jordan, I didn't kill Sergio, he didn't show up. The Casagrandes have probably found him by now anyways. Now c'mon, let's get out of here." The trio went back outside, crossing the street where they stopped. "Alright, this should be good." Clyde immediately began to panic and talk in a hushed tone, still afraid of the possible bugs. "Lincoln, you fucking killed Sergio?! Look, I get it, the pay decrease and those comments were uncalled for and he deserved to die but you went and killed him?!" Jordan nudged Clyde, telling him to calm down when she did. Lincoln let out a frustrated sigh and nodded. "Yeah, I know but I can't change it now. Sergio's dead and that psychopath Carl is onto me and would love nothing more than to screw me over so he can kill me. He took the other boxes, I'm sure of it." Lincoln sat down on the pavement. "Well, it looks like he's succeeded. How're you going to make the same amount of money with only half the amount?" Jordan asked. "What if we charge double for the ones we sell?" Clyde suggested, earning him questioning gazes from Lincoln and Jordan. "Okay, it was just a suggestion." Lincoln watched the cars driving by, blocking out the voices of Clyde and Jordan. He knew what his next move needed to be, he hated the mere thought of it but it was his only chance. "I know what we need to do. Saturday afternoon, meet me at Gus Fring's Games n Grub. We can discuss it there with the others." Jordan narrowed her eyes at him. "Others?" He nodded. "If we're going to do this... Go up against the Casagrandes... We're going to need more than the three of us." Lincoln got up to his feet and began to cross the road back toward his house. "Saturday afternoon. Fring's place." He gave the two of them a wave before heading inside.
To Be Continued
