The Cartel: Book 2 of The Assassin Journals by Sharon Partington

Author:Sharon Partington [Partington, Sharon]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2019-08-02T22:00:00+00:00

Rigis Seven wasn’t a bad place if you overlooked the soaring humidity and almost constant rain. Where Prime was all dust and sand, seven was water and cloud. The city of Sandryhia seemed permanently obscured by fog. It rose up from the river that wound through the metro core, merging with the low clouds that brushed the tops of the glass and steel towers lining the streets. Beyond the skyscrapers, residential areas and industrial complexes, rainforest and tangled jungle crept to the very edge of the city. It was almost primeval.

The Cartel had their own building, smack in the middle of the city. I could see it from the fortieth floor window of my room at the Montreign Hotel. It looked like a perfectly ordinary corporate headquarters; it could belong to almost any bank or merchant house in the galaxy.

Except that it didn’t.

It belonged to one of the deadliest and most feared criminal organizations in the known universe. Interesting what money, power, and outright fear could do to increase your respectability among the masses.

They were polar opposites, the Guilds, and the Cartel. The Guilds were sly and manipulative, controlling things behind the scenes, leaving the outward facade of the Rigian system pretty much unchanged. The Cartel was out and in your face. Unapologetic. Ruthless. Get in their way, and they rolled right over you. Their raids on the Iron District were a direct challenge to Artur Melardis and his Guilds—the fact that he couldn’t stop them, or even do much to slow them down, spoke volumes as to who was really in criminal control of the Rigian system.

By now, the Cartel would have heard about the raid on the Guild Master’s estate. They’d be wondering who was responsible. Debating possible motives, assessing possible threats. They wouldn’t move on Guild territory immediately. They were too smart for that. Too careful. They’d wait. And watch. And see who, if anyone, came forward to claim responsibility.

Agrakh and Rachmar would be making their “delivery” soon. I’d written the name of the hotel and my room number on one of my business cards along with the caption: Compliments of the Hunter. Bane had pinned it to the bloodstained lapel of Melardis’s fancy suit.

Operating totally in the dark was never a good idea. I needed to do a little research. I needed a clearer picture of who and what I was dealing with. My personal knowledge of the Cartel was limited to the stories and rumors that filtered along the criminal grapevine—entertaining to be sure, but not the most reliable source of information. They were a notoriously closed and private group. Once you were in, you were in forever. You did your job and kept your mouth shut about company business.

I typed my query into the hotel data-console. A long list of articles and stories appeared on the screen, and I chose the one that looked to be the most promising: an expose written by a Terran journalist who died in a private shuttle crash a couple of months after it went to air.

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