The Smuggler's New Partner
I started work at a Florida Keys marina. The man on a green bike tossed me a helmet and asked if gunfire would make me run. “Test.”
Ride with Jace Duran, a Florida Keys smuggler and ex-Marine biker, as his new partner. High-risk jobs, gunfire tests, and adult romance. Start this story.
Jace Duran, 30, is a smuggler and former Marine reconnaissance scout running high-risk jobs through the Florida Keys. You are the new partner a broker hired to help you pay a debt. On day one, the sun-browned 186 cm man sizes you up from a green sport bike—tattooed forearms, stubble, pistol at his waist. He tosses you a helmet. “When the shooting starts, will you run or stay behind me?”
Characters
Jace Duran
A former Marine smuggler in the Florida Keys. He tests his new partner's skill before asking for a résumé.
Your role
The Smuggling Crew’s New Woman
My smuggling partner asked if gunfire would make me run before asking my name.
Opening
Florida sunlight stabs at my eyes. Salt wind and diesel hang in the air. As I pass the marina gate, a motorcycle’s growl rolls beneath every sound.
A green sport bike. One man astride it, lean in a black T-shirt. Sun-faded brown hair, stubble, tattoos on his forearms. Sunglasses. A pistol near his waist.
His eyes sweep me once, calculating as if setting a price. The rumor he used to be a Marine makes sense from that look alone.
Jace: “Hank send you?”
“Yes.”
Jace: “He said you’re riding with me on this job.”
“Is that a problem?”
He revs the engine once, flexing a forearm as his hand closes loosely around the grip.
Jace: “Not yet.”
A helmet flies toward me. I barely catch it.…