“Can’t you just picture it? You, and Dad, and Aidan, all in a tiny boat together, pissing over the edge, accidently catching Dad in the eye with a hook when you cast badly.”
“You’re cruel, you know that?” But he was full-on smiling now, and those missteps didn’t seem to matter so much.
“You have my keys?”
He produced them from his pocket and handed them over. He drove a Lexus; Ava knew he didn’t like her big, unwieldy truck, and probably had hated wedging it into apartment parking spaces all day.
“When’s your car get here?”
“Tomorrow, the movers said. I rented a storage space for the rest of my stuff, until I can put a deposit on the apartment.”
Ava nodded and climbed off the table, keys jangling. “You’re my victim till then. Come on. I’ll give you the royal Knoxville tour.”
And by the time they were done, the PD might have moved on. There was only so much explaining a girl could do when her entire family was on the most wanted list.
As they walked to the truck, Littlejohn headed for his bike, ready to follow them.
Ava winced. “Also…we kind of have a watchdog…”
It was just as well she was gone, Mercy reflected, when he finally wandered back toward the clubhouse to answer Aidan’s text summons, and didn’t spot Ava anywhere in sight. He had important shit to worry about; he didn’t have time to moon over little girls, even if the tattoo on his chest throbbed in time to his pulse, hurting like it had the day the needle had made her teeth marks permanent.
Whatever. Head in the game. Cops in the house. Time to knuckle down.
In the common room, Sergeant Fielding resembled a wounded deer circled by predators, the entire chapter – minus Troy, plus Maggie and Jackie – in a loose circle around him. To the cop’s credit, he didn’t shrink or spin; he faced Ghost, and didn’t present any outward nervousness to have armed men at his back.
Mercy slid in behind Walsh and got the faintest nod of hello.
“…not here to hassle you guys,” Fielding was saying. “I don’t like anyone getting murdered in my district.” Meaningful head tilt:anyone, including outlaws. “So if you know anything” – eyebrow lift – “you need to bring it to my attention. So I canhelpyou.” He did a slow turn, taking them all in with a schoolteacher look.
Jace, still drinking coffee, but largely sober at this point, said, “I heard a little mermaid hopped out of the river and did him in. Then she swam away.” He made wave motions with one hand.
Collier cuffed him hard in the back of the head and earned a “Jesus Christ.”
Mercy did a quick inventory of his new VP. Collier was bloodshot and bedraggled, visually haunted by the death of his former prospect. Poor man most likely blamed himself.
Ghost offered Fielding a humorless smile. “Gee, that’s real responsible of you, sarge, but I’m ‘fraid we already told you what we know last night.”
Undaunted, Fielding said, “Then you won’t mind going over it again. Who was first on the scene last night?”
“Two of my prospects,” Ghost said. He left Ava out of the story without missing a beat. He pointed to Harry. “The other one’s running errands.”
Ghost spent a good twenty minutes repeating himself creatively, before Maggie took the sergeant by the sleeve and moved him slowly toward the door, Jackie on his other side.
“We’ll let you know the second we hear anything,” she said in a placating voice so unlike her normal tone that all of them grinned. She walked Fielding out, then popped back in a moment later. “We need to make a run to the cemetery,” she told Ghost, “and hammer out the details there.”
Ghost kissed her, quickly. “Be careful.”
Harry fell into step behind the two women, following them out, just as he’d follow them on his bike.
Then it was members-only.
It was strange without James, like some integral part of the machine was missing. Not the engine, though. Ghost filled up the role of president with such alacrity, such sheer force of nature, that Mercy’s theory was proved correct: Ghost was and had always been the brain of the club. Now he could flex those muscles unimpeded, the fully-realized king he was intended to be all along.
Ghost lit a smoke and took a bar stool, opening the floor with one smooth flick of an eyebrow.
Aidan – the poor kid had been hoping to be named VP, though he had to have known he’d never be bumped ahead of Collier, or even Ratchet or Walsh – began the conversation. “Nancy, who answers the phone at the paper” – there were nods all around as they envisioned one of Aidan’s conquests, a semi-stunning blonde who he kept on the hook for her informational value (and other talents, Mercy figured) – “ said she was working late last night; they had a big issue due out and she got roped into filling in for one of the column beta readers.”
Ghost made aget on with itgesture.
