When she turned to regard him over her shoulder, her smile was wondrous, her lips soft and pink. “It’s beautiful,” she murmured. “Why’d you ever want to leave?”
But then, like always happened, he remembered that Ava had never been to New Orleans with him.
And then his eyes opened, like old rusty steel vent shutters, heavy and gritty with the sleep he hadn’t had enough of. He was in the dorm room where he’d had Ava in his lap the night before, alone, still fully dressed, and mildly hungover. Last night, the party had dispersed, and they’d sat vigil around the bar, waiting for news from the hospital. Hound and Rottie had gone hunting, wanting to be just the two of them, keeping low profiles on the streets as they sniffed around for whispers of what had happened at Dartmoor.
In truth, he wasn’t sure why he’d hoped for a peaceful return. Knoxville had always been both the best and worst place for him. That would never change.
He wouldn’t shed any tears for Andre on a personal level; he hadn’t known him well and couldn’t claim to have liked him. But on a club level, the murder of any member was a capital offense. Especially since Andre’s murder hadn’t been about him, but about the colors he wore. It was a murder against the club, not just the man in it.
Welcome back, Merc. Now get to work.
The clubhouse was quiet, but in the distance, he could hear the humming of air wrenches at the bike shop. Whatever internal drama within the MC, it was a Saturday, a work day, and the Dartmoor businesses would be running like always.
Mercy shoved out of bed, brushed his teeth with a swallow of the Johnnie Walker he’d left on the nightstand, and went to greet the day.
The common room was in a crepe streamer shambles, chip crumbs, empty bottles, damp napkins, and condom wrappers littering the floor and every table service. A hangaround was in the process of sweeping and trash-collecting. The kid nodded to Mercy on his way through and said a quick “morning, sir.” Louisiana members Matt and Grady were at the bar, talking over coffee, the hangaround behind the bar laying out napkins, swizzle sticks and a jar of creamer.
“I like how respectful the flunkies are around here,” Mercy said as he climbed onto the stool next to Matt. “They call me Sir. I could get used to that.”
Grady chuckled a thick, smoker’s laugh. “Whoever said these Millennials can’t respect their elders was wrong. They find their manners when it counts.”
“You’re the only one who thinks that,” Matt said, voice distracted. He was reading a newspaper and slid it toward Mercy. “Read that. See what you’re getting yourself into.”
The front page declared that the mayor, some dick named Stephens, was “vowing” to shut down the MC. There was a hastily snapped nighttime photo of the ambulance leaving the clubhouse, clearly taken from a distance. So the press had been alerted. That photographer had been waiting to take photos, before anyone knew that Andre was being carted off to the hospital.
Then the name struck home:Stephens. Mercy had never met the Knoxville mayor, but he’d had an intimate run-in with the man’s son, Mason Jr. The night five years ago filled his mind and crippled him a moment, bringing back to him that awful fear and tenderness that had accompanied his usual rush of furious adrenaline. That night, he’d been murderous on Ava’s behalf, and it was an experience he had no desire to repeat. It was too lethal, that kind of rage, too all-consuming.
“You picked a good time to patch Tennessee,” Grady said with an eyebrow twitch. “Good luck with all that shit.”
Mercy pushed the paper back as the hangaround handed him a steaming mug of coffee. He nodded a thanks. “Nothin’ I haven’t seen before,” he said. “I can handle it.”
Grady smirked. “Just make sure you’re handling the right thing.”
Matt chuckled into his coffee.
“I could take offense to that,” Mercy said. He sipped his coffee and found it sugared just the right amount, no cream. He saluted the hangaround with his mug and earned a pleased smile for it. Knoxville hadwaybetter flunkies than NOLA.
A sudden tangle of footfalls heralded brothers coming in the front door.
“Good, you’re up,” Ghost said as he stepped into sight, a supportive arm ready for an unsteady James should the president wobble. “You ready for church?”
“Yeah.” Mercy took a slug of his coffee and slid off the stool with one last glance for his NOLA brethren. Grady and Matt gave him openly confused glances; neither of them understood why he’d throw himself against temptation again, not after what had happened before.
But that wasn’t their business.
To Ghost, he said, “Let’s do it.”
“Purse, keys, phone…” Ava checked her reflection in the floor length mirror on the back of her bedroom door. She wore pressed black skinny trousers, black leather pumps, and a pale blue summer sweater over her sleeveless white silk blouse. She’d flat-ironed her wavy hair and then secured it in a sleek ponytail. In her ears, she wore the diamond studs Ghost had given her for her high school graduation. Her fingernails were unpainted.
All very professional and severe.
She was a totally different girl than she’d been the last time she’d checked her outfit in this mirror.
“Ten till!” Maggie called from down the hall.
“I know!” she called back. She snatched her slender leather briefcase off the bed and ducked into the hall, trying not to hurry so fast that her heels got tripped up in the carpet nap.
Maggie was packing a brown bag lunch for herself at the kitchen table, and she had company. Jace sat at the table, drinking coffee out of a Tweety and Sylvester mug, his eyes half-open and the color of a bruised pomegranate. He was in the rumpled flannel Ava had seen him in the night before.
