In the end, I gave up on working.
I watched the man from across my shop for close to ten minutes before he finally said, “What’s got you looking at me like that, Webber?”
I uncrossed my arms from my chest and headed toward the truck that Jasper was working on.
“I saw something a few weeks ago that I need to talk to you about,” I said.
Jasper frowned. “What?”
I’d also seen something a few weeks ago that had alarmed me even more.
“You’re still active duty with New Orleans Police Department,” I said. “On special loan to the FBI and homeland security for a joint task force that is set on investigating rogue one percent motorcycle clubs that are being put under the joint task force for gangs by Congress.”
“Apollo find that out for you?” Jasper asked, sounding calm.
But he had a tell.
His hands on the truck’s hood were white as he clenched the metal.
“No,” I answered. “Found that all out on my own.”
Jasper’s head dropped.
The scars on his neck and face pulled taut with the move, and I studied him as he tried to think up something to say and couldn’t.
He’d been investigating the club.
He’d gone through three whole years of being a Truth Teller, and I hadn’t seen the first goddamn sign.
What all did he have on us?
For some reason, though, I didn’t think he was going to share any of the information he’d found out or witnessed since he’d become one of us.
However, I couldn’t have him here.
It was a liability, and one day, they just might force him to talk.
“You need to leave,” I said. “You need to get the hell out of this club, and never look back, or I won’t be able to protect you.”
The others would kill him for what he’d done.
Not even Apollo knew.
I’d done this research on my own.
I’d borne the burden on my own for weeks now, and it was slowly killing me inside.
I liked Jasper.
I wanted him here.
But if I couldn’t trust him…
“Let me explain,” he said softly.
I shook my head. “There’s no explaining that’ll ever help. You need to leave. Now.”
A familiar car pulled into the driveway of my shop, and any other time, I would’ve smiled like a lovesick fool.