Talia giggled, kissing him again . . . just a little close to the mouth. I kept my face blank. Marsh looked toward me next.
“So what’s your story?”
“Coop is my cousin,” I told him. “Just got done serving time—tryin’ to figure out my next step. He’s been helping me out.”
Marsh nodded his head thoughtfully, and I knew he’d taken the bait. Two independents with questionable backgrounds could be useful to him.
“You ride, too?”
I grinned—wouldn’t have to lie about this part.
“Live to ride,” I said. “Worst part about bein’ inside was losin’ my bike. Now I’m on the road every day. Feels like I can breathe again.”
Marsh nodded.
“Enjoy yourselves—we throw a good party, and there’s always room for independents around here, so long as they know their place.”
“Appreciate the hospitality,” Gage said. “We’ll keep our eyes open, let you know if we see anything you should know about.”
“Sounds good.”
Marsh gave Talia one last squeeze, then turned away, clearly done with us. I shared a glance with Gage—that’d gone well.
“More beer,” Sadie whined, but Talia wanted to do shots, pulling us in another direction. Marsh’s sister might be hot as hell, but thank God that Gage had to deal with her. All issues with Mel aside, no fuckin’ way I’d want to stick my dick in that cunt.
Teeth, I’m tellin’ you.
Bitch would probably bite it right off.
• • •
Hours passed—felt like the party was endless.
We’d been drinking all night, although I’d been dumping mine quietly or pawning it off on Sadie, who was now so wasted I wasn’t sure how I’d get her home again. She sure as shit wouldn’t be able to stay on a bike. Talia thought this was hysterical—apparently Sadie did the same thing every weekend with a new guy (or two, or six) and sometimes she just crashed at the club, where anyone could have a go at her. Good friend that she was, Talia assured me that she always rolled Sadie onto her side before leaving her behind.
You know, so she wouldn’t drown in her own vomit.
Generally I tried to stay pretty open-minded about people—not my place to judge—but Talia made it difficult. As for Sadie, I felt more sorry for her than anything else. I mean, she was an adult making her own decisions, but shit like that doesn’t happen in a vacuum. Something had fucked her up along the way. Horrible human being that I am, I mostly just felt relieved it wasn’t my job to rescue her.
We hadn’t seen Hands yet—so far the best part of the night. Maybe his passing through town had been a random coincidence after all. Generally I didn’t believe in those, but I guess anything’s possible.
As it turned out, I was right.
There’s no such thing as coincidence.
• • •
We were standing out by the barrels talking to some of the brothers—the newer ones, Marsh’s puppets—when Gage reached up to scratch his nose. That was our sign. I followed the line of his gaze to see a stringy little guy, hardly taller than Sadie, talking to Marsh. His hair was shaved, with a tattoo of a swastika on the back of his head. Aryan. Fuckin’ great, Gage hadn’t mentioned that. Those guys were crazy as shit, with their bombs and their bunkers.
We had to take care of this fucker and do it in a way that wouldn’t raise any questions. Gage was already turning away, making sure that Handsy-boy couldn’t get a look at his face.
I needed a diversion.
Up to this point, I’d seen Sadie as annoying and pitiable, but she chose that moment to make herself useful.
“I’m gonna puke!” she wailed, turning toward Talia frantically. Her friend—also drunk off her ass by this point—started laughing and then Sadie exploded.
Literally.
I’ve never seen so much barf come out of one human being, and that includes the time six of the brothers got food poisoning from some bad macaroni salad. She was spraying everyone and everything, including Talia, who went from laughing to screaming in an instant, pointing and yelling like a fuckin’ banshee.
Empathetic fuckers that they were, the Nighthawk guys lucky enough to be out of range seemed to find this hilarious, Marsh and Hands included. I edged toward them, keeping an eye on Handsy-boy as a prospect came running with a hose. He passed me and I took the opportunity to “trip” over the hose, crashing into the snitch as hard as I could. We hit the pavement together hard, and I’m not gonna lie—it hurt like a sonofabitch.
The fuckers around us laughed even harder.
“Jesus,” I moaned, rolling to my side as I tried to catch my breath. Hands’s face was right next to mine, mouth slack. I watched as someone reached down, checking the pulse at his neck.
“Out cold,” a man said, sounding vaguely pleased by this news. I looked up to see one of the older brothers—part of the pre-Marsh crew, I guess, because he wasn’t wearing a shiny new cut—kneeling next to us.
“Hey, I’m really sorry about that,” I whined, trying to sound harmless and sincere at the same time. “I don’t know what happened.”
“Prospect tripped you,” he said. “You okay?”
“Yeah, I’m fine,” I said, although my side ached like a motherfucker. If I’d cracked a rib, Gage was gonna owe me. “He gonna be okay?”
Hands chose that moment to groan, blinking slowly.