“Look, this gig is stressful. I don’t talk about shit, but if you need to, get it out so we can keep rolling.”
Much as Nikki hated to admit it, Roni was right. Nikki opened her mouth and closed it. Where did she begin? What did she say? She’d hardwired herself to avoid girl talk at all costs. Doing what she did, she had to be the complete professional. Talking about a little lip-lock wasn’t in the realm of what was usually acceptable. But that was when Gabriel wasn’t in the picture.
“Let’s start with Gabriel,” Roni prompted.
“God.” Nikki buried her face in her hands. She could still feel the whisper of his touch and the sting of rejection when he pulled away from her. They were a mess.
“That good?”
“Complicated.”
“Considering you came back covered in blood and he’s storming around, I get that.”
Nikki couldn’t bring herself to say that Gabriel had kissed her. What if she’d imagined it? What if he was going to tell her it was all an accident? A product of adrenaline? When they’d been together, the adrenaline-fueled, post-op sex had been crazy. The best. She also couldn’t bring herself to talk about it when it could all be taken away from her.
“Have you ever killed someone?” She leaned against the cinder-block wall, soaking up the chill.
“Yeah.” Roni shrugged, as though it were no big deal.
“Does it bother you?”
“Sometimes, but I’ve never killed a man I wasn’t positive deserved it.”
But it wasn’t Nikki’s place to act as judge and jury. That reasoning wouldn’t work for her.
“How did you know?”
“First guy?” Roni held up a finger. “He was a Russian mobster with a reputation. We were . . . eighteen. Our dad was gone. This guy thought he could torture information out of us. He was going to rape Tori and make me watch. I shot him in the face.”
“Shit.” Nikki took a second swig of whiskey.
“Second guy was an all-around criminal of opportunity. He was wanted for the death of a couple people. Third was a hit man. My theory is, if they shoot at me, they wouldn’t feel guilty if it was me that died. So I shouldn’t either.”
Nikki nodded. It made sense, but what if the guy she’d shot was like Jed or David? What if he hadn’t known what he was doing?
“Think you can make it?” Roni asked.
“Yeah. I’m good.” Nikki screwed the cap back on the flask and handed it to Roni.
“Great. We’ve got plans tonight.” She stood and pocketed the flask.
“What are we doing?” Nikki followed Roni out of the bunk room and into the garage. Sunlight poured in from both sides of the open bays. Music blared over the sound of tools clanking and the general busy nature of a garage.
For a moment, all eyes were on her, but the only ones she noticed were Gabriel’s. He stood silhouetted by the afternoon sun, the rear yard of the garage behind him. She didn’t need to see his face to fill in the sharp lines, the thinned lips. They were already committed to memory.
“Gather round, everyone,” Aiden called. He grabbed a tablet from a drawer in his workstation and laid it on the top.
Nikki shuffled closer, but stayed on the outskirts of the group. By all rights, it should be her leading this powwow, but she wasn’t up to it. Maybe Gabriel was right to doubt her ability. She hadn’t done well today. Instead of staying low and focusing on what Gabriel was doing, she’d caused a mess that could have gotten them both killed.
“Looks like Wilson has torched his waterfront operation. Call came in to the Homestead cops about an explosion. Julian is there now with Matt Smith, who is trying to pull it into his jurisdiction.” Aiden passed the tablet around.
The images were a collection of the ones Nikki had taken, with the key focal point highlighted, and what appeared to be cell phone shots from after the blast. Those had to be additions from either Julian or Matt.
“Think they set off the lab?” Gabriel asked from right behind her.
Nikki shivered and her nipples puckered. It was a completely illogical reaction to him, and yet she couldn’t help the way her body responded to him.
“It looks that way,” Aiden replied.
“Damn it. Our leads?” Gabriel paced three steps to Nikki’s right and clasped his hands together behind his head. He was really worked up about something.
“Emery is working on tracking down the license plates in the pictures, where some of the equipment might have been purchased. Him and the girls are making a lot of progress, but he says they’ll need a few hours.” Aiden took the tablet back and powered it down. “Nikki, what’s our next step?”
Four sets of eyes turned to her.
She cleared her throat and straightened. Think. She was a damn FBI agent. She’d logged hundreds of hours in the field. One little shake-up wasn’t the end of her world.
“Can we speed up that process or is it better to leave Emery alone?” she asked.
“Honestly? He’ll work faster if we leave him alone. Besides,” Aiden checked his watch, “we’ve got to make an appearance at Stoke’s in thirty minutes. Anyone hungry?”
“Hell, yes,” Roni cheered.
“Stoke’s?” Nikki echoed.
“Food,” Roni replied.
“Shit. Aiden, I gotta bounce. I’m supposed to be on shift with the other derby refs.” Gabriel thumbed over his shoulder.
“Yeah, see you there, man.” Aiden waved Gabriel out of the garage.
Nikki turned away so she wouldn’t have to watch him leave. Last night she’d been sure it was all over. That either her broken heart would waste away in unrequited love, or she’d pick up the pieces and move on. The kiss had shattered her so completely. If he’d done it at another time, when she was stronger, maybe it wouldn’t have touched her soul. But he had, damn him.
She was pathetic.
“Come on.” Roni shimmied out of her coveralls and tossed them onto another workbench.
“I’m not—”
Roni hooked her arm around Nikki’s neck and pulled her out into the back lot, grinning.
“Shut up, will you?” Roni said between gritted teeth.
Nikki held her tongue and let the other woman draw her out to her silver Dodge Viper. They didn’t speak again until they were inside. Roni dropped the smiling, happy girl routine. It was rather refreshing.
“Look, we have to go tonight to support Madison, but we can split after we eat and go hang at my place until Emery calls us in. Gabriel will be busy. You won’t have to worry about him because he’s volunteering with the rest of the roller derby squad. League. Whatever.” She turned toward Nikki, one arm draped over the steering wheel.
“I don’t understand . . . I think I missed something . . .”
“Madison—Aiden’s chick? She plays roller derby. We got together and decided someone needed to join the league to . . . watch out for her. Gabriel is the only one of us who can stand on roller skates, so now he referees for the league and does fund-raisers with them. Especially at the car hop, because there’s biker dickbags that like to harass the girls.”
“Is this something we have to do?” She hated how whiny she sounded, but didn’t she get a pass after the day she’d had?
“Yes and no.” Roni shifted into drive and peeled out of the Classic Rides lot. “Madison did me a solid a couple months ago, she took the fall for what was our fault, and she makes Aiden less of a prick. I like her. She should be in witness protection—”
“For the Evers case?” Nikki struggled to recall all of the details.
“Yeah. But instead she hangs with us. We show up, people know to stay clear of her, she’s safe.”
“It’s good for appearances.”
“Exactly. You’re learning.”
“Daddy always said I was a fast student.” Nikki leaned back in her seat and rested her head against the seat.
“Don’t take this the wrong way, but you’re pretty frazzled.” Roni didn’t pull her punches. She didn’
t lay it out there like an accusation, but she wasn’t sugarcoating it, either.
“The first time I killed someone, it was to protect a little girl. He was determined to kill the kids in the same classroom where he’d been humiliated as a child. I hated that I had to pull the trigger, but I didn’t feel guilt over it. This time . . . I don’t know if I did the right thing or not.”
“I’m guessing you didn’t punch yourself in the face?”
“No.”
“And Gabriel didn’t bust your lip?”
“No.” But he had sucked it.
“Look, I don’t know who he was, but he attacked you. Did he have a gun?”
“Yes.”
“Then if you hadn’t killed him, he’d have killed you. You shot him before he could pull the trigger. It’s that simple.”
“But—”
“No,” Roni snapped. “No buts. What we do—it has to be that simple, or we’ll lose our minds wondering if we’re doing the right thing.”
Nikki nodded. She’d heard something similar in the academy, but Roni spoke with the kind of been there, done that conviction that resonated with Nikki.
“What happened with Gabriel?”
“Nothing.”
“Big fucking lie, but if that’s what you want to believe, whatever. Here.” Roni dug out a small zipper pouch from the tote sitting in the floorboard.
“What . . . ?” Nikki frowned at the bag.
“Makeup.”
She flipped the visor down and peered at her reflection. Her hair had a slight wave to it thanks to the humidity. The bruise on her jaw stood out under her pale skin, and her lower lip was puffy. She couldn’t be sure if that was due to the elbow she’d caught with her face or the little bite Gabriel had given her during their make-out session.
Thinking about his mouth on her made her insides heat. She pressed her thighs together and plucked out a bit of concealer. It was for appearances. If she was supposed to be part of the crew from Classic Rides, she couldn’t sport a fat lip and bruised jaw. It might give people the wrong impression. She smeared a bit more of the makeup here and there, keeping it light and natural.
“Find out anything today?” Nikki asked to fill the silence.
“Nah. We got word about your visit as we were heading out. Emery squeezed in some research on the other missing guys. Pretty sure they’re shacking up with your man Wilson. That’s crazy about Hillary.”
“Who is she?”
“Drift racer. Crazy bitch. Her family on her father’s side is pretty redneck. Her mother is Cuban. The brothers are pretty cool, but she’s totally unhinged.”
“Do you race against each other?”
“Oh, no. Drifting is done on a track and you’re judged by people who think they know shit. We just drive really fast.”
“Then how do you know each other?”
“Hillary used to come out to some of the scheduled races. We do a monthly big race out in the Everglades and she’d hang around. Had a thing for Gabriel, but he wouldn’t touch her with a ten-foot pole.”
“How do you think she’s involved?”
“Hillary is sponsored by a couple Cuban restaurants. Family connection type thing. We know the owners, not family, store drugs for the Cuban gang. It’s mostly cheap or highly addictive stuff. Meth. Cheese. Whatever the latest kid craze is. The DEA hadn’t been too interested in busting their people up. Betting Wilson’s people make the stuff, sell it to Hillary’s people, and they distribute it. The group has never been much on our radar. They’re pretty satisfied to stay in their neck of the woods, but now with Evers pretty much out of the picture and us not dealing, someone has to step up and fill the supply chain.”
“This was a lot less complicated when it was all about someone wanting to blow something up.”
“Yeah, wasn’t it?” Roni turned into a lot with a big STOKE’S BAR & GRILL marquee advertising something about Deadly Dames.
The red barnlike restaurant was flanked on three sides by a row of tin awnings. People parked under them and girls wearing less than Roni had dressed her in brought orders out on roller skates. Motorcycles clustered along the front of the establishment, and the rest of the patrons appeared to give them a wide berth.
Gabriel’s car was conspicuous, both because of the color and make, but also from the group of skaters standing around the hood. He’d changed into black shorts and a striped ref shirt.
Nikki slumped down lower in her seat, jealousy gnawing on her. Roni parked the car a couple of spots to the right of his and shifted into park.
Gabriel didn’t even glance their way, just kept staring at a clipboard. Maybe the kiss had been a mistake.
“He’s a freakishly good skater.” Roni popped her seat belt and turned to face her.
Of course Gabriel was a freakishly good skater. He was good at everything.
She knew she was being sullen, that she was allowing her less honorable emotions to get the best of her. Jealousy was the first sign of it. Gabriel wasn’t hers. There was nothing to be jealous about. They’d established that last night. And yet, no matter how sad it was, he was still the man she dreamed about.
Aiden’s Challenger and John’s classic Ford pickup pulled into the open spaces between the Viper and GTO, making the distance less obvious.
“I like you,” Roni announced.
Nikki tore her gaze away from Gabriel’s bulging arms crossed over his chest and back to her driver. Had she missed something? Was like code for something else?
The confusion must have leaked onto her face because Roni tossed her head back and laughed.
“Not in a lesbian way, though you are pretty hot in shorts.” Roni grinned.
“Thank you?” In the past, Nikki had gone to great lengths to cover herself up to avoid comments about her body so she could be respected for what she did, and not how she looked. It was weird hearing it now.
“I’ve known Gabriel almost as long as this gig has been going on. Can I tell you something?” The way Roni sat completely still, like a snake about to strike, was slightly unnerving. Then again, there were many things about the woman Nikki found slightly scary—if they weren’t on the same side.
“You’re going to tell me no matter what I say.”
“Pretty much.” Roni shrugged.
A girl in track shorts and a bikini top with skating alligators rolled to a stop outside Roni’s window. She tapped on the window and smiled.
“Aw, hell. This is Lily.” Roni rolled the window down and Lily leaned through the open space, bracing her arms on the car door.
“Hey.” Lily’s face was framed by curling dark hair, and there was something painfully perfect about her features that made her, in a word, beautiful.
“Lily, this is my new friend, Nikki.”
“Nice to meet you.” To Lily’s credit, she actually looked at Nikki when she said it. Judging by the way she raked her index finger over her thumb and how she bit her lip, Lily was preoccupied with something else.
“He’s not coming tonight,” Roni said.
“What?” Lily blinked.
Roni blew out a breath and rolled her eyes.
“Julian’s out working,” she repeated.
“Oh.” Lily blinked a couple of times, but it was clear the wind had been just knocked from her sails.
Roni ordered for both of them after a little chitchat and the roller girl skated off.
“Do I want to know?” Nikki asked.
“God. It makes my head hurt.” Roni massaged her temples. “The stuff that went down with Madison? Lily got involved for a hot second. Julian rescued her, and now she’s got it bad for him.”
“Okay.”
“I get that you’re seeing Aiden as the asshole and Julian as the more reasonable one in all of this—”
“Not really.”
“I’m sorry—what?”
“I met Julian. Before. He’s different now.” It was a difference that made her sick to her stomach.
“He is.”
“Yup. Which is why a pretty girl like her needs to stay the fuck away. He’d blow her mind and break her heart.”
“Or she could become a target.” Nikki stared across the parking lot at Lily entering their order into a terminal mounted on the side of the building. Nikki had to weigh every person who came into her life. Was she willing to put them at risk to be a friend? An acquaintance? There were costs to being who she was, and some of them were very high.
“Exactly.”
“You discourage her interest?” Nikki asked.
Roni shrugged. “I didn’t discourage anything. I tell her how it is. I might warn her, though. Back to you and Gabriel.”
“There isn’t a me and Gabriel.”
“Yeah, right. He’s hovered around you ever since you guys got back.”
“He thought I got injured. He’s always been the protective type.”
“Not with me. Or Tori. We’ve got ovaries, too.”
“Gabriel and I have history.”
“He’s not the type to let history dictate what he’s doing.”
Nikki didn’t want to hear this. Roni was giving her the building blocks to perpetuate her fantasies. What she needed to hear was that he’d banged every one of the girls in their skimpy clothes and had a line of clingers waiting to blow him every night when he was done with work. Of course, then Nikki would want to use their heads for target practice, but that was her problem to navigate, not his.
“I didn’t know about you two until you walked in the door, but now that I see you, things make sense.” Roni gestured at Gabriel, who stood with one arm draped over the side of Aiden’s Challenger, sipping a beer. “Look at him. He’s perfectly placed himself between Aiden’s car and Aiden while he does his job. He’s distancing himself from the girls. I never got why a guy with a hot ride and a decent face didn’t at least have someone he saw on the side. I’m not saying there haven’t been girls, but they don’t stick around long enough for any of us to know their names.”
“What are you trying to say?” And could Roni get it out any faster?
“All I’m saying is that you two have history and maybe it’s not done yet.”
“It’s over. It’s done. There’s nothing more to say.”
Chase Page 10