“And Eve? Where is she?”
T-Bone and Spike shrugged. “After Kevin disappeared,” the bald biker said, “word went out that the Denver boys were looking for her. She freaked out when the first little rumors started flowing in. Started talking about how she needed to leave, how Kevin was going to leave her holding the bag on this. So we kind of helped her skip town.”
“Well, wasn’t that sweet of you?” I asked, my words dripping with a little more venom than I’d intended. “Getting my baby sister wrapped up in a world of drugs and crime, then helping her avoid responsibility.”
“Look,” Spike said after finishing the last of his beer and slamming the bottle down, “your little sister is a fucking adult. She can join the army, she can vote, she do whatever the hell she wants. It’s a free country. Her life is hers. Yeah, she wanted to get involved with this shit. What was I supposed to say? ‘Sorry, honey, this is for real adults. Not pretend ones like you. Gee, I hope your big sister doesn’t get mad at me.’”
I shook my head. “At least you protected her from this Kevin guy. Dead or not, he doesn’t exactly sound stable.” I took the last swig of beer and Silverback got up to grab me another. “So, where’d you take her? You said she wanted to skip town, right?”
Spike sat there for a minute, trailing a line of water from the condensation ring like a ten year-old boy who got his hand caught in the cookie jar.
“Well?” Jake asked. “Where’d you take her, Spike?”
“Look, you find Lilith, or Eve, you don’t tell her I told you, okay? She’d kill me. She trusts us, and all.”
“Your secret’s safe with me,” I said. “Now, where the hell did you take her?”
“Wyoming. Casper, Wyoming, middle of the state. She knew a chick up there, someone she’d met that had been passing through, and she figured she could lay low. I mean, who the fuck would go hide in Casper of all places?”
“Besides friendly ghosts?” Jake asked.
Spike cracked a smile. “That’s a good one, man. Know what, man? You’re funny.”
“So I’ve heard,” Jake replied, smiling around the mouth of his beer as he took another swallow. He glanced toward me as he set the beer down, and his smile dropped. “Anything else you can tell us? Where you might have dropped her off? Anything like that?”
“Little motel near the north side of town. Said she was meeting her friend around there. Only one around that I saw, right off the highway. Sage and something. Sage and Sun, I think, right there on the west side of town.”
“Her friend got a name?”
“Jasmine, I think.”
I made a face. Jasmine? I didn’t know a Jasmine. “Any idea how my sister might have met her?”
Spike shrugged. “Ya got me. I mean, hell, we barely know Eve. Didn’t even know she had a fucking sister. Thought her name was Lilith for these last few months. Maybe she met her down in Enchanted Rock while she was staying there? I don’t know.”
Well, that was sweet, wasn’t it? Here I was, crossing over half a state to try and save my sister’s life. Turns out, she never even thought of me or mentioned me to her friends. Didn’t surprise me in the least. Eve had always been selfish like that, only thinking of herself and no one else. “Remember what this girl looked like?” I asked.
Spike made a face. “Blonde, young. Real pretty, though. Kind of a hippie chick. Ears all pierced up, had them dreadlocks. Ended up getting a room and staying the night out there before I rode back. Tried to get her to come have a drink with me and Eve, but she wasn’t having any of it. Said she was keeping herself pure during the full moon. Some shit like that.”
Jake made a face, his brows coming together just the slightest, like he was concerned. None of the bikers noticed it. Honestly, it was so subtle I was surprised I caught it.
I cleared my throat a little, trying to get his attention so I could see what was wrong, but he didn’t even look over at me.
“Anything else?” Jake asked.
“Just, man, we’re real sorry she got wrapped up in all Kevin’s bullshit. Her having to run and hide, all that. It ain’t cool. But, you know, shit happens.”
“Shit happens?” I asked, my words coming out angrier than I’d intended as I put both hands on the table. “That’s what you have to fucking say for yourselves? My baby sister is out running from the mafia because they think she owes them drug money,now, and all you’ve got is ‘shit happens?’”
The bikers shrank back a little at my words. Jake reached over to cover my hand with his.
I shot Jake a look. “Don’t. Don’t let them off on this. They’re the ones who helped her get into this mess. And now we’re the ones who have to get her out.”
He squeezed gently. “I know that,” he said. “But yelling at them isn’t going to accomplish anything. Best we can do now is head up to Casper, see if we can’t pick up the trail there.”
I sighed. “Anything else you can think of?”
He shook his head and turned his attention to our unexpected allies. “Well, gentlemen, thank you for your cooperation. I think we’ve got enough to go on.”
“Y’all got a card or anything? In case we hear from her or something?”
Jake frowned and shook his head. “Didn’t bring any with me.”
“He’s with Frost Security if you need to check him out,” I said helpfully. “Got a pen?”
Russell pulled one from his pocket and handed it over to me as Spike gave Jake a look. They locked eyes.
I scrawled my number on the back of Lacy’s business card and slid it over to the biker. “Please call me if you hear anything. I’m hoping we can do something to help her.”
Spike broke long enough from his impromptu staring competition with Jake to take my card. He looked it over and stuffed it in his hip pocket. When he spoke, his tone had changed the tiniest amount. It become a little more menacing. “Yeah. Y’all probably need to get on the road, don’t you? Long drive to Casper.”
I looked over at Jake, and he looked back at me. Was it something I’d said? We both pushed back from the table. “Thanks for the beer,” Jake said as we went to stand. “We’ll show ourselves out.”
“Yeah,” Spike said. “You do that.”
Without any more goodbyes or thanks, we slipped out of the backroom and headed into the bar. Jake guided me past the bartender at a quick pace, his hand on my lower back, his body pressed against mine.
“Stop shoving me, Jake,” I said as we emerged from Crossroads and stepped into the bright, late morning sun. “What the hell was that?”
Just as we stepped up to the truck, the bar’s front door opened up.
“Mr. Jake?” called a voice from behind us. “A word, before you go?”
I glanced back. It was Spike, all by himself. He had on his heavy leather biker jacket, hunched up against the cold. And his aluminum baseball bat in hand.
Chapter Twenty-five – Jake
I pushed Elise to the pickup. “I’ll handle this.”
“What the hell, Jake?” she asked to my back as I headed right for Spike, my hand at a conspicuous distance from my gun. Bat or no bat, I was pretty sure I could handle him. But, still, I didn’t want to fight him.
Spike turned his head and spat as I got within muttering distance. “Thought you seemed shifty when you walked in here, Jake. Seemed weird when she said you were her private detective, but didn’t mention the name of the place you worked for.”
I knew it was a bad move for Elise to mention the name Frost Security or to hand over our business card, but I couldn’t say anything inside Crossroads without making them suspicious. I came to stop about ten feet from him, close enough we could speak our minds and not be overheard by Elise, but far enough that neither of us would be able to get a jump on the other.
“She didn’t know,” I said, squaring my shoulders, kept my eyes trained right on him. If he took a swing with that slugger, I wanted to see it coming.
“I was up on that fucking mountain. That night.�
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“From the reaction on your face when you heard who I worked for, I figured as much.”
“She know?”
Gravel crunched behind me, and I could tell it was the sound of Elise’s footsteps as she began to approach us. “Jake? What’s wrong?”
I put a hand out towards her. “This is between me and him, Elise. Nothing to do with you or your sister.”
Gravel and snow crunched beneath boots as she slowly, carefully walked away.
He sneered. “Got the hots for her, don’t you?”
I shrugged. “Maybe. Doesn’t mean I won’t kick your ass up and down this parking lot in front of her, though.”
“Why don’t you tell her, then? Huh? Ain’t you worried she’s gonna find a tail first time she sees you without your jeans?”
“No reason for her to know, that’s all,” I said with a shake of my head. “Besides, it doesn’t exactly work that way.”
“What the hell are you fucking freaks, anyways? Government experiments? Said you served. Was that what it was? Them mixing you up in a blender with wolf blood or some shit?”
“Nope. We’ve been around long as humans. More or less, still are human.”
“Wolf-men? Like that Michael J. Fox movie?”
“Something like that, I guess. And sorry to disappoint, but I play soccer, not basketball.”
He smirked. “Ain’t that sweet?”
“Look. I appreciate your help. And, clearly, you want to do some ass-kicking, but you don’t want the guys inside to know why you’re doing it.”
“Think T-Bone or those guys would believe me if I told ‘em?”
I shook my head. “Nope. You don’t either. Otherwise, you would’ve told them.”
“Course I ain’t told ‘em. They’d think I started to hit the product. None of us up there have said anything.”
“That’s good,” I said evenly. “It’ll keep you out of the county mental ward.”
“I even looked for y’all on the internet. You know that?”
“What’d you find?”
“Fuck all.”
I nodded. “Sounds about right. We keep things quiet.”
“More on Bigfoot than there is on y’all.”
“Spike, listen. I’d love to talk about this all day. But I got a woman out there in Casper that I gotta find. Now, you can go ahead and let me leave, and me and my friends will keep clear of here. Or you can take a swing with that bat of yours and start something you and your crew can’t finish. In all my years, I’ve never back down from a fight, not once. And it’s a little late in life to break that record.”
He swallowed, his Adam’s apple bobbing up and down. His eyes shifted. Beads of sweat broke out on his bald head as he licked his lips. He didn’t know which way he wanted this to go. He’d been so sure when he grabbed that bat, but now he was pretty sure I’d win in a fight. After all, I’d nearly taken out him and three other guys in a small room.
“Make your choice, Spike. I still got a long ass drive ahead of me.”
His eyes fell away from mine as he took a step back. “Don’t ever come back to Crossroads. You hear me?”
“Ain’t exactly my scene anyway. And, by the way, I remember the part of your story about you coming to Enchanted Rock over the last few months. Our warning still stands. I find out again that you guys are running drugs through town or trying any kind of bullshit, we’ll be coming back up here to Crossroads whether you like it or not. And it won’t be to just share a beer and talk about the first time we met on that mountain.”
His face went white.
“Hear me?”
He nodded. “Yeah. I hear you.”
“Good. Now walk back inside, and you tell your buddies you just forgot to tell me something about Eve. Got it?”
He didn’t say anything.
I balled my hand into a fast, squeezed so tight all the knuckles in my right popped like a bowl of Rice Krispies.
He took a step back.
“Got it?” I growled.
Spike nodded. “This ain’t over,” he said with a little stammer. “Y’all know that, right?”
“Look, Spike, don’t start something we both might regret. You think it was bad up on that mountain? We didn’t even bring our A game last time. So just turn around and take your shitty little bat back inside, and I’ll forget you ever stepped up to me.”
“I’m just saying–”
“Nope. I think we’ve both had enough of that. Go.”
I turned my back on him and headed for the truck, my ears wide open for any sound of his movement.
He was slow, almost lumbering, his boots crunching in the gravel as he came up behind me, working up to full speed.
“Jake!” Elise called, but I was already reacting, my adrenaline already pumping.
I spun, rushed at him, my right hand up and my left arm low as he was on the backside of his swing.
He didn’t have time to react, to block. His eyes just went wide, shocked at my speed.
I slammed my shoulder into his elbows, blocking his swing, reached around, and grabbed the bat as I punched him in the throat with my free hand.
Spike stumbled back, gasping and tripping over his own feet.
I snatched the bat from his grasp and tossed it aside as he, sputtering for air, fell backwards onto the gravel and ice in a twist of limbs.
Heart hammering in my chest, I turned back to Elise, walking as fast as I could without looking like I was running. “Pickup,” I barked. “Now.”
“Jake!”
“I said now, Elise!”
We both hopped in the pickup and she tossed me the keys. “Is he going to be okay? Did you hurt him?”
“Just his ego,” I replied as I started the pickup and threw it into first. “His throat will be sore, and drinking a beer’s going to be hard for a couple days.”
“Where’d you learn to do that?”
“Just basic training,” I said. “Do it long enough, never goes away. Now let’s get out of here before he gets to his feet. Besides, I’m hungry.”
“Jesus Christ, Jake,” she said, craning her neck to look at Spike still hunched over, as we pulled out onto the highway.
“Look, we’ve got about eight hours ahead of us, and it’s almost noon. If we don’t eat lunch soon, I’m going to start getting cranky.”
Her stomach grumbled audibly, loud enough that even if I hadn’t had shifter senses I could’ve heard it. “Point taken,” she said. “Are you okay? Did he hurt you?”
I shook my head. “Just fine. You? You handling everything okay?”
She swallowed and nodded. “Yeah. Yeah, all things considered, I think so. I mean, my sister was a drug mule, is hiding another state over, and the mob put a hit out on her because they think she stole their coke. What else could possibly go wrong?”
Chapter Twenty-six – Elise
We drove through Yellow Rose, heading away from Crossroads and looking for a place to eat.
Even though Jake and Spike had kept their voices low, I’d heard some of what they’d been discussing. Mainly the part about Jake being attracted to me. The bald leader of this Skull and Bones chapter had put it in a little more crude phrasing, though.
I glanced a little nervously over to Jake. For a guy who’d just been in two fights in the last hour or so, he looked pretty decent. His full, black hair was a little disheveled and his shirt was a bit wrinkled, but other than that, he looked fine. Calm, collected. Almost as if everything that had happened this morning was part of a completely normal, run-of-the-mill day. And, hell, maybe it was. I didn’t know what kind of situations private security contractors got themselves into while they were on the job.
And, I had to admit, it was kind of exciting. This idea that we were racing around, handling a case together. That we were making a difference. That we were trying to, against all odds, find something that was lost. What else did I have to look forward to back home? Leading a nature hike? Walking the lines to make sure our fences were
all patched? After all, the only thing back home was an empty farmhouse and land that had to wait until spring for the new crops to be planted.
I looked back out the window, at the small town of Yellow Rose as we passed it by. Even in this town that had been mostly ignored by tourists and the wealthy, it was beautiful. A little rundown and in desperate need of a new coat of paint, maybe, but still gorgeous.
I shook my head, biting my lip. I still couldn’t believe he was doing all this for me and my sister. Financing this trip with his own money, working on his vacation time, getting into bar fights with bikers and parking lot brawls.
And, wow, just wow, the way he’d moved. Any other guy, I would have figured Spike would have hit a home run with that baseball bat of his. But Jake? I’d never seen anyone move that fast before, not in my life. He was like something out of an action film! Tall, dark, handsome, and deadly. And he’d barely even broken a sweat while he was taking Spike down.
But it wasn’t even the way he’d fought Spike that did it for me. It was the way his hands felt on mine, the way he guided me at the small of my back. It was just warm, protective. Like he belonged there.
I could fall in love with a guy like that.
Even with Eve missing and on the run, though, I hadn’t realized what true fear was, not until I saw those bikers ganged up on him in the backroom. Or the moment I saw Spike’s bat swinging for the stands, aimed right at Jake’s head. My effort to find Eve was familial obligation and worry for my baby sister. My fear for him was something else. Like a frigid, ice-encrusted claw gripping my heart, twisting my insides at the sight of his pain.
Even with my previous boyfriends, some of whom had been pretty rough guys, I’d never felt that moment of terror. That moment of this all being over. Of how I’d found this wonderful, almost perfect guy, only to have him torn away from this world right in front of me. Our imagined life together had practically flashed in front of my eyes, a life I’d never even realized I’d been picturing since the first moment I met him.
“How’s that place look?” he asked, nodding to an old, 50’s style diner up on the left. It was covered in dull aluminum siding, and had that weird bubble architecture that made everything from that era look strangely sci-fi. Like we’d built the atomic bomb, and the next spot on America’s destination was going to be the moon, then Mars, then points unknown. The sky wasn’t even the limit, back then.
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