“Karaoke?”
“I really can’t think of a bigger boner killer than African wild dogs singing.”
Honestly? Neither could he.
* * *
Max wasn’t planning on dancing until Dutch showed up at the party. He grabbed her hand and spun her out into the middle of the dance floor. From there, they busted into the Hustle, with Streep and Tock on either side of them. The wild dogs loved it.
Her big sister, however, just looked horrified. She dropped her head and covered her face until Max noticed the female who sat down at the booth with her.
She grabbed Dutch’s hand and he spun her into his arms.
“Hey,” she said as they moved together, “isn’t that the She-lion from the street near our house?”
“Yeah.”
“She was at the thing.”
“What thing?” he asked, as they moved from the Hustle into the Bump.
“At the NYPD office. She was with the guys who were trying to blackmail me and my team.”
“From what I hear, those guys are still in the hospital. So she’s here on her own.”
“Spin me to Tock.”
He did.
“Did you or Nelle ever find out what team those guys belonged to? The ones at the NYPD office?”
“Nope. There’s nothing on them. And if Nelle can’t find out—”
“Got it.”
She Hustled her way back over to Dutch. “Dance me to Charlie.”
Her friend took her hands, pulled her in, and lifted her. Then he carried her over to the table.
“What are you two doing?” Charlie asked.
“I am impressing the masses,” Dutch said with a shoulder shimmy, then he shimmied his ass back to the others.
“I begged you to get better friends,” Charlie only half-joked.
Max pulled a chair from another table and put it right beside the woman harassing her sister. “You shouldn’t be here.”
Charlie scratched her forehead. “Max—”
“If you think you’re going to blackmail my sister like you tried to do to me, I’ll make sure the only thing you know for the rest of your miserable life is pain.”
“Imani, could you excuse us?” Charlie said.
“Yeah. I’ll text you tomorrow.”
Max waited until the She-cat had walked away before turning to her sister. “Are you letting that bitch blackmail you?”
“I need you to calm down.”
“I need you to grow a set. Don’t let her push you into anything!”
“I’m not!”
“Then what are you doing?”
Charlie shrugged. “I’m taking a job.”
“A job?”
“Yeah.”
“Doing what?”
“Hopefully . . . helping people. She’ll give me the resources I need and the intel, and I do what I do.”
“You don’t even know her.”
“No, I don’t. But I don’t get a bad vibe from her either. And she’s not stupid.” She rested her elbow on the table and her chin on her fist. “I don’t know. But I want to give it a try.”
“Why?”
“I need a job, Max. I need to do something with my life. Something that provides regular money that I don’t have to worry about laundering.”
“Is this about my mother again?”
“No. It’s about me.”
“You’re putting yourself at risk. Putting us at risk.”
“We’re always at risk. We’re MacKilligans. Which is also the reason this is the closest I will ever get to a government job. So I’m going to try it out.”
Max knew her sister was probably right, but she wanted to talk to Imani. She left the table as Charlie yelled, “I’m not running after you! I’m not!”
“Good!”
* * *
Zé walked through the club with the keycard that Nelle had given him burning a hole in his back pocket.
He was trying to find Max but everyone kept getting in his way. He’d never been so popular. He wasn’t sure he wanted to be that popular. But the wild dogs kept introducing themselves. He didn’t know why. And the cats and wolves kept sort of challenging him with looks and the occasional body slam. He also didn’t know why.
Honestly, he just wanted to find Max and get out of here.
When Dutch landed on the ground in front of him, Zé stepped over him and kept going.
“Aren’t you going to help me up?”
“Nope.”
Zé did stop at the bar, though, when he saw Charlie standing there . . . seething. And the woman seethed well. Arms crossed over her chest, brown eyes flashing. And every predator in the room avoiding her.
“Hey, Charlie. Are you okay?”
“She’s making me crazy!”
That was direct.
“She makes me crazy, too,” he admitted.
“I’m just trying to do what’s right for me and our family. So I don’t need her shit.”
“I understand.”
“Why does everything I do always have to be about my sisters?”
“It doesn’t.”
“Are you just agreeing with me?”
“No. But I can tell you and Max are close. She just wants you to be happy and you just want her to be happy. The pair of you are running around, trying to make each other happy. It’s sickeningly sweet. Or would be if she wasn’t always covered in military knives under her clothes and even now you have a .45 holstered to the back of your jeans.”
Charlie looked over her shoulder. “Oh, can you see it?”
“No. The T-shirt covers it.”
“Great.” She gave a small smile. “You really care about Max, don’t you?”
“She’s insane and dangerous and has managed to convince my old team leader that I am taking advantage of a mentally unstable woman. How could I not care about her?”
Charlie’s snort turned into a laugh, her wide smile lighting up her face.
“Come on.” She grabbed his hand. “Let’s go find her. I’ll slap her around a little bit, then you can take her home.”
“That’s big of you, Charlie.”
She wrapped her arm around his back. “Isn’t it?”
* * *
Max lost Imani in one of the hallways. She sniffed the air but there were tons of cats and dogs in the club, making it hard to focus on just one scent.
Thinking she caught the female’s scent going down a flight of stairs, Max followed. But when she opened the first-floor door it was another hallway with exit doors at each end.
“Fuck.”
She sniffed the air again but she couldn’t catch anything specific.
Making a guess, she took a right and went through the exit.
Imani had already made it to the end of the alleyway by the time Max stepped outside. She followed, but abruptly stopped.
“Seriously?” she demanded, turning to again face the cousin who wouldn’t let it go. Whatever “it” might be. “Woman, what is wrong with you?”
“Just wanted to tell ya,” Mairi said, “I’m going to find your da and bring him to Uncle Will. Let him deal with his bastard half-brother.” She suddenly grinned. “He’s gonna rip ’im apart.”
Max waited for more but when she didn’t get any, she shrugged and said, “Okay.”
Her cousin continued to grin for a little longer but it eventually faded and she asked, “What do you mean, ‘okay’?”
“Is there another meaning for ‘okay’? Some Scottish slang meaning I’m unaware of?”
She took a few steps closer to Max. “You know what Uncle Will’s gonna do to him . . . yeah?”
“I’m aware. So’s Charlie. You might make Stevie cry . . . for about five minutes. If that’s the reaction you’re hoping for. Other than that, I don’t know what you want from me. Or why you’re even bothering to tell me.”
This time, Max stepped closer until she was inches from her cousin. “What do you really want from me, cousin?”
“I
guess just a challenge. Something fun to do.”
“You think this is fun? Tracking me down at a party you weren’t invited to, hiding in an alleyway that you hope I’ll come through at some point in the evening, and talking to me when neither of us likes each other? You think that’s fun?”
“Terrorizing you is fun.”
“So you don’t have friends.”
“What?”
“If you had friends, sweetie, you’d be hanging out with them. Not ‘terrorizing’ me. And yet here you are. Have you thought about joining a club? You’re . . . foreign. Don’t your people love soccer?”
“Football.”
“Oh, come on. That’s not really football. Until you people have a Mean Joe Green on your team, you don’t know what football is.”
“Who?”
“One of my grandfather’s favorite football players. He was amazing. You can catch some of his plays on You—”
“Stop talking!”
“There’s no need to yell. I understand your unhappiness.”
“I am not unhappy.”
“Really? Because you don’t really appear happy.”
“You know what I really want from you, cousin?” Mairi exploded.
“Again with the yelling.”
“I want to see you suffer!” Mairi suddenly hissed, true badger rage filling her up, turning Mairi’s pale skin a bright, angry red. “I want to see you in torment before I finally end you.”
“God, sweetie,” Max told her with intense honesty. “That is the saddest thing I’ve ever heard.”
Mairi’s entire body twitched a bit. “What?”
“Don’t you think that’s a sad way for you to live? You don’t even know me, but you spend your days hating me. Plotting what you’re going to do next. And I know you want me to hate you back so we can have this big . . . badger war? I guess. But I could not give a flying fuck about you.” She shrugged. “Sorry.”
That badger rage exploded and her cousin grabbed Max by the throat, slamming her against the wall.
That’s when Max began laughing. She couldn’t help it. Because even when the crazed bitch was punching her in the face, even when she was choking her with her bare hands, even when she was reaching for one of the knives Max had on under her T-shirt . . . Max couldn’t get past the fact that the terrifying and horrible Mairi MacKilligan was letting Max get to her simply by doing what her mother had sort of done to Charlie earlier that day.
With one hand still gripping Max’s throat, Mairi used her free hand to raise the blade she now held high above her head. Based on her aim, Max knew that she wasn’t going for the heart, which was the second-best way to kill a honey badger. She wanted to stab her in the face. She wanted to scar her.
It was like she had something to prove, but Max didn’t know what it was. That she was a better fighter than Max? That she was stronger? Meaner? Deadlier? Did any of that matter? Even with Max dead, Mairi’s life would still suck. Max’s death wouldn’t fix that for her.
The knife came down, and Max raised her forearm at the last second. The blade tore through skin, flesh, and bone.
And still Max laughed. Despite the pain.
Then Charlie was there. Coming in behind Mairi and yanking the blade away from them both. She yanked their cousin to her feet and began stabbing at her. Hitting her in the neck, the chest, even the face; gripping Mairi’s hair so she couldn’t get away without losing a good chunk.
Something that she actually did when she couldn’t stand being hit with the blade anymore.
Max cringed when she heard that horrible sound. Charlie left standing there with a blood-covered knife and part of Mairi’s scalp dangling from her fist.
Charlie screamed as their cousin sprinted away from her. A scream of rage and warning.
Until she winced from pain, Max hadn’t realized that Zé held her arm.
“Charlie!” Zé ordered, getting her sister’s attention. “Hold Max’s arm. I’ll be right back.” He waited for Charlie to replace him and then he ran back into the club.
They didn’t speak to each other but they were no longer mad either.
Zé returned quickly with a club T-shirt. He crouched beside her and began to wrap the wound. “We should take her to the hospital.”
“Why?” Max and Charlie asked together.
“The knife went through the arm. There might be nerve or tendon dam—” He shook his head. “Okay. Forget it.”
“Just take her home,” Charlie said.
“You coming with us?” Max asked.
“And ruin Stevie’s night?”
“I thought it was Kyle’s night.”
“Stevie planned this shit. It’s now her night. Besides, I can’t go home.”
“I swear to God, Charlie. If you go after that crazy bitch—”
“I’m not going after Mairi. At least not until we figure out how we’re going to deal with her. I just can’t go home right now because I promised Stevie I’d do ‘Ode to Billy Joe.’”
“You promised that on purpose?”
“I love that song.”
“It’s ten thousand years old.”
“And it has aged like a fine wine.” She pulled out her cell phone. “I’ll get you guys a car.”
“We have one already,” Zé said. “Nelle got us a limo and a hotel room.”
That made Charlie laugh out loud but Max was mortified. “Seriously? She seriously did that?”
“She’s trying to help a man out.”
“We’ll take her limo, but we’re going home.” The last thing Max wanted right now was to be in strange surroundings. “Okay?”
“Fine with me.” Zé helped her to her feet, which was nice.
Charlie started to walk away but Max grabbed her arm. “Do not tell Stevie or my team about Mairi. Not a word. I’ll tell them myself when I feel like it.”
“Fine.”
“And I’ve decided.”
“Decided what?”
“You need backup.”
“In general?”
“No. Mary Mother, some days . . .” She took a breath. Began again. “I’m saying, you need backup on this job for Imani.”
“Because I didn’t kill Mairi right off? I wanted the bitch to suffer!”
“I don’t mean that either. I mean you need backup on this job and that’s what I’m going to do for you. I’ll be your backup.”
“So you can steal my job before I even get it?”
Max gritted her fangs. Because her teeth were fangs now. “Charlie, I swear to God!”
“Do you two do this all the time?” Zé asked.
“Yes,” they said together.
“I’ll have backup, Max,” Charlie told her. “Imani’s letting me pick my own team.”
“From the cretins who couldn’t defend themselves against you?”
“Why do you keep arguing with me?”
“Because we’re doing this. You go on that job, I’m with you.”
“Forget it. We’re not—”
“I’m dying! Why are you being mean to me when I’m dying?”
“You’re not dying!”
“I could be. And wouldn’t you feel bad not giving me what I want?”
“Dude, I don’t even know what that means.”
“I know and that’s all that matters.” She motioned for Zé to leave through the alley rather than going back into the club. “Oh, and by the way . . . thanks for saving my life.”
“Yeah, sure. Although we both know you could have taken that bitch out at any time.” The club door opened and then Max heard her sister ask, “Why haven’t you taken her out yet?”
“Don’t you find her sad?” Max asked. “I find her so sad.”
“Why?”
Max stopped and looked at her sister while Zé still held onto her wounded arm. “Unlike me . . . she doesn’t have a Charlie or a Stevie. She’s all alone. That’s gotta suck.”
“What does she expect, though?” Charlie asked, finally heading back into t
he club. “With that fucking personality.”
chapter TWENTY-FOUR
Zé worried that he’d made a mistake by not taking Max to the hospital. Once they were in the limo Nelle had lent them, heading back to Queens, Max slept cuddled up against him. She held her arm with her other hand; the blue T-shirt appeared even darker than when he’d first put it on. But the blood on it had dried. So had the blood on her head and face, though it didn’t hide the multiple bruises where her cousin had repeatedly punched her. She winced a few times in her sleep but that was the only sign she was in any pain.
When they reached the house and Zé was about to carry Max inside, she suddenly sat up, eyes blinking the sleep away.
“Are we home?” she asked.
“Yeah.”
The driver opened the door and Max immediately got out without needing Zé’s help. As she stood in front of the house, waiting for him, she tilted her head one way, then the other. Each time a sound like a shot went off and Zé gazed at her, half-in and half-out of the limo.
“Was that you?” he asked.
She looked over her shoulder and smiled at him, the dried blood crinkling.
Max started toward the house and Zé followed her inside, where she walked straight to the kitchen. By the time Zé joined her, she stood in front of the sink with the water running.
He waited off to the side, ready to help when she needed it, and watched her remove the T-shirt on her arm. She handed it to him and slipped her arm under the faucet, letting the water beat down on the skin. Zé cringed, imagining the pain she was feeling. Until the blood washed away and he saw there was no more than a raised scar on each side of her arm.
“It’s still healing,” she explained when she saw him staring. “On the inside. The scar will fade some over the next few days, though.”
With the blood on her arm gone, she stuck her head under the running water. When she’d washed the blood off, she wrung her wet hair out and finger-combed it off her face.
“How do I look?” she asked when she was finally done. Somehow, she was grinning. He didn’t understand how she could be grinning.
“Not as horrifying as I would expect.”
He motioned to the kitchen table. “Sit up here. I’ll put something on the other wounds.”
There was a first-aid kit under the kitchen counter. He pulled it out, opened it, but ended up doing nothing but gawking into it for a few seconds.
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