10. LINK
“Declan?”
“Link? What the fuck do you want?”
My lips twitched. “Wonderful to hear your voice too, Dec.”
A grunt sounded down the line. “If you say so. There a reason for this call, or you just blowing smoke up my ass?”
“If that’s what gets you hot under the collar?—”
“Okay, fucker,” the Five Pointer growled. “Let’s get shit on the road. Don’t need you talking sweet nothings in my ear. What do you want?”
“Got a few questions about a guy called Donavan Lancaster. You heard of him?”
“Can’t not know who that bastard is.” Another grunt, then I heard a scrawl like he was making notes. I didn’t think it was about this conversation because he sounded absentminded, like he wasn’t focusing on what we were discussing. “He built Landis Scraper and has a few other projects that got Finn all riled up when the plans were revealed.”
Because I wasn’t a total heathen, the name prompted me to inquire, “How is Finn, by the way?”
“Taken to fatherhood like a charm. It’s fucking sickening.”
My lips curved at that because, even though he sounded partially disgusted, I heard something I didn’t think he realized he’d revealed—yearning.
I got it. For the first time in my life, I fucking got it. Which kind of blew my mind.
Declan was about my age, after all. When a man passed thirty, he started questioning shit. Shit he probably shouldn’t question but did anyway. And when forty was on the horizon? Fuck.
“Glad to hear it.” I cleared my throat with the niceties out of the way. “Any reason Donavan Lancaster would know we were working together?”
“We as in the Five Points and the MC?” He hummed under his breath. “Not as far as I know.” Another hum. “Wait. Lancaster? Isn’t that the fucker Nyx’s girl took out?”
“Yeah. His son. Daddy is causing shit for us.”
“I’ll bet. That fucker was his blue-eyed boy. Saw him around most of the party spots. Even went to a few of our clubs. Didn’t like him. Got called in once to deal with him.
“He’d beaten the fuck out of a girl he’d been trying to pick up. Didn’t like it when she said no.”
“Why didn’t you report it?”
“Since when do we go to the police over shit like that? I stuck a gun under his chin, told him if he darkened our doors again I’d blow his brains out.
“Then, I told him I’d blow off his cock if he approached the girl and sent her home with one of our foot soldiers.” A laugh sounded down the line. “They just had their second kid.”
“You matchmaker you,” I joked, amused at that particular irony.
Declan muttered, “Yeah, regular fucking Cupid, that’s me.” Maybe the two of us should go into partnership? “Anyway, no. I don’t see why the daddy would know about our mutual interests. Why do you ask?”
“He’s trying to use our connection against us. Leverage with the cops.”
“Well, let him. It’s not like we don’t have the pigs in our pockets.”
“True.” I grunted. “Was just hoping there’d be a reason for him knowing that kind of shit.”
“That kind of money, he’ll have ears everywhere—” His voice waned. “I see what you mean. Thanks for the heads up, Link. I appreciate it.”
When the dial tone clicked in my ear, I grimaced.
Great.
Heads up or heads roll…I wasn’t sure which was likely to be going down in the Five Points today.
Dialing through to Rex, the second he picked up I muttered, “Declan doesn’t know of a reason why Lancaster would be aware of our connection, but I might have just started a fucking witch hunt.”
Rex groaned. “Good going, Link. What was that shit about you being a scalpel and Nyx being a jackhammer?”
I pulled a face. “He didn’t give me a chance to get a word in edgewise.”
“Fuck.” Rex blew out a breath that gusted down the line. “It’s not ideal, but leave him to it. Maybe he’ll find a snitch, and if he does, we’ll have our answers.”
“Yeah, I guess.” I was proud of my ability to ferret out shit for the club, and couldn’t help but feel like I’d let Rex down.
“Where you at?”
“The garage. Need me at the clubhouse?”
“No. Carry on. You going to have the books to me soon?”
My mouth tightened. “I’ll get them to you when they’re fucking ready.”
“It’s already mid-goddamn-month, Link?—”
“And I told you I didn’t want to manage this place. I’m a fucking mechanic. Not management.”
“Well, I want you to be both so get your goddamn act together.”
For the second time in as little as twenty minutes, someone put the fucking phone down on me. I growled under my breath then threw a wrench at the bulletproof window that linked my office to the workshop.
Pissed when it didn’t shatter, even though I knew it wouldn’t, I got some satisfaction out of Gunner and Jaxson, a brother and a Prospect, jerking in surprise at the noise.
Ignoring them, I looked at the books in front of me. Rex seemed to think I’d been ignoring them, but fuck, I hadn’t.
For some reason, the numbers just seemed to jump off the page at me no matter how hard I worked to keep shit in line.
I’d gone so far as to transfer all the stuff Gunner input into the computers onto a work pad in the vain hope I’d be able to tally shit up, but to no avail.
Back when I’d been in school, I’d probably have been given a fancy name for why I was shit with figures, but that stuff didn’t wash in an MC.
Dyslexic or not, I was expected to do my part. Even if that part felt like I was being asked to find a cure for world fucking hunger.
As I glowered at the books, I wondered if there was something else I could do, something else I could procrastinate over…
I picked up my phone. It had been quiet for a while because I knew Lily was in a class at the country club.
Just the thought of her bending in all those weird positions had me corralling a boner.
Still, I’d prefer to pester her than do the shit I was in this office for…
Me: You still at yoga?
Lily: Just out. Why?