Chapter 16 – Grey #2
“It better be. It’s definitely safer than getting her any more involved in my shit than she already is. The last thing I want to do is parade her in front of Diesel.”
I tipped my head to one side, pursing my lips. She had a point there.
“Besides she won’t be here all alone anyway. You have plans tonight, don’t you, Becks?”
Becca smiled at AJ meekly before shaking her head. “No. No, I’m just going to stay here.”
AJ crossed the floor to her friend, lowering her voice as if I couldn’t still hear her clear as day. “You haven’t been out at all this week. Did something happen between you and your mystery guy?”
Becca shrugged, sighing again. “Fuck if I know. I think he’s avoiding me. He does that sometimes,” she shrugged. “Gives me time to catch up on some BioChem homework though, so whatever. I don’t need him.”
AJ squeezed her friend’s shoulder. “You sure as shit don’t, babe, but nobody ghosts my bestie and gets away with it. Want me to track him down? Drag him over here for a little chat?”
Becca barked a laugh that quickly died in her throat when she saw AJ’s expression and realized her friend wasn’t joking in the slightest.
“ Uh ,” she said, laughing for a different reason now. “I’ll let you know, ’kay?”
AJ nodded. “Hopefully we won’t be long,” she turned to me. “We won’t be long, right?”
“Sorry. We haven’t been briefed. No idea what’s going on. Could be twenty minutes. Could be all night.”
I hated admitting it but there it was, we were carting Ava Jade to Sanctum with absofuckinglutely no idea what was going to be waiting for us when we got there.
It wasn’t for a lack of trying to find out.
We’d been snooping around Sanctum and the warehouse, and I’d even made an excuse to go and pick something up from Diesel’s house just to have a little snoop there, too.
Straight up asking him had gotten us nowhere, either. So, here we were.
“Is it another trial?” Becca asked, and AJ visibly tensed.
She’d had no choice but to come clean to her friend after the shit that went down at Briar Hall.
It was about time, really. And as much as we didn’t like it, it wouldn’t have been fair to leave her in the dark, especially not if she was going to continue to stay here with AJ, which seemed like it might be the case.
AJ lifted her hard gaze to me, and I sighed.
“We don’t know,” she admitted, echoing my thoughts.
“You’ll take care of her, right?” Becca asked me, fixing me with a venom laced stare that made me pause. I understood that she was pissed about what happened at BH, and that AJ was being swept up in all this, being out in danger, but there was more than worry there. There was hate.
And then it was gone, erased with Ava Jade’s short laugh at her friend’s demand.
“ Them take care of me ?” she said, grinning at her friend. “Don’t worry, Becks. I don’t need anyone to take care of me. I’ll be back before you know it.”
Becca’s expression darkened, but she nodded. She really was in a foul mood. I hoped her boyfriend called her back soon. Otherwise, I was afraid her claws would only get longer. Her bite, harder.
“All right, then,” AJ said, snatching a faded jean jacket from the back of the chair Becca was sitting on, sensing the tension in the air and wanting to leave before it got any thicker. “Don’t wait up. Keep everything locked. You remember how to use that blade I left you?”
“Stick ’em with the pointy end,” Becca replied, miming a stab gesture that needed a lot of work. AJ laughed at that.
“And the other part?”
“Stab first, ask questions after.”
“You’re going to be a pro in no time.”
Becca waved us off after Corvus honked for the second time. “Go already before he blows a fucking fuse.”
Ava Jade checked the door twice before we left to make sure it was locked and secure. She checked the garage door and the front door, too, wistfully tilting her head up to the small illuminated window set above the garage doors, worry creasing her forehead.
“She’ll be okay. Corv installed all those new cameras. If you want, I’ll put the app on your phone on the way there. That way you can check them whenever you want.”
She smiled at me with her hand on the door handle to the back seat. The first smile I’d seen from her in a week. “Can you?”
“Yeah,” I said and held the door as she slid into the seat next to Rook, who was staring out the window like the trees themselves might grow claws and fangs and come for his girl.
I cleared my throat, nudging the back of the passenger seat. “Corv, can you drive?”
“What the fuck for?” he growled.
“I’m going to put the app for the cameras on AJ’s phone.”
He grunted. “Give it here,” he said, holding out his hand for AJ’s phone without turning around. “I’ll do it for her.”
She hesitated, but reluctantly unlocked her phone and placed it into his hand, sitting up straighter in her seat to watch over his shoulder.
Either she had something to hide or she wanted to see if he would try snooping so that she could give him hell.
My skin bristled at the former option, wondering if there were any new messages between her and Kit .
I clenched my jaw as I circled the Rover and hopped into the driver’s seat, pulling us out on the road.
“Nothing more from the stalker?” Corvus asked in a tone that I knew was trying hard to sound casual and not demanding but failed on all counts.
“Nope,” AJ replied, popping the p .
Turned out the last message Ava Jade deleted before reading the whole thing was just that first line. Recovering it and decrypting it was a total waste of time.
But seeing the three words for myself was enough to make my blood boil anew.
I warned you…
He warned her ? Ha! Motherfucker was a dead man walking.
We’d considered the option that he could have crawled off somewhere and died of his injuries, but somehow I doubted that. It would be a waste. There was a deep, dark part of me that wanted him to still be alive so I could have a hand in killing him myself.
“Grey,” Corvus said, edging my name in a question, and I realized how tightly I was holding the steering wheel and forced my stiff fingers to relax. Made myself slow the speed of the Rover as we pulled into the back lot at Sanctum and Corvus handed AJ back her phone.
She was the first to hop out, appearing to not be at all worried about what might await her inside.
I sighed after her door closed and flinched when Corvus gripped my upper arm in an uncommonly gentle gesture. “You good, man?”
I swallowed and gave him a quick nod. “Yeah. I’m good, just…”
“I know,” he replied before I could properly articulate what I wanted to say. “We got this. She’s going to be fine.”
The Rover rumbled to a standstill as I twisted back the key and stepped out into the crisp night air, inhaling deeply through my nostrils.
Food.
I needed something to eat. The banana I ate at breakfast and the pizza pocket I warmed up at lunch weren’t even a fraction of my normal intake. No wonder I was so fucking irritable. No wonder my hands felt like they were trembling.
AJ flipped through the newly installed camera feeds through the app on her phone as we made our way inside, seemingly satisfied to find nothing but the shuddering shadows of trees moving in the wind and the quiet house on the screens.
“All clear?” I asked her with my best encouraging smile.
“Yep. Looks fine. She knows to call if she hears or sees anything. She’ll be fine.”
I wasn’t sure if she was telling me that or herself, but either way, I agreed as we entered the main floor of Sanctum and the music from inside washed over us along with the smell of beer and whiskey.
I gave Sasha a nod as we entered and upon seeing us, she drew out Rook’s favorite bourbon and poured him a glass without asking.
“Hey, sweets,” she called, drawing the attention of the others. Sasha set the bourbon down on the bar for Rook and grimaced before taking it with a grateful nod. “Anybody else want anything?”
“No,” Corv growled, his gaze tracking across the pub in search of Diesel.
“I’ll take a water,” AJ asked, and I caught her gaze dipping to Sasha’s chest. It was hard not to, the way she wore her tits almost hanging out of her shirts. They were some nice tits, too. Fake, but sometimes those were even nicer than the real kind.
“Sure thing, hon,” Sasha replied and filled a glass with ice and water, plunking in a slim black straw before handing it to AJ.
“You, Grey?”
“Nah, I’m good,” I replied as I began looking for Diesel, too.
It was busy enough for a Saturday night and Sasha was quickly called away to help the other bartender fix drinks at the other end of the bar.
Mostly Saints and their girlfriends or fuckbuddies graced the bar and tables.
Pool balls knocked noisily into one another from the area at the back.
A few locals drowned their sorrows in cheap beer at the bar and a handful of girls in too-short dresses eyed the leather-clad Saints not already spoken for from a booth near the door.
Giggling as they adjusted their cleavage and hair.
I couldn’t see Diesel anywhere.
Which meant he either wasn’t here yet, or he was in the private room around the other side of the bar out of sight.
“Diesel here yet?” I went to ask one of the servers, a girl called Cat.
She shook her head. “Haven’t seen him, but the others got here about an hour ago. Who’s your friend?”
I glanced back at AJ. “That’s our girl,” I said before I could change my mind. “You get her anything she wants and if anyone so much as looks at her funny, I want to know about it.”
Her lips twitched into an awkward tight-lipped smile as she replied. “Sure thing. I’ll make sure everybody knows.”
Rook growled behind me, and I turned to see him staring after a stumbling drunk asshole, leaving me to wonder if the guy’d accidentally bumped into him. He downed his bourbon and took off after the guy.
“Rook!” I called, but he was already gone, lost to the crowd.
“He muttered something about going to the bathroom,” Corvus said, giving me a strange look. Obviously he hadn’t seen the look on Rook’s face. Or maybe I was just overthinking it.
I grunted, giving a nod.
“I’ll do a lap,” Corvus offered, he and Ava Jade stepping up behind me. “Grab a table and wait.”
“No, I’ll go,” I said, stopping him. “I need to stop by the kitchen and grab something to eat.”
He looked like he might argue, but upon studying my face, stepped back to allow me to go. I must’ve looked as shit as I felt.
They found their way to an empty booth near the pool tables, Corvus slipping into the booth seat opposite Ava Jade.
“Hey, man!” Axel shouted over the music, clapping me on the back as I made my way through the crowd. His blue eyes hooded and glazed with intoxication. “Where’s your pops at? I wanted to?—”
“Don’t know, Ax. He should be here soon,” I interrupted, leaving no room for more conversation, but that didn’t stop him.
“Hey! Hey, Grey, man I just wanted to let you know it’s all set up like he asked. I didn’t start drinking until it was done, you know. They’re ready for him in the back.”
What is? I wanted to ask the question but didn’t. Then he’d know I had no fucking idea what he was talking about.
“Where?” I asked instead. “I need to check on them.”
His face screwed up in confusion, and I worried I said the wrong thing but I stood my ground, waiting. “Well?” I pushed. “Where are they?”
“Kitchen,” he said as another Saint began tugging on his arm for a reply to a question. “Bottom shelf of the cooler. I did it exactly how he asked, man. Just like always.”
Like always?
Fuck.
“I’m sure you did, man. Thanks.”
I left Axel to his friends and hurried through the back end of the bar, pushing into the kitchen.
At this hour, it was closed and every stainless-steel surface gleamed.
Satisfied it was empty, I crossed to the walk-in cooler and yanked it open, a blast of chilled air wafting into my face as I stepped inside.
Down low on the shelf to my left were two chalices made of heavy silver, the Saint emblem of a fleur-de-lis with a dagger protruding from the bottom embossed into the sides of each cup. Inside of each, a golden liquid reflected the horror on my face.
I swiped a palm over my face and began to pace the narrow slice of concrete floor, going over the limited options to prevent what was about to happen.