Chapter Fourteen
Sniper
“D on’t tell me we actually got something from that fucking shell casing?” In the aftermath of Falcon’s shooting we found several clues regarding the identity of the shooters, but nothing concrete.
Slate threw his head back and laughed. “Fuck man, I wish. As generic as they come, same with the tire tracks.”
Of course we couldn’t be that lucky. “Did the biker I shot say anything?”
Gio shook his head. “Nothing useful and I think I sprained my finger sticking it in his wound.” He held up his finger for extra effect. “Said someone hired them to shoot one of us but he didn’t know who.”
Rocky frowned in confusion. “Just any one of us? No one in particular?”
“Nah. It could’ve been anybody, but they aimed at Falcon because that chick he’s been fuckin’ is the VP’s old lady and the kid sister of their sergeant-at-arms.”
“Horny bastard,” Hawk muttered with a grin.
There wasn’t a goddamn thing funny about any of this, not to me. Not when I’d just come face-to-face with Katey’s tears. For such a tiny thing, she was strong as fuck. She didn’t let anyone see her when she was vulnerable. Hell, I’d only seen it because I surprised her, and it made me wonder how many times she’d cried alone in that room. I had to think about that because I couldn’t think about the taste of her lips, or the feel of her body trembling beneath me. “So what the fuck did we find?”
Rebel groaned. “Not you too, Sniper. You gone over your wife? You’re the last person I thought would end up pussy-whipped.” His tone was angry as it always was when another female invaded the club. “I thought she was a favor.”
“She’s a fuckin’ person,” I shot back just as angrily. It was a foolish move seeing as I was still a prospect but the way he talked about her didn’t sit right with me.
“Another one bites the fucking dust,” he muttered to himself.
I glared at Rebel, daring him to say another fucking word. I didn’t like fighting my brothers but right now I could beat the fuck out of something. Or someone. Hell, anyone would do. “Well?” I turned to Slate, my tone a lot calmer than it had been.
“Turkish cigarettes. Motherfuckin’ Turkish cigarettes if you can believe it.” Slate shook his head. “The good news is that only three stores in Steel City sell the disgusting things.”
That was promising. “And the bad news?”
Slate sighed and looked around the room. “Two of them store their security footage on a local storage drive so I can’t just hack into their systems.”
Diesel stood. “Anything else?”
“One more thing,” Gio said as he stood. “That asshole Sniper shot? I didn’t recognize him as one of the Dead Crows.”
“Well fuck,” I grunted and scrubbed a hand down my face. That information was helpful but not immediately so.
Think. I needed to think.
My mind raced until I had something useful. “If it’s not the Dead Crows it has to be another weaker MC, one who needed money and street cred enough to do someone else’s dirty work.” Right now it wasn’t clear if this shooting was related to Katey’s ex or if it was something else altogether and I needed an answer.
Now.
“There’s one guy who might be able to give us some answers,” Rebel said. “He supplies for some of the smaller MCs and gangs and the fucker gossips like a rich housewife.”
“Redneck Jeff?”
With half a smile, Rebel nodded. “Yep.”
***
Twenty minutes later we pulled up to the motel parking lot where Redneck Jeff conducted his business. “This is his office?” I asked, disgust dripped from every word.
“Yeah Princess,” Rebel groaned. “Try not to scare him before we get answers.”
T-bone laughed and clapped me on the back. “Give the man a break, Rebel. His wife is in danger, he’s allowed to have his panties in a bunch.”
“Fuck you,” I spat out and nodded at the scrawny dude with a long beard and long, straight blond hair. “That him?”
“Yep. Let me do the talking,” Rebel instructed, his voice low and firm.
“Gentleman, what can I do you for?” Redneck Jeff flashed a bright smile and sat with one ankle crossed over his knee. His chair sat in the middle of the door and just behind him was his product. “I gotta warn you that I don’t got enough product for the likes of you.”
“Good because we’re not here for your product.” Rebel crossed his arms over his chest and stared down Redneck Jeff. “We need information.”
“It ain’t free,” he shot back, one brow arched as his lips kicked into a knowing grin.
“How much,” Rebel asked, his expression bored.
“Depends on what you want to know,” he shot back, knowing he had the upper hand in that moment.
“Any idea who shot my boy Falcon the other night?”
Redneck Jeff’s eyes rounded in surprise. “Naw, ain’t heard nothin’ about that.”
He was lying. I knew it immediately, but Rebel said to keep my mouth shut, so I did.
“Really?” Rebel asked in a tone that said he knew Jeff was lying too.
“Really,” he confirmed, the barest hint of a smirk on his lips. “First I’ve heard about it.”
Rebel fisted his hands at his sides. “I don’t believe you, Jeff.”
“I have no reason to lie to ya.”
That son of a bitch! My gaze lasered in on a wooden box with a familiar logo on it. “Hey Jeff, you mind getting me a pack of those fancy cigarettes? The Turkish ones.”
He jumped up. “You like those, do ya? Only got one guy who buys ‘em and he pays twenty bucks a pack, but for you I’m asking ten bucks.”
“Sold.” He got up and grabbed a pack of the cigarettes.
Rebel’s scowl turned into a smirk. He gave me a nod.
“Here ya go!” Redneck Jeff smacked the soft pack against his palm before he extended the pack to me.
I gripped his wrist and yanked him to me, pressing my blade to his neck. “Wanna try that shit again Jeff? And this time tell me the truth, or you’ll be breathing through a slit in your throat. Feel me?”
He struggled against my tight hold. “Fuck man, okay! What do you want to know?”
“Who buys those cigarettes?” Rebel posed the question as cool as can be, as if everything was normal. “The Dead Crows?”
He snorted. “Nah, those pussies are too scared to do somebody else’s wet work.”
“Then who,” I asked.
“Tellin’ you this shit could get me killed.”
I applied more pressure to the blade against his throat. “Keepin’ it to yourself right now will get you killed. Feel me?”
He nodded frantically. “It was the Black Vultures MC, but it wasn’t personal, they were tryin’ to collect a bounty.”
Rebel frowned. “On Falcon?”
“Nah, no one’s gonna shoot pretty for not keeping his zipper shut. Some dude called Sniper. Know him?”
Rebel glared hard at Jeff. “Yeah, I fuckin’ know him,” he growled.
Jeff snorted a laugh. “Stupid fuckin’ name if you ask me.”
T-bone covered his laugh with a cough.
“Nobody fuckin’ asked you,” I spat out and pressed the tip of the blade into his skin. “Who paid the damn bounty?”
“Can’t say for sure,” he began in that slow bullshit tone that was about to piss me off.
“Want to try again?”
“Look, I had my pods in my ear and I was a little stoned, so I was only half payin’ attention. But I think they said it was some guy named Evan or Ethan, some shit like that.”
“You sure?” Rebel asked because I was too stunned to say anything more.
“Yeah, I’m sure. Said the dude put up fifty large for his life. They’re probably gonna try again if they got pretty boy instead.”
He wasn’t wrong, but that wasn’t the part that worried me. I wanted to know where the fuck Ethan got fifty grand to put on my head.
“Thanks,” Rebel said eventually and tossed a few bills on the ground at Jeff’s feet.
“Anytime. Tell your boy to watch his back.”
I released Jeff and sheathed my knife before heading back to my bike, my mind on Ethan. Something else was going on, I just knew it, and there was one person I knew who had the answers I needed.