CHAPTER 31 GRETA
GRETA
Idrag Iron Jack by the hand past the convenience store and a pet supply to the lot in front of the abandoned building.
“Wait up!” a voice calls.
I turn to see Grey Beast jogging behind us, trying to shove on athletic shoes, the bloody towel still around his neck. “I’m coming, too.”
Iron Jack halts to face him. “Why the fuck would I want you along for the ride?”
“I want to know what made you think I killed your parents.”
I turn to Jax. He stands patiently on the edge of the lot, arms clasped behind his back. Right. He’s just the ride.
Grey Beast’s trainer approaches from behind. Grey Beast holds up his hands. “I’m fine. Go on back and lock up. I’ll let you know how I am.”
The trainer stands firm, arms crossed. “What the hell are you getting yourself into?”
“I don’t know,” Grey Beast says. “But Iron Jack is from the circuit, and I have his back.”
“Like hell you do,” Iron Jack roars, shifting like he might take him on again in the parking lot.
Yeah, Iron Jack isn’t convinced yet. I take his arm. “Stop it. You’re wrong right now. Shut up and get on the helicopter.”
He scowls at me, the very first time I’ve seen his wrath aimed at me. I can take it.
“What helicopter?” he asks through gritted teeth.
“It’s behind the building. I had to get here somehow. Jax is a family friend.” I lean in. “I think he’s how Uncle Sherman gets involved so easily in everyone’s business.”
“I have excellent hearing,” Jax says.
“Come on.” I pull Iron Jack toward the building.
I glance back as we turn the corner. Grey Beast still follows us, then Jax. The trainer is gone.
The blades are still at the moment. Mia opens a small window. “We heading out?”
“Yes,” Jax calls. “And call for the jet. We have to get to the Miami area right away.”
She nods.
Jax moves around us to open the door. “Let’s get in.”
I step up into the helicopter and take the farthest seat. Iron Jack settles beside me, opening and closing his fists. His knuckles are split and bloody.
I take one of his hands. “I’m forever going to be patching you up, aren’t I?”
“Probably.” He watches Grey Beast lunge into the helicopter and take a seat opposite me.
Jax enters more gracefully and fills the last spot. “Full house,” he says. “This will be fun.” He latches the door. “To the jet, my love?”
I can’t see Mia from this seat, but the helicopter fires up. After a moment, we’re airborne, banking left to head somewhere.
Jax pulls up the tablet he used earlier and peers at it, frowning. “We’re going to miss the beginning of the Miami standoff. The Wild Hair are already en route. Even I can’t get us down the Eastern Seaboard that fast.”
“What the fuck is happening in Miami?” Iron Jack growls.
Jax’s gaze moves to me, then back to Iron Jack before returning to the tablet. “Charming chap you have there. All right. While you were barking up the wrong revenge tree, your little club has figured out what we already know. Greta tipped them off when she talked to Merrick this morning.”
I cringe at Jax calling the Wild Hair a “little club” and worry Iron Jack will blame me for calling Merrick.
But Jack leans forward, clasping his hands as if he’s trying hard to concentrate. “What did the club figure out?”
“Greta here questioned why this big lug would call you out so far after the fact.” He aims a thumb at Grey Beast. “He won. He’s on the circuit. She checked on that card the Kin member used, and sure enough, it was stolen.”
Iron Jack turns to me. “It wasn’t a callout?”
Grey Beast shrugs. “I have no idea what anybody is talking about.”
“Oh, it was a callout,” Jax says. “You were intended to get in an altercation with Grey Beast and never come out of it. The Kin uses real cowardly methods to dispatch their enemies, don’t they?” He shakes his head. “So inelegant.”
Grey Beast scowls. “I didn’t even know a card was stolen.”
“Your people do,” Jax says. “A fraud alert was placed on the card yesterday. You would have had no idea what was going on.”
Grey Beast wipes blood that is dripping into his eye and presses the towel back to his temple. He stares at Iron Jack. “You always were a better striker than me. You should have been the one on the circuit.”
Iron Jack stares at him. “But you wanted that spot.”
“Of course I did. It’s what every fighter wants. But you were the better fighter. I had to prove myself over and over after you left. Every time I failed, they talked about how you wouldn’t have. I hated how it all went down. Your mom and dad. Fuck. Just horrible.”
Iron Jack still gapes at the man, then his shoulders sag. “Fuck. So who did kill them? I guess you’ve figured it all out.”
“My friend, it was the Kin all along.” Jax passes him the tablet.
“Here’s the transfer of cash to the ex-wife of the truck driver, who drugged her former husband so it was easier for the Kin to move him off course and force an accident with your parents.
She got her payout.” Jax flicks to the image of a fifty-something woman in a fur stole.
Iron Jack’s entire body goes tense. “I will kill her with my own hands.”
Jax takes the tablet back. “No need. She blew through the cash, hooked up with a mafia type, thinking he would give her the high life. He promptly sold her to an equally terrible man living on a private island off the coast of Cuba. A hurricane took out the entire complex last summer, and the ex-wife’s body washed ashore three days later. ”
“Whew,” I say. “Talk about karma.”
“What about the Kin?” Iron Jack says.
“They are currently working on the site of the property you recently raided and partially burned. They returned, it seems, on the assumption that you would meet your demise.” He grins. “Which you avoided.”
“What the actual fuck?” Grey Beast says. “Are we going to fuck them up?” He pulls at the fighting gloves until they fall to the floor. His hands are wrapped in white tape.
“We might,” Jax says. “I’d say we have about twenty minutes until your club arrives at their property.” He moves his tablet closer.
We all peer at the screen. The usual Wild Hair formation roars down the highway. Ten pairs on motorcycles followed by Chain in his truck. I wonder if the women are with them.
“My love?” Jax calls. “Is the jet ready?”
“Yes, Jax. We’re about to touch down.”
He nods and tucks the tablet under his arm. “We will transfer to the jet. Considering takeoff and touchdown, plus air time, plus getting to the rural site…” He pauses, thinking. “I’d say we’ll make it there in about an hour.”
“The whole thing could be over in an hour,” Iron Jack says.
“May well be. But we’ll see where they are and watch the progress.”
The helicopter sets down on a private air strip. Jax leads us out to a small white plane. We head up a short set of stairs.
Grey Beast nods as he looks around. “I want one of these.”
“You better win a few more fights.” Jax sits at a small table. “Iron Jack, you and I should sit here and watch the coming confrontation.”
Grey Beast and I take two swivel seats in the center of the room.
“Is Mia coming?” I ask Jax.
“No, she will need to see to another situation. I will fly the new helicopter once we land in Miami. Can’t set down a jet in the marsh.”
I buckle in as the engine fires up on the jet. When Uncle Sherman said he was sending someone to help me get to Miami, I honestly assumed he’d have Dell Brant send his corporate jet. The Pickles aren’t so rich that they have planes at the ready. But they seem to know people who do.
Iron Jack watches the tablet. When we’re steady in the air, I spot a red box under a long upholstered bench on the far wall. Time to clean up these fighters. I open it and pull out antibiotic towelettes to pass to Grey Beast.
“Thanks,” he says, pressing one to each side of his face. “I’m going to look freaking fantastic during my press interview next week.”
“It’ll heal,” I say. “Hopefully.”
I pull out a roll of gauze and head to the table. “Let me wrap your hands,” I tell Iron Jack.
He scoots over on the oversized chair to make room for me. We sit close as I wipe his bloody fingers clean and wind the gauze around each one.
“They’ve arrived,” Jax says.
I lean forward. The Wild Hair caravan rolls up the drive cut through the trees.
Ahead of them, bikes are scattered among the blackened remains of a garage. The larger structure is still standing, although it is heavily damaged.
Members of the Kin are dragging debris into a huge pile. A few are standing around a table saw, cutting long lengths of fresh lumber.
We watch as the Wild Hair pull up to the clearing leading to the Kin clubhouse.
The fight is about to begin.