Chapter 17
SEVENTEEN
MIXED BAG
The Avenging Angels Headquarters were four storage units a short drive away from Oasis Square.
Three of them were taken up by our work vehicles (a Mercedes sedan, a Honda Accord and a Kia Sportage), since it wasn’t smart to do our business in cars people could trace the license plates to.
The last unit was where things got serious (in other words where we plotted, but mostly just hung out).
In it was a big red curved couch we could all fit on (yes, all of us) and a desk with a speaker smack dab in the middle of it so Arthur could talk to us.
We had another desk, a secretary’s one, in a corner, on top of which was a computer hooked up to high-speed broadband.
A white board was mounted on the back wall behind the big desk, a kickass angel statue sat in another corner, and portraits of each of us hung on the walls all around.
Rounding this out was a beverage fridge, fun glasses and straws, and making it all official, we had a laser pointer.
After dropping Knox (early, he wanted to get there first, wholly because he didn’t want Cheyenne to see me dropping him, and I approved of this play), I rolled up to find all the Angels there.
I barely made it through the big open door before Harlow was on me, giving me a hug.
When she pulled away, she oozed, “I love this. You look so happy.”
I loved it too, because I was so happy.
After giving her a smile I hoped wasn’t love-loopy (but I feared it was when her expression got brighter and happier), I moved further into the unit, heading toward the beverage fridge, taking in the fact we had a visitor, kind of.
Clarice was sitting in a chair none of us ever sat in. The one behind the desk.
I couldn’t see what was on her lower half, but her upper half was covered in a mink-colored asymmetrical cashmere sweater that fell off her shoulder and was giving me life, and I didn’t even own it.
“Yo,” I greeted.
“Yo,” she replied.
I stopped at the beverage fridge, observing, “You’re a surprise guest.”
“And you bitches have never been involved in a case this risky. Arthur wanted a voice of reason at the proceedings.”
Huh.
Well, first things first.
I turned to the rest of the assemblage. “Byron is a good kisser and he and Dream are going on date number two tomorrow night.”
I shared this before I nabbed a drink out of the fridge.
“Ohmigod, a second date this soon?” Willow asked.
At the same time Gemma asked, “Ohmigod, he’s a good kisser?”
I threw myself on the sofa with a single-serving bottle of Perrier (Arthur didn’t scrimp) and answered, “She didn’t say if he was a dueler, dancer, plunderer, or a mix, but she said nerds can kiss.”
Delivering that, I popped the cap on my water.
“Dueler, dancer or plunderer?” Gemma asked.
We all stared at her.
“Oh,” she mumbled when the light dawned. “I hope he’s all three.”
I hoped he was too.
Just FYI: Knox had that mix all the way down, and the best part of it was the dizzying array of how he could mix that mix up.
“And right now, Knox is sitting down with Cheyenne at the Starbucks on Twenty-eighth and Indian School.”
Everyone made faces, except Shanti.
“I hope that goes well,” she remarked. “I fear it will not,” she concluded.
Hmm.
“Also, news on the Chambers Family front. Apparently, they’re in a Chambers Family Feud,” I told them, my gaze keen on Clarice, wondering if she and Arthur already knew this. “A split between the sister and her boyfriend, and the dad and two brothers. Knox referred to it as war.”
Clarice didn’t give much away, but I saw the tightening of her lips, so I suspected even she and Arthur didn’t know about the Chambers Feud.
“Holy shit,” Raye said.
“Yeah,” I agreed, and kept the information flowing.
“That was what happened that led up to the shooting. Knox was having a sit-down with Rocco, the sister’s boyfriend.
Knox was putting his foot down about them backing off recruiting him to return to the family business.
Rocco was there to press him into service and take his sister’s side.
And one of Rocco’s henchmen got trigger happy when this descended into a shouting match. ”
At this intel, they were all casting glances at each other.
“What?” I asked.
Jessie caught my gaze and said, “The guys got word this morning that the cops in Tucson found the triggerman dead. Shot in the forehead, execution style. He’d been dead awhile.” A heavy pause. “And they reckon that while is a little over a week.”
“Fucking hell,” I breathed, unable to absorb the news that Rocco, or God, I hoped not, Gypsy ordered a hit.
Alternatively, perhaps feeling some tardy fatherly (or brotherly) love, one of the other ones had done it.
“Gypsy, or this Rocco guy, had him whacked,” Raye laid it out plain.
“Fucking hell,” I repeated. Then I asked her, “Are they going to tell Knox?”
Those times when it was okay to be a wuss?
Not having to be the one to tell your man it was a good bet a member of his family called for the murder of a human being was one of them.
“Obviously, Cap and Eric knew this meet was going to happen, so they were going to connect with him while you were gone,” Raye answered. “Then Knox texted Cap about a ride, so he’s going to do it when he goes to pick him up.”
A car was heard outside.
There was rarely much traffic at the storage units (as in…none), so this was a surprise, though clearly only to me.
What was more of a surprise was when Jayden, Shanti’s extortionately good-looking cousin, also a cop, came strolling in.
It was hard to take my eyes off him, he was that good-looking, but I did when I felt the waves of displeasure beating at me from two sides.
Jayden’s, when his eyes fell on Clarice.
Clarice’s, who, when I checked her out, was glaring at Jayden.
“You,” Jayden said, that one word a huge-ass accusation, of what, I did not know.
“Me,” she drawled.
Jayden looked around, and it was clear he was already in no mood due to Clarice’s presence, but still, he was impressed taking in our sweet conference room/lounge/war room, particularly the kickass pop art portraits of all the Angels on the walls.
His gaze sliced back to Clarice. “You know better.”
“Do I?”
“You kit them with this pimped-out bat cave?” he demanded to know.
“It’s not a bat cave. It’s an Angels’ lair,” Clarice returned.
Oo.
Nice.
Angels’ lair. We had to start using that.
“And no,” she answered him. “I have way better taste than this.”
No shade to our conference room/lounge/war room, because on a certain level, it was tight.
But it was also loud and kind of obvious.
I’d mentioned Clarice’s sweater. She always dressed like she’d just arrived back from Milan.
Thus, I had no doubt she spoke truth.
Tension flowed between them, and on the surface of this, it wasn’t surprising. Her day job when she wasn’t moonlighting as our Bosley was a defense attorney, and a very good one. He was a cop. These twain did not normally meet.
But when I probed at the tension I was feeling and realized it was sexual, I sent wide eyes to Shanti.
Jayden was married. We hadn’t met his wife, but Shanti reported she was extra.
So…what gives with the sexual tension?
“Why are you here?” Clarice lashed out.
“Because Shanti wanted me to talk to these women about what to do in a stalking situation,” he fired back.
I hadn’t had the time to ask her, so…
Good call, Shanti.
“Do it, and go,” Clarice returned.
“I’ll do it then state very clearly, these women should stay far away from that mess that’s leaking north from Tucson,” Jayden retorted.
All the Angels on the couch were turning our heads back and forth like we were at a tennis match, and this didn’t stop when Clarice rejoined, “They are not in that.”
“They better not be, because it’ll be on you if I have to console Aunt Tandi after I carry Shanti’s casket into the church,” Jayden replied.
Yikes.
Clarice opened her mouth, but I got in before she could say anything.
“Do you know about the feud?”
From his place behind the couch, Jayden looked down at me. “What feud?”
He didn’t know?
It also seemed Clarice didn’t know.
Was the Chambers family keeping it under wraps?
Could two, essentially, gangs keep something like this under wraps?
Or maybe it hadn’t escalated very far.
Should I tell the cops (or this cop) about it?
I made a decision, because if the cops didn’t know, they should.
“Gypsy and Rocco have broken off from the dad and brothers,” I shared.
Jayden’s face got hard.
It made him no less hot, in fact, it made him more so.
I sallied forth beyond what his expression did to my nipples. “They’re at war. I don’t know what it means—”
“I do,” Jayden said heavily.
I kinda, sorta did too, in the sense that however that came about it’d be bad, or worse, considering we already had one dead-by-execution guy.
“So? Stalkers?” Clarice prompted.
Jayden moved around the couch so he could take a position leaning against the side of the desk.
Clarice glared daggers at him as he did it.
Though, I didn’t miss the quick peek her dagger-shooting eyes grabbed of his behind.
Seriously.
What was going on?
Gemma offered, “Do you want a Perrier? We also have pop. And it’s early, but it’s Sunday, so we have beer and wine too.”
“Sadly, what I have to say won’t take too long, but thanks,” Jayden told her. He looked among us. “Which one of you has a stalker?”
I raised my hand.
He turned his attention to me. “Male or female?”
“My boyfriend’s”—wow, that was nice to say out loud—“ex. Female.”
“How serious is this?”
“She’s following me around and may be following Knox around.”
His brows rose. “Chambers is your boyfriend?”
I nodded.
“I see it,” he muttered. Then, in a normal voice, “Anything else?”