Chapter 6
Six
One day you’re young and fun, and the next you’re turning down the radio to see better.
—Text from Calliope to Jasper
CALLIOPE
I was exhausted.
But, surprisingly, that didn’t mean that I wanted to leave where I was.
I was happy with my seat in the shop next to my vehicle that Jasper was working on.
He frowned when he dipped something down into the tank and pulled it out.
He touched the stick with his fingers, and he brought it to his nose so he could smell it.
“Shit,” he grumbled.
“What?”
He looked at me like he didn’t want to tell me what he’d found.
“It’s sugar.”
“What?”
“In your gas tank,” he said. “It’s sugar.”
I blinked. “But, how?”
He pulled out his phone and said, “Give me a second.”
I pulled my legs up in the seat that Jasper had pulled out for me and hugged them to my chest.
I dropped my forehead on my upraised knees and prayed for patience.
How the fuck had this happened?
I parked my truck in the garage at night so…
“You’ll need to hack into the UPS place. I need to see the camera that was on her truck,” Jasper said. “She parks in the garage at home, so there’s no way that it would’ve happened at our place. I have a feeling that it happened there. Thanks.”
He hung up the phone and looked at me. “What?”
“Got any enemies?”
I let out a snort. “I have lots of people that hate me. You, for instance.”
He didn’t deny it.
Not many of my sister’s friends truly liked me.
That included the Truth Tellers MC.
Not that I’d done anything to them, but my personality wasn’t super welcoming or likable.
I’d had a long life, and I was only twenty-one years old.
I just didn’t see the world with anything less than suspicion.
My mom had ensured that I’d struggled from the moment I was born. If it wasn’t for Searcy, I probably wouldn’t even be alive today, it was that bad.
I’d spent many nights starving, and watched my siblings do the same. To be quite truthful, that was what had pushed me to get a job at thirteen. I’d illegally started to work at a gas station restocking. I got to work for cash—which was way below minimum wage—during the wee hours of the morning.
I used to sneak out at one o’clock in the morning to go stock, then I used to climb in bed only for my mom to pull me out of bed at five-thirty to work at the diner.
Eventually, I stopped doing what she wanted, and started working for myself because at least that way I’d actually get paid and not have to do manual labor for free.
Needless to say, I was a bitch and had a damn good reason for acting that way. I was raised to be that way, and I wouldn’t apologize if people didn’t like me.
If you didn’t have any friends, they couldn’t disappoint you.
Everyone always disappointed you eventually.
“I have a gut feeling that you got that woman fired, and she retaliated by putting sugar in your gas tank.” Jasper pulled me out of my morose thoughts.
I lifted my head from my knees and said, “Great.”
“I’ll get it fixed for you. All it should take is draining the gas tank and changing the fuel filter.”
I had a feeling that was going to be a pain in the ass, which was why I got up and got him a box of cookies.
He glanced at them. “You’re ready to share them now?”
I shrugged. “Feels like I should, since you’re doing this out of the goodness of your heart.” I paused. “I’m sorry for making you miss that party.”
He shrugged. “Didn’t really want to go anyway.”
I walked to the fridge and pulled out the milk, walking back toward him with it.
He took it and placed it on the side of my hood before saying, “I wonder if these cookies are as good as you say they are?”
I popped open the box, and the smell of cinnamon and chocolate wafted to my nose.
I picked one up and handed it to him since his fingers were disgustingly dirty, and reached for my own.
He took a bite and paused just as I took a healthy bite of my own.
My eyes met his, and I saw that he was surprised.
I allowed my gaze to travel his face for a long second—something that I didn’t usually allow myself to do seeing as he got all butthurt every time I looked at him for longer than three seconds—and noticed his hair was longer.
I’d heard him talking to his sister once about how his hair was turning gray.
It was, but it wasn’t.
It was mostly black, with a few strands of silver interspersed throughout.
It was pretty damn sexy, if you asked me.
His eyes, however, were what always held my attention.
So deep and soulful.
Like he had a bone-deep ache that never quite went away.
“It’s fantastic,” he admitted. “Where did you say this guy lived?”
I giggled, which was very unlike me because people like me didn’t giggle, and shook my head. “I’m never going to tell. The secret will stay with me forever.”
He grinned and took another bite, then went back to working on the truck.
For the next two hours, he drained my tank, cleaned my fuel lines, and ultimately made sure that everything was in working order.
Then he put everything back together and said, “Now we need gas.”
I winced. “I can walk and go get a little bit again.”
He leveled me with a look. “I’ll go. You stay here. I don’t have any space on my bike for you.”
That had me wilting slightly because there was space, I’d seen my sister ride with Doc plenty of times to know that there was always space, but chose not to argue.
Instead I sat down in the seat he’d gotten for me and started to read a book.
He grabbed another cookie from the box, then took his milk and started walking, leaving me alone in the huge shop by myself.
I was halfway through a chapter—a book about dragons and mages—and was really getting into the scene when a scrape had me craning my neck to see who was there with me.
Except, when I looked, there was no one there.
Weird.
I got out of my seat, clutching my phone in my hand, and went to have a look around.
It was as I was moving around the fourth car in the massive shop that I realized that there were a lot of places to hide in here.
Inside cars. Under cars. On the other sides of cars.
There was room fairly everywhere for someone to hide.
Which had my heart speeding up inside of my chest.
So many places to hide, yet I was stuck sitting here like a damn duck waiting to be slaughtered.
I decided the best option for me was to wait outside.
At least if I was outside, I had somewhere to run.
I went through the maze that Jasper had led me through earlier until I reached the front door.
Then, for good measure, I slammed it closed and then went to the shadows to wait for Jasper to get back.
I crouched down low next to the building and waited.
Maybe if I was still and quiet, nothing would happen.
I was probably overreacting, but I had a gut instinct that never failed me. And right now, it was screaming that I needed to be careful and cautious.
It was as I was crouched down there that the door to the office opened, and a man slinked out wearing nothing but black. His shirt. His pants. His boots. His baclava. Even his gloves were black.
He was tall, but not as tall as Jasper. And skinny as a rail.
Maybe a teenager.
I didn’t know, but what I did know was that I was staying put and hoping that the man didn’t notice me.
He walked down the length of the building, stopped before he could get to the corner, and then took an immediate right that took him diagonally across the parking lot.
He stopped halfway across the parking lot and then walked straight down the middle of the drive until he got to the street.
It was then I realized that the man was avoiding the cameras that I knew Webber had up.
What the fuck?
Jasper’s bike sounded, and I blew out a silent sigh of relief as the rumble got closer and closer.
How I knew it was Jasper’s bike, you ask?
Because it had a very distinctive, throaty purr.
It was less loud than all the other bikes that I was around, and I decided it was due to the deepness of the rumble.
I clenched my hands into fists but stayed exactly where I was until Jasper got to the parking spot he’d been in earlier. He had my small red gas can in his hand, and he was swinging his leg off his bike as I stood.
I blinked with how fast he moved.
One second, he was holding a gas can, and the next I had the barrel of a big black gun pointed at me.
“Shit,” he hissed as I stepped into the lights. “What the fuck are you doing out here? Jesus, can’t you follow directions?”
As he dropped the gun, my temper began to rise.
“I don’t know,” I snapped. “I usually can. At least now. But when I’m faced with a man sneaking around Webber’s shop wearing all black that was trying to be quiet, I don’t tend to listen to someone telling me to stay.”
He frowned as he started to catalog the area with a keener eye. “What man?”
“I don’t know,” I grumbled. “I didn’t stop to ask him his name or introduce myself. I just left.”
He cursed and called up Apollo again. “Apollo.”
“Dude,” Apollo groaned. “I’m trying, but do you know how many fuckin’ cameras that UPS facility has? A lot. And seeing as the one she’s working at is in the damn airport, it’s even harder to get in here without people tracing it. Give me some…”
“Forget that for a second. I left to get gas and just got back. Left Calli behind and she said there was a man in Webber’s shop wearing all black.”
Apollo started typing away, which I could hear since I’d gravitated closer to Jasper on instinct.
He may piss me the fuck off, but I still knew he was safer than standing in the shadows away from him.
“There’s nothing…” Apollo grumbled. “Is she sure?”
Jasper’s eyes came to me where I was standing next to him, arms tucked around my body, and said, “She’s very sure.”
I rubbed at my face, then told him what I witnessed as the man left.
That had both men pausing.
Jasper stiffened.
And on the other end of the line, the typing that’d been furiously going stopped.
“You’re telling me you think he knew where the cameras were?” Apollo asked, sounding worried.
“Yes.”
“Fuck,” Jasper hissed.
“I just switched cameras to the coffee shop across the street. I can see the person clearly now,” Apollo said. “Nowhere on any of our cameras, but everywhere on everyone else’s.” He paused. “Ahhh, there she is.”
“She?” I asked.
“She,” Apollo confirmed. “Got to the gas station where she parked her car. It’s Agent Max.”
“Who?” I asked.
Jasper groaned. “Fuck.”
“Time for you to make contact with the sister,” Apollo said. “I’m following her through the streets now. Oh, she just stopped in a parking lot next to the closed-down laundromat. Hold on.”
I waited on the balls of my feet, bouncing not because of the cold, but because of my anxiety.
Shit.
A woman had been the one sneaking in here?
What had she done, and why was she here?
An agent didn’t sound like good news.
Especially not for an outlaw motorcycle club.
Apollo said something that I didn’t hear because I was too busy letting my mind run wild, but I tuned in just in time for what Jasper had to say.
“I’ll go after I get gas in Calli’s truck,” he grumbled, pinching the bridge of his nose.
He smelled like gas, which reminded me that I needed to get the truck filled up as soon as I left. One gallon wouldn’t do it when I had to be at work fairly early in the morning.
“Calliope,” Apollo called out. “Did Max have anything on her when she came out of the shop?”
I shook my head. “No, nothing.”
“Hmm,” Apollo said. “Hush, head into the office and see if she put any taps on my computer or my phone.”
“On it.” Jasper jerked his head to me. “Get inside.”
I followed behind him, nervously looking over my shoulder as I did.
When we got into the office, Jasper took something out of his pocket and started to wave it around the room. The little machine lit up.
I watched in fascination as he moved throughout the building, Webber and Apollo still on the line with him, but not saying anything.
“You just carry one of those around everywhere you go?”
“I do,” he replied. “Job security.”
I didn’t say anything more as he started to pull out stuff from the computer next.
Then the bathroom.
Followed by the plant next to the door.
All in all, he found three bugs, a USB in the back of the computer, and a few other things that I had no clue what they were.
Just as Jasper found the last one, Webber walked through the door looking furious.
“Gonna take more than a sweep of this device to check out the shop,” Jasper grumbled. “You’re going to have to treat this place as hot until we can go over it all.”
“Great.” Webber groaned. “At least it’s Christmas, and I won’t be here for a few days. I can get a few of the prospects to go over it with a fine-tooth comb.”
“Then go over it yourself, because the prospects are unreliable,” I murmured mostly to myself.
Jasper shot me a look that I couldn’t read, but didn’t comment on my statement.
I didn’t dislike the prospects, but I didn’t really like them, either.
They were always so fast to follow directions and orders.
It rubbed me the wrong way.
It also spoke of desperation bordering on infatuation.
That just didn’t compute with me.
Then again, blind dedication to the job never sat well with me, either.
It was always good to question everything.
At least in my honest opinion.
“All right,” Jasper said. “Y’all, I have to get her truck out of here and then I’ll stop by and see Max.”
“Doc is on his way there now. He said he’d go with you.”
I muttered more somethings under my breath, wondering if I was getting a watch dog now.
I liked Doc.
He was great to my sister and his children. Great to my siblings.
But we’d never been close, and probably never would be.
We had a healthy amount of respect for each other, and that was probably how it always would be.
Jasper hung up and headed out to the shop, and I assumed I was supposed to follow.
Jasper dumped all the gas he got into the tank, then started the truck up.
It sputtered a few times, but ultimately stayed running.
“Go fill it up,” he suggested. “Drive carefully. Stay close to town if you need one of us.” He paused. “Also, order one of those gas cap locks. That way she can’t try to do it again.”
I knew a dismissal when I heard one.
“Thank you, Jasper,” I said as I gathered the cookies, leaving the box we’d eaten out of for him to snack on by himself.
Jasper only grunted a “you’re welcome” and crossed his arms over his chest.
I drove out of the shop once he opened the large bay doors, and forced myself not to look back.