Chapter 29 #2
At the sound of that name, Evan twitched. Finally, one he recognized.
He didn’t admit it though and clipped out a belligerent “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“This Junior person, he’s why you missed the game,” Sean said, and I turned to look at him, wondering when and how he’d come to that conclusion.
Was this more info from my brother, or was Sean simply that good at reading people?
“Just tell us the truth, Evan,” Elli pleaded. “You have me worried.”
Evan looked at his sister for a long beat, then breathed out heavily. “There’s nothing to worry about, Tiny.”
“I don’t think any of us believe that anymore,” Elli said.
Evan bit the inside of his cheek. His gaze slid from Elli to Lukas to Sean, then back again. He exhaled heavily. “Fine.”
“Fine, what?” Elli asked.
“Fine, I loaned Junior some money,” Evan said. “He’s a friend of mine. He was supposed to pay me back, but he didn’t.”
I detected another lie, but I couldn’t tell which part wasn’t true.
“I heard he was in Reno,” Rogue continued. “So, since we were playing a game near there, I found him, and we had a sit down. I got my money back. I bought a watch. That’s all.”
I glanced at Elli. Was she buying any of this? Rogue didn’t seem to be in the position to be handing out loans.
“That isn’t all,” Rafe reminded him. “You also missed a game.”
“The conversation took a while,” Evan said. “Now…are we done?”
“We’re done,” Lukas said. “And for the record, this was never intended to be an ambush.”
Evan scoffed.
“Seriously, man,” Lukas said. “You have us worried.”
“No need to worry,” Evan said. “As you can see, I’m fine. Elli’s fine. Kiera, too. Whatever happened, happened. But it’s over.”
“You’ve said that before,” Lukas said.
“I think it’s time for you all to go,” Evan said, and he gathered up his beer to bring it back to the fridge.
“Ev…” Elli said, looking both apologetic and concerned.
“You, too, Tiny.”
Those who were still sitting stood up, and Evan held the door open for us all to leave.
SEAN
“So, did we believe him?” Bjorn asked.
“Nope,” Lukas said.
Everyone had regrouped on the sidewalk outside Rogue’s apartment building.
Elli glanced up at her brother’s third-floor window and when Sean followed her gaze, a dark figure came into view. The curtains jerked shut.
“Okay, Murph…” Q said. “Who the hell is Lou Ritter?”
Everyone turned to look at him, and Kiera took his hand.
“I got his name from Kiera’s brother,” Sean explained. “He’s who she was supposed to hand the bag off to at the bodega. I was hoping he might be the link to Rogue.”
“Okay,” Q said. “But who is he?”
“Not sure,” Sean said. “But I did a little digging online. There were a couple newspaper articles where his name was mentioned in connection to the Cavallaro family.”
“Oh, shit,” Bjorn murmured.
“Why ‘oh, shit”?” Elli asked, her voice rising. “Who are the Cavallaros?”
“Organized crime family,” Sean said.
Elli shook her head vehemently. “There’s no way Evan’s involved in anything like that. That’s why you can’t find a link.”
“Yeah,” Lukas said. “I gotta agree with Elli on that one. There’s no way.”
“But he knows something,” Sean said.
Lukas didn’t disagree with that.
“So, what do we do now?” Q asked.
“We follow him,” Sean said.
“Do you really think spying is going to make anything better between you guys?” Elli asked. “Let me try and talk to him again. Alone this time.”
Lukas pressed his lips together in indecision.
Sean understood where that was coming from. Once upon a time, Rogue and Lukas had been best friends. This whole thing had to be messing with his head.
“Compromise,” Sean said. “We won’t all spy on him. Just me. Rogue won’t know he’s being followed.”
“Until he goes inside and you no longer have a tree to hide behind,” Q said.
“I don’t hide behind anything,” Sean retorted, some of his frustration with the situation leaking out onto Q, who held up his hands in surrender.
“See what you can learn,” Rafe said. “Whatever Rogue’s got going on the side, I don’t want it affecting our performance on the ice. We’re going the distance this year. I won’t let shit mess with that.”
“Agreed,” Q said. “I got one, maybe two years left before I retire. This could be my last chance to hold the cup.”
The Stanley Cup. Jesus. Sean hadn’t let his imagination go that far yet. Well, actually, he’d imagined it plenty of times since he was a kid, holding the cup aloft, his teammates huddled tight in victory, but Q talked like it was a real possibility. And maybe he was right.
They’d had a weak start with some sizable fuck ups, but they were finally playing up to their potential.
“Someone else should keep an eye on Tuttle and Petey,” Sean said. “They’re in on this, too.”
“How much you want to bet they’ve got new watches?” Lukas asked.
“Whatever we find,” Q said, “do we report it to Coach? To O’Rourke?”
O’Rourke, the team owner, was a bad-tempered berserker boar. Sean hoped he wouldn’t need to attend that kind of meeting.
“Depends,” Rafe said, and his hellhound eyes glowed red. “Let’s just take this one step at a time. Murph, you’re on Rogue. Q you take Tuttle.”
“I’ll take Petey,” Lukas said.
“Just be careful,” Kiera said, and she squeezed Sean’s hand.
That firm grip made him feel as though she’d reached right into his chest and took hold of his heart, claiming it as hers. It felt good. It felt right.
“Did you want to hang out at our place again?” Elli asked Kiera, then her voice turned pointed as she added, “While these maniacs are all playing stakeout?”
“My car’s fixed, and it was towed back to my apartment,” Kiera replied. “Could we stop and get it?”
“Absolutely,” Elli said.
As Kiera took her first step away, Sean felt the pang of her soon-to-be absence. So much so, he instinctively pulled her back and curled her into his body.
Kiera tipped her head back in invitation, and he kissed her once. Hard. Putting as much meaning into it without going so far as to cause a scene.
“Be careful,” she repeated.
Then he let her go.