by Nicole Fox
“Been down here?” I asked as we approached the Big Muddy.
She shook her head. Then sort of shrugged. “Kinda. Never really been down to the river just to, you know, hang out or anything. I grew up near it, though, back home, and we'd go down to the edge of it sometimes and get high, drink some beers.”
“Back home, huh?” I asked. “Up North?”
She nodded, bit her lip.
We looked out over the railing at the river, watching it churn and flow as it made its way out to the sea. “Your brother was there in that hotel to take you home, wasn't he?”
“Yeah,” she said, nodding a little, “my stepfather went away on a DUI, so we were free from him. I could've gone home.”
“Would you have?” I asked. Had her brother not been there in that hotel room, she and I would have met under completely different circumstances. Sven would still be alive, and she'd still be one of the girls he was running. Would she have caught my eye? Or would she have just been some street-walker I would have turned down at the end of the meeting, then left forever?
The thought that it took her brother dying for us to meet was somehow disheartening. But, strangely, it somehow gave my feelings more import. Like, somehow, we were meant to meet.
“I was going to,” she replied. “Tomlin and I were about to leave when Sven came back. Then, well, you were outside my hotel room when I came running out.” Jace glanced down at my hand next to hers. They were the smallest fractions of an inch apart.
I looked down, followed her gaze, and smiled a little.
Without saying a word, she slid her hand into mine, and our fingers entwined together.
“I'll take you home when this is all done,” I said, the words leaving my mouth before I even realized I was speaking them. “Give you a shot at a new life.”
She laughed, the sound like the tinkling of bells to me.
“Who said I wanted to go home to that piece of shit anyways?” she asked, then laughed again.
# # #
Jace
“I don't think you could pay me to live in a small town ever again,” I said, leaning up again Koen’s side and gripping his hand tighter.
He laughed. “Really? But that's home, right?”
“When Tomlin was around, maybe,” I said, the laughter leaving my voice. “But I realized just now, when you told me you'd take me home, that, well, Tomlin was the only thing tying me there. What would I do, anyways? Get knocked up and have a bunch of kids with some meth-head, then go to church on Sunday, while I'm working at Tilly's Diner every night?”
He grinned. “Nah, I guess not.”
“Can you picture me with grease stains all over my outfit?” I asked, returning his grin as a lopsided smile.
“So, what do you want to do, then?” he asked, emphasizing the first “do.”
I shrugged. “Stay here with you, if it's an option.”
A look of shock passed over his face, one that was soon replaced with realization. “With me?”
“Yeah,” I said, bumping into his side with my shoulder. “Why not?”
“Well, first thing, you know I'm gonna be a hell of a lot poorer with Aleksey behind bars. No guns getting stolen means no money coming in.”
I rolled my eyes and turned my attention back to the water. “Koen, you know why I like you?” I asked after a while.
“Cause I'm a bad ass and great in bed?”
I laughed and shook my head. “Yes, Koen, you are. But, I respect you, too. I respect that you're trying to go after this guy, and trying to get him for me. Even though you know it's going to hurt the bottom line. That takes guts, especially when you're leading the men you are.”
“Well,” he said, putting an arm around me and pulling me close, “at least it's not just Fed that respects it. I just hope we come out on top.”
I let him crush me into his chest, the smell of him and the city filling my senses. “We will,” I whispered. “Don't worry, we will.”
Chapter Twenty-One
Koen
Agent McKesson called me the next morning, bright and early, while I was fixing breakfast for me and Jace. Jace and I had spent another night together, with her practically moving from the guest room into mine. I'd never had the same woman in my bed twice, let alone three times, and the giddiness of it was going to my head.
So, when my phone rang and I didn't recognize the number, I decided to just take my chances. Even if it was a telemarketer, I was more than happy to run the risk. Damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead.
“Koen Baldwin?” Agent McKesson asked.
“This is he.”
“We met the other night, Claire McKesson from the Bureau? Did I catch you at a bad time?”
My heart sped up, and my mouth went dry with instant nerves. This might be my chance, I realized. I could put things right with this phone call, especially if she was the one initiating the contact. Maybe, just maybe, we'd get a second chance at this.
“No, no,” I said as I scrambled the eggs in my skillet and went to flip the bacon in the other. “What can I do for you this morning, Agent?”
“I got a call from a colleague in a local agency out in Elmwood who was looking for some assistance. I was wondering if, through your contacts with our mutual interest, you might know something about it.”
Elmwood was a local suburb, about twenty miles outside the city. I knew the Thunder Kings had interests out there, and had sunk a lot of time and money into securing their territory, to the point where I'd actually had to order my boys to steer clear of it in order to avoid an even wider turf war.
About that time, Jace came padding into the kitchen on bare feet, wearing just one of my old Sturgis tee shirts. It was so huge it nearly swallowed her, and, for some reason, the sight of her in it nearly made want to do the same.
“Elmwood?” I asked, my eyes focused on the little vixen I'd taken in. “I'm familiar with the town. How can I help?”
“Who is that?” Jace mouthed at me as she picked an almost-done piece of bacon out of the skillet. I nearly slapped her hand with my spatula, but she was too fast.
“McKesson,” I mouthed back.
“ . . . is trafficking narcotics, heroin to be exact, in there. Big players, and my buddy isn't getting any leads on his end. So, he asked me to reach out to my CI's, my criminal informants, to see if I could shake some information from the trees. While you're not one exactly, I just thought . . .”
“McKesson?” Jace mouthed back. She made a “well?” motion with her hand.
“One second,” I said. “Someone just walked into the room.” I put the phone against my shoulder, muffling the receiver.
“What does she want?” Jace whispered.
I explained to her what was going on, the short version.
“And do you know?”
I nodded. I knew. Of course I knew. Everyone knew.
“Tell her,” Jace said. “Fucking tell her, Koen, and get us back in on this thing.”
It broke down like this:
The Russian mafia was heavy into drugs, and that would make Aleksey a prime candidate for helping anyone moving drugs in and out of the metro area. And, if I knew my Thunder Kings, they were responsible for the sudden influx. One, they wouldn't allow anyone else to traffic on their turf. And, two, they had zero qualms about moving that kind of shit.
But, there was still that unwritten code bikers followed, about not snitching, even on rivals. You never involved the cops, not on purpose at least. At the same time, though, I needed to prove I was reliable to Agent McKesson. I needed to show her that I had value, and that I could help her bring the Wolf down.
Jace narrowed her eyes. “You fucking tell her, or I will. What would Fed do?”
I sighed and rolled my eyes, then put the phone back to my ear. “Tell your friend to look into the Thunder Kings. They're an outlaw biker gang in the area, big on meth and H, and they're probably what he's looking for.”
She didn't respond for a moment, but I had the f
eeling she was writing the info down.
“Good to know,” she said.
“Now give me the phone,” Jace said, clapping one handed at me as she chewed the last bite of bacon. “I wanna talk to her while you finish up breakfast.”
I grumbled and shook my head before hanging my phone over to the little wisp of a woman. Maybe having a brassy, half-crazy woman around the house wasn't such a good idea after all.
# # #
Jace
It took some convincing, but I finally got Agent McKesson to meet with us again. This time in a less formal setting, and closer to Koen's home. We met at a little Starbucks in a nearby shopping center, some place we wouldn't know anyone from the city.
“Alright,” McKesson said as she sat down with her plain black coffee that was so at odds with the half-fat mocha frappucino I'd ordered for myself. “Talk.”
Koen nodded. “Okay. I wasn't completely honest before.”
Claire snorted and kept her eyes focused on Koen like he might bite her if she looked away. “Yeah. I know. And your little tip this morning wasn't exactly the first indication, either.”
He shrugged and gave her a little grin, trying to be charming with her. “Okay, my associates and I have been stealing from Aleksey Volkov, not doing business like I said before. We've been knocking over shipments of guns for the last year or so and moving them through our channels.”
I hadn't exactly expected him to be that blunt, and from the look on Agent McKesson's face, I don't think she did either. She looked like she couldn't decide if she was going to burst out laughing or arrest him on the spot.
“Okay,” she said after a moment, nodding. “Okay,” she said again. “How long, again?”
“Maybe a year or more,” he said with a shrug. “We got some pretty good ones, too.”
“Funnily enough,” the agent said as she sat back in her chair, “you're probably doing more good than harm, overall. Not that the courts would see it that way, I think. But, there's irony that I think you might appreciate.”
Koen laughed and shook his head, disbelievingly. “What do you mean, 'more good than harm?'”
“Exactly that. Aleksey is a gun smuggler, you see. He was before, and still is one now. Most of his business interests lay in sending guns overseas to different groups, destabilizing countries. He's responsible for things that would make even Kim Jong Un blush. West Africa, Central America, Mexico. Hell, the Sinaloa Cartel probably has the Wolf on speed dial. Your thefts are cutting into his bottom line, which means you're hurting him where we can't. Not yet, at least.”
“Not yet?” I asked, leaning forward. “Does that mean you're trying?”
The agent held back a grin from her lips, but I could see it in her eyes. “We're trying right now, yes. But, we've needed someone on the inside that he'd talk to, so we could get evidence. A recording, you understand, otherwise it won't hold up in court.”
“But I'm not on the inside,” Koen said.
“Of course not. But, you're enough of a thorn, he'd still want to talk to you, wouldn't he?”
“Guess so,” he replied as he drummed his fingers on the table. “I mean, I'd want to talk to the guy pissing in my cereal, if I were in his shoes.”
“Exactly,” she said. “You'd have to wear a wire, and you'd have to get a meeting with Volkov. But, we could get you the protection you want, if you go through it. Legal and physical, if we need to.”
This was it. This was the chance we needed. I reached over and put my hand on Koen's, squeezed it tight for support.
He entwined his fingers in mine, glanced down at them, then at me. He nodded when he saw my eyes.
“I'm game, if it means we can protect the ones we care about,” he said after a moment, his eyes still on mine. He turned back to the Agent McKesson. “I'll do it. I'll wear a wire.”
Chapter Twenty-Two
Koen
We all met a couple days later at Grandpa Xavier's house, Benji, Fed, Agent McKesson, everyone.
Gathered around the kitchen table, we drank beers while Grandpa got steaks ready for the grill out back. Despite the reason for us being there, it felt strangely natural and . . . normal. Just my ex-federal agent turned biker buddy, my retired FBI agent grandfather, a working FBI agent, and two retired prostitutes. Oh, and me. The president of an outlaw biker gang.
You know. Normal.
“Your grandson and his girlfriend are cute,” Agent McKesson said as she popped a roast peanut into her mouth.
Jace perked up. “Girlfriend?” she asked.
“Yeah, she's not my girlfriend,” I said, almost reflexively.
We both looked down at our hands, which were entwined together.
Agent McKesson cackled at our expense, sending the blood rising to Jace's face in a bright blush. “Yeah, right. Keep telling yourself that, kiddos,” she said, popping the rest of the nuts into her mouth.
“It's kinda funny, isn't it?” Fed piped in, gently ribbing us both. “The way they both deny it at the same time?”
“Yeah,” Benji added in her characteristic squeak. “Almost like they're in sync, or something.”
Everyone got a good laugh at us, which made Jace just squeeze my hand tighter. Everyone except Grandpa Xavier, of course. I glanced over at him, and from the way he was beaming at us, I knew he didn't care one way or another. He just wanted us to be happy.
“Come on,” I muttered to Jace as I tugged at her hand and went to stand up. “You haven't seen the backyard yet.” Together, we disappeared out the back. Hopefully, their conversation would turn to something else that wouldn't include us, or our love lives.
# # #
Jace
“So,” Koen asked as we looked out from Xavier's back patio over the green of the Louisiana landscape, “think we should take the plunge?”
I laughed. “The plunge? What do you mean?”
“You know . . . make it official?”
I turned and put my arms around his waist, pulling myself into him. He looked down at me with those icy blue eyes of his, then leaned down and kissed me, the stubble lightly rubbing my skin. I closed my eyes and just enjoyed the moment, the feel of our skin together, of his strong arms around. I smiled as our lips parted, then opened my eyes and gazed up at him. “You asking me to go steady, Koen Baldwin?”
“Guess I am,” he said back, his voice so thick with sarcasm you could scrape it on toast, “Jace Spears.”
“Well, ask me then.”
“Fine,” he said, sighing as he rolled his eyes. “Will you be my girlfriend?”
I'd never seen him be so awkward, so unsure of himself, before. It was actually kind of cute. “Let's go with . . . partners in crime,” I offered.
He threw his head back and laughed, then shrugged a little. “Sure, why not. Partner in crime, then?”
I nodded then stood up on tiptoes to kiss him again. “Yes. That sounds lovely.” I grinned as I turned back to the landscape. I put my elbows up on the wooden rail and leaned on them. “So, what's next?”
“I dunno,” he said, and gave a little laugh. “Suppose we get to know each other better?”
I laughed. “Sure. You go first, though. You know more about me than I know about you, I think.”
“Okay,” he said, stepping up next to me and leaning on the rail. The old wood sagged a little under the added weight, but it seemed sturdy enough. A good foundation was everything, it seemed. “Well, I grew up without my momma around. She ran off on my father when I was just a boy. And, well, Gator was off with the guys a lot.”
I nodded along, knowing a little bit about stories like his. My daddy had been gone for a long time, and momma had to struggle to make ends meet for years before she found Jeremy. And, then, well, that hadn't exactly been an overall improvement. Especially with the way Jeremy talked with his fists more than with his mouth.
“But,” Koen continued, “Gator, he brought me into the club when I was old enough to prospect. They'd been my uncles before that, then they beca
me my brothers. When he passed a while back, I stepped in to his shoes, so to speak.”
“Big shoes, huh?” I asked.
“Yeah,” he said and grinned a little, a lopsided smile that was half pain, half pleasure at the memory of his daddy. I knew that feeling, too. “Big fucking shoes, that's for damn sure. Just, he always took these wild risks, you know? Always seemed like he had things under control to all the guys around him, but I knew what kind of people were showing up looking for him. Gambling debts, loan sharks. He almost lost the clubhouse once.”
