“You what?” Shy asked, sounding tweaked.
Rush looked at Shy.
The man also looked tweaked.
“I dropped her in the office with Tyra before I came here,” Rush mostly repeated.
Tack kicked back his chair and booked toward the doors.
Rush knew that was not a good thing.
“Dad, what the fuck?” he called, swiveling his chair toward the doors.
His father stopped at them, turned to his son and stated, “You left two redheads alone together, neither of them knowing each other, one of them your stepmother, one of them the woman you moved in with you after a dead body was dumped outside her house.”
Shit.
What was he thinking?
“Holy fuck,” Brick muttered.
Rush shot out of his chair and booked after his father who’d pulled open one of the double doors and moved through.
He heard the sounds of men, a lot of them, on the move behind him but he didn’t look back. He just caught up to his father.
They prowled through the common room of the Compound, out, hit sunshine, and his dad actually broke into a jog as he went across the forecourt.
Fuck.
Rush jogged with him.
Boots hit pavement behind him.
His father took the steps up to the office two at a time.
Rush did too.
Boots hit cement behind him as he did.
Tack threw open the door and stormed in.
Rush followed him.
“What on earth?” Tyra asked.
Rush was crowded as men shoved in behind him.
But all they saw was Tyra at her desk, leaning into her elbows toward Rebel, who was in a chair opposite her, those long legs of hers in her faded jeans stretched in front of her, her cowboy boots crossed at the ankles, her elbows to the arms of her chair, both hands held up. One had a coffee mug, the other a half-eaten donut.
Rebel glanced through the guys and settled on him.
“Hey,” she greeted calmly. “Everything cool?”
“You tell me,” Tack growled, but he wasn’t talking to Rebel, his eyes were on his wife.
“Tack, I’m not going to eat her,” Tyra said.
Rush watched his dad’s jaw grow tight.
His eyes swung to Tyra when she spoke, but she was looking at Rebel.
“Just FYI, I was a little distraught when Tack got home last night. We’ve been dealing with this Valenzuela thing for a while. I wasn’t happy there was another dead body. I thought you were being reckless. Just an overprotective stepmom thing. No biggie.”
“You ranted at me for an hour,” Tack bit out.
She rolled her eyes. “It wasn’t an hour.” Again she looked at Rebel. “Maybe forty-five minutes. Though I will admit it was ranting. The boys went down to the basement to escape it. Tack cooks. He was late home. I was low blood sugar.”
Rebel was casually chewing a bite of donut.
She swallowed and said, “Understandable.”
Then she took a sip of coffee.
“I didn’t get off this easy,” Shy put in.
Tyra looked at her stepson-in-law. “Rebel hasn’t slept with half of Denver.” She looked back at Rebel. “Have you? Not that I’d mind, of course. No judgement for the sisterhood. A woman has needs the same as a man.”
“No judgement for Rebel, but me . . .” Shy muttered irritably.
“I haven’t,” Rebel looked to Rush. “I haven’t, baby. It’s low threat of awkward run-ins if you ever take me out to eat somewhere other than your kitchen.”
“Our Punk might not have that low of a threat,” Hop muttered.
Men chuckled.
Rush took in a calming breath so he would not lose his mind.
“Are there any donuts left?” Big Petey asked.
“Just one,” Brick answered.
“Lenny’s in the building,” Joker added.
“You really need to bring more donuts, Cherry,” Dog grunted, gazing across the office at the mostly empty bakery box.
“Punk?” Tyra asked.
“Rebel has a nickname,” Snapper answered.
“Already?” Tyra asked.
“A lot like Rush, we don’t let grass grow, woman,” Hound said.
And now Hound was in on the act, giving him shit.
“And it’s Punk?” Tyra asked.
“You didn’t see her outfit yesterday,” Brick told her.
Tyra looked to Rebel. “I thought Saliva was metal.”
“I don’t know what they’re talking about. My outfit was rocker chic yesterday,” Rebel said.
Tyra nodded like she was forming a mental picture.
“It was somethin’, don’t know if it was rocker chic,” High muttered.
“Don’t you men have important business?” Tyra asked the group, her eyes narrowing. “You know, women to keep from being killed, criminals to bring to justice?”
“Everybody out,” Tack ordered.
“Rush, FYI, I ordered you a sandwich. And one for Rebel. So that’s handled,” Tyra told him. “But maybe next time you might think about feeding your woman.”
“Yeah, next time, think about feeding your woman,” Speck spoke up.
He was now officially done with that shit.
So, slowly, Rush turned and leveled his eyes on Speck.
“Goin’ back to the Compound,” Speck announced, then shoved through the wall of men and out the door.
Rush turned back and looked at Rebel.
“You okay?” he asked.
“Perfectly fine. Though later, you’re dead,” she answered and stuffed the last bite of donut in her mouth.
She was fine.
He looked to Ty-Ty. “Be nice.”
Her brows went up. “When am I not nice?”
“Don’t make now the time you start,” he ordered.
Tyra rolled her eyes at Rebel.
Rebel smiled at Tyra.
Then she took another ship of coffee.
It was all good.
He moved to the door.
His father fell in step beside him as they made their way across the forecourt back to the Compound.
“You wanna talk about how you want a handful again?” Tack asked.
“She really rant for an hour?”
“Don’t believe her bullshit about forty-five minutes. It was more like an hour and a half.” His dad heaved a big sigh. “We need to get this Valenzuela shit finished.”
Rush couldn’t agree more.
“So I’ll run this shit down,” Tack said an hour later.
The waste of sandwiches, chip bags, cellophane from cookies, spent bottles of beer and cans of pop littered the table as all the men around it kept their eyes locked on their president.
“I’ll call Valenzuela. Set the meet. Hop and Shy with me. Hound, High, Snap and Rush ride with, peel off, stay close to the meet location. Everyone else on alert when that goes down,” Tack went on.
No one said anything, which meant everyone got it.
“Join forces with Valenzuela,” Tack continued, now talking like he had rocks in his mouth he wanted to spit out. “Find Chew. Priority one. In the meantime, we shake down anyone who might have a lead on where Chew is. Slim told me they’re haulin’ in Digger and Pacino from the club formerly known as Bounty, and they’re gonna lean on Digger to get him to give up Chew, as well as other fucked-up shit.”
His dad’s eyes came to Rush before he kept talking.
But all the men had been briefed.
Digger was a suspect in Rebel’s friend’s murder and Hank and Eddie were going to further explore that option.
And also push the man on if he knew the whereabouts of Chew.
“It might end there, Digger gives him up,” Tack said. “I don’t have good thoughts about that. So we keep lookin’, find that asshole and shut shit down.”
No one was gonna disagree to any of that so again, no one said anything.
“Now, Snap’s bein’ followed,” Tack carried on. “High and him didn’t see anything, but from now on, sucks, brothers, but if you can, ride with a man at your side. Do it armed. Keep vigilant. And let someone, brother or old lady, know where you’re going and check in when you get there.”
There was shifting at that. Not uncomfortable, ticked.