Mace was silent but he leaned forward and pul ed his cel out of his back pocket.
“Um, Mace –” I started again, thinking now the time was ripe to share the fact I was bleeding.
“Two seconds,” Mace replied.
Apparently the time wasn’t ripe.
I looked around the backseat for something to press against my wound. I was probably bleeding al over the seat. I saw a blanket on the floor opposite me, leaned over and grabbed it. I lifted a butt cheek, shoved it under, sat on it and pressed its edge to my hip. Why I cared about bloodstains on the seat of the Explorer, don’t ask me, but it was something to worry about that didn’t involve me and my friends getting shot at, at four o’clock early on a Wednesday morning. So I went with it.
Mace hit some buttons on his cel but the phone rang in the cab before he connected.
Luke hit a button on the console.
“Stark,” he answered.
“Luke, get to Jules. Now. She cal ed in. Drive-by, AK-47.
They shot out Nick and Jules’s windows,” Jack told us.
“God damn it!” Luke clipped.
“Sid,” Mace replied what I thought was nonsensical y.
“Cal Vance. Cal Lee. We need a rendez vous point,” Luke demanded to Jack. “Cal Louie and find out what the f**k is goin’ on with Ava.”
“Copy. Out,” Jack said.
Disconnect.
Luke took a turn without slowing, I went flying and so did Juno. My big dog and I became a tangle of furry limbs and not-furry-limbs. Once we were on the straight and narrow and my ass cheek was back on the blanket again, I thought it best to buckle in.
Mace was looking around the seat at me, his eyes watched me click the buckle then without a word he turned back to the front.
“Hang tight, Juno,” I whispered after I buckled in and I reached across myself with the hand that wasn’t bloody and stroked Juno’s head.
Juno woofed a calm woof.
Good to know my dog was cool in a crisis. Though it would have been better if I’d never needed that knowledge.
Mace was on the phone. “Ike,” he said. “Yeah. Cal Matt and Bobby. Sid’s made a move. We need confirmation on Ava and the girls. Ava reported to Luke they were under fire and he lost contact. Louie’s with them. They were outside that g*y club on Broadway.” Pause. “Yeah, out.” He flipped his phone shut as Luke took another turn without slowing and we al leaned with it.
“Um, Mace –” I began yet again.
“There.” Mace ignored me and pointed at a cherry-condition, red, circa 1980-something Camaro il uminated by the streetlights and headed our way.
Luke hit the brakes, executed a swift, tight, three-point turn in the middle of the road (scaring the effing beejeezus out of me, by the way) and raced up behind the Camaro.
Once there, he flashed his lights.
Leaning to my side and looking between the seats, I saw the driver’s hand wave, the Camaro slowed and Luke shot round it. I looked behind us and the Camaro fol owed as I heard the bleeping sound of the phone being dialed on the dash. I turned back around to front, one ring and connect.
“I’m okay,” a woman’s voice said.
“Nick?” Mace asked.
“He’s okay too.”
“Have you contacted Vance?” Mace went on.
“Yeah, he’s heading back from Albuquerque now,” the woman said and I knew this was Jules, a more recent friend of mine. I’d met her a few months ago when she’d come with some of my friends to a gig. She was married to one of the Nightingale Men, Vance Crowe. In fact, they were just back from their honeymoon.
For your information, it was just my bad luck that after one of the Nightingale Men broke up with me, one of my closest friends hooked up with the Nightingale Man, Lee Nightingale. Her name was India “Indy” Savage. I’d known her for years. Now she and her best friend Al y (a Nightingale herself, Lee’s sister), both close friends of mine, were mixed up with the Nightingale posse. This meant for almost a year I hadn’t had a lot to do with my friends. They knew about me and Mace because they guessed but they also didn’t know because I didn’t share details, not during our five month relationship and not after it ended. It was too precious to share, not even with Al y, whose brother was my now-ex-boyfriend’s employer, and it had never gotten to the point where it wasn’t. When it was over I just got busy. But then again they were al busy too.
As the months passed Indy and Al y added Rock Chicks to the club and al of them were claimed by Nightingale Men along the way.
As I said, it was bad luck, what I didn’t say was it was super shitty bad luck.
Also for your information, I was the Queen of Super Shitty Bad Luck and getting shot was only the most recent example of that fact.
“Fol ow us,” Luke told Jules.
“Gotcha,” Jules replied.
Disconnect.
The dash phone started ringing immediately and Luke pressed a button.
Without a greeting, Jack informed the cab, “Ava’s fine.” I expel ed a breath I didn’t know I was holding. Luke’s fear disappeared.
“Louie returned fire, got the girls and boys in Daisy’s limo. Everyone’s safe, no one was hit. They’re headed to The Castle. Lee says that’s the rendez vous.”
“Copy that. The others?” Luke asked.
“Soon to be in transit but not good. Both Eddie and Hank got cal outs. Both houses were hit by drive-bys after they were gone. AK-47s again. Roxie and Jet were sleeping.
They’re okay. Lee’s just been in to get a vehicle. He’s picking them up and heading toward The Castle.” To keep you up to date, Eddie was Lee’s best friend, Jet was his fiancée. Hank was Lee’s brother, Roxie was living with him.
See how this al came around and went around? Sucks for me because I lost Mace, though the girls were happy as clams, getting married, having babies (Jules was pregnant), living the good life of being a Hot Guy’s Woman.
The life I tasted and loved but lost and would never have again.
“Fuckin’ Sid,” Luke clipped, breaking into my thoughts.
“Fuckin’ Sid,” Jack agreed.
“Ike’s mobilizing Matt and Bobby,” Mace put in. “He was looking for Ava. Now he needs an alternate assignment.”
“Copy that. I’l cal him,” Jack responded.
“Out,” Luke said and hit a button.
Silence.
“War,” Mace declared.
“Fuck yeah,” Luke replied.
I didn’t know what they meant but I didn’t like the sound of it.