“Relax, it’s only dinner,” he broke in. “What happened to your leg?”
“My leg?”
“You were favoring it.”
“Oh, I twisted my ankle.”
“How?”
She went with what she’d told Michelle. “I tripped on the stairs.”
“See? It’s a good thing I came over. You need a little TLC.”
Telling herself he wouldn’t stay long, she helped him carry the food into the kitchen.
“Pretty Boy called,” Horse told Shady. “Ink iced a woman at Skin’s sister’s house this morning.”
Shady was out in his garage, which he’d finished. The rest of his house was a dump. A weight set filled his living room. But this room was nice. He’d put in a bar along one side, bought a pool table, hung some beer signs and created a place of honor for his antique Harley over in the corner. He’d even poured a large cement pad outside for extra parking. But it was the gun cabinets along the back, and the weapons inside them, that were his pride and joy.
“What’d you say?” Setting aside the Taurus Millennium series PT145 he’d been cleaning, he swiveled from his worktable to face Horse. A giant of a man with a pockmarked face, bulbous nose and shaved head, Horse always made Shady feel like a kid by comparison. Shady had gotten his nickname from his resemblance to the white rapper Eminem; they had the same slight build and forever-young face. His appearance made it difficult for him to be taken seriously, but no amount of weight lifting seemed to change that. Horse, on the other hand, didn’t need to lift. He had bulk in spades. According to Mona, the woman Shady was currently living with, Horse looked mean and stupid. She was right about the mean part. But he wasn’t stupid. He made almost as much off pimping out whores as Shady did selling drugs.
“Ink busted a cap in a woman,” Horse repeated.
Shady wiped his hands on a cloth before tossing it aside. “It’d better be Skin’s sister.”
“It’s not. Laurel was gone by the time they arrived. They think she’s in protective custody.”
“Then what the hell? Why’d they kill someone?”
“Frustration and an itchy trigger finger. Ink said he wanted to let Skin know he’s coming for him.”
“We still don’t have a clue where Skin is?”
“No.”
That answered everyone’s questions, then, didn’t it? Made what Virgil Skinner was doing pretty damn obvious.
Cursing, he shoved the ammunition, gun parts and tools off his worktable as he stood.
Horse didn’t flinch as they hit the floor, but the noise drew Mona, who poked her head into the garage. “Hey, what’s going on?”
Shady could’ve said Martians had landed and she would’ve believed him. She was so stoned she had to hang on to the door frame so she wouldn’t tumble headfirst into the pool table. “Did I ask you to come in here?”
He’d told her he wanted her to look like a Playboy bunny at all times—laughable considering the stretch marks on her stomach and the crooked teeth in her mouth. But he had to give her points for trying. She wore nothing but a black bra, a thong and a pair of high heels.
“What’d you say?” Her words slurred and her body swayed as if she might lose her grip and fall despite her efforts to remain upright.
What a worthless crack whore. She’d lost all five of her children to Childhood Protection Services, quite a feat even for a bad mother. He only kept her around because it was nice to have a piece of ass whenever he wanted. She didn’t complain when it got too rough, and she let him pass her to the boys, which he did whenever he wanted to prove that he’d share everything he owned with his Crew brothers.
But he was tired of Mona’s drug habit. “Go inside!” he snapped. “I don’t want to see your ugly face!”
Glassy eyes smudged with mascara, lips stretched into a vacant smile, she stepped back and let the door close as if he’d asked her nicely.
“Any chance you want to take her off my hands?” he grumbled to Horse.
Horse considered the suggestion. “I can put her to work.”
“Take her with you, man. I’m done with her.”
“She got any clothes?”
“Does it matter? She won’t need them where she’s going.”
“She’ll need something to hide her worst features. But I can handle that. What do you want me to tell Pointblank?”
Shady pulled on his soul patch, the only hair he allowed on his body. “Anyone see Ink make the hit?”
“They don’t know for sure. It was a drive-by. Someone might’ve spotted the rental car.”
“They haven’t been arrested, though?”
“Not yet.”
“Have Ink come back as soon as possible.”
Horse shoved his hands in his pockets. “The cops are looking for him around here. That’s why you sent him away.”
“And now they’re looking for him there, too, so it doesn’t improve things if he stays.”
“I don’t think he should be in either place.”
Shady kicked a wrench off his seat. “What do you mean by that?”
“Ink’s becoming too much of a liability. Attracting that kind of attention endangers everybody.”
Horse wasn’t the only one leery of Ink. Ink was crazy enough to frighten them all. “In some ways, he is a liability. In other ways, he’s an asset.”
Pursing his lips, Horse stared at the carpet. “They put the lot of us in prison, who’s gonna take care of business on the outside?”
“It comes to that, we’ll serve him up. We won’t go down because he’s too stupid to know when to keep his pistol in his pants.”
Seemingly satisfied, Horse raised his eyes. “What about Pointblank and Pretty Boy?”
“They stay. Have Pretty Boy find a C.O. by the name of Eddie Glover who works at the prison in Florence.”
Horse walked to the pool table and racked the balls into the plastic triangle. “You think Glover might know where Skin is?”
“If anyone knows what happened to him, it would be Glover. Word is they were pretty damn friendly.”
Studying one cue and then another, Horse decided on a stick. “Skin was friends with a C.O.?”
“Part of his change of heart.” Shady chafed at the fact that he hadn’t been able to convince other members of The Crew that Virgil wasn’t as great as they thought. Virgil was the kind of leader other men naturally followed. But he’d never been one to take orders. He was an independent son of a bitch and refused to back down even when it was in his best interests. That made him difficult to manage and as dangerous to the organization as he was to its enemies. Shady had been worried about Skin ever since he heard Skin might be cleared of his stepfather’s murder. Who wouldn’t be tempted by a clean break? Skin wasn’t the gang type—not at heart.
Remembering how determined he’d been to walk his own path whether the rest of them liked it or not, Shady shook his head. There’d been times when he’d flat out refused a command. Anyone else who’d done that would’ve been killed. But everyone admired a man who could fight like Skin. They let him slide whenever he acted up because he was so damn good when he did get involved.
“How are they supposed to find Glover?”
“I just told you. He works at the prison.”
“A lot of guys work at the prison. You don’t have his address?”
“I can get it.”
“What about a description?”
“He’s five foot eleven, maybe one hundred and eighty pounds. Red hair cut short. Freckles everywhere. That tell you enough?”
“It should. I know someone on the inside who can get me his shift, which will also help,” Horse said. “But what if Glover won’t talk?”
Shady wasn’t about to let Skin make him look like a fool. He had to prove he deserved the leadership role he’d fought so hard to obtain. “Everybody talks,” he said. “You just have to give them enough incentive.”