Three
Ghost didn’t get much sleep. If any. He wasn’t sure he ought to count the hour he drifted in limbo, unsure if the light behind his eyes was real or imagined. He was alert and full of useless nervous energy at five, a good hour before the alarm was set to go off. He watched the clock, the glowing numbers moving so slowly, and listened to Maggie breathe beside him. He felt her warmth, but they weren’t touching, her back maybe an inch from his elbow.
He wondered if he rolled over and put his arm around her if he could feel the baby already, the first slight shift in her body.
No, he decided. She didn’t look any different; too soon to feel anything.
He stared at the dark ceiling and marveled at his own inability to cope. Years ago, when Maggie told him she was pregnant with Ava, the news had hit him full in the face like Mercy’s sledgehammer. He’d stood silent, gaping, unable to wrap his brain around all the ways in which he was such a stupid asshole for knocking up a teenager.
His Uncle Duane’s voice echoed inside his head: You’ve got to get your shit together, boy. He’d been right…about that, at least. The year before he met Maggie had been an ugly one, and it hadn’t been anyone’s fault but his own. He wasn’t sure he’d ever explained it to Mags properly, not then and certainly not now, even though he had a chance to do it all over again. He hadn’t been angry about the baby, no, never. And he’d certainly never been angry at Maggie or blamed her for anything. Instead, he’d been angry with himself, and his own reckless stupidity.
He thought the same thing now that he had then: why hadn’t he taken any steps to prevent this? Why hadn’t he been careful? Why hadn’t he been adult enough to have a freaking conversation about it, for God’s sakes?
The ugly truth of his behavior toward Aidan was this: he had always been just like his son. It ran in the family or some shit. He’d never been Duane’s perfect soldier. No, that had been…
He sat up so fast he thought he might pass out.
Maggie shifted. “Mmm?” she mumbled, still half-asleep.
His heartbeat throbbed in his ears, and his face, and all down his arms, strangely absent from his chest. For a moment of shaking clarity, he couldn’t breathe, could only think yes, him. It had to be him. But then he sucked in a breath and it all seemed stupid.
“Nothing,” he told Maggie. “Go back to sleep, baby.”
She mumbled something he couldn’t hear and resettled.
Ghost wasn’t going back to sleep, though.
He slid out of bed, ignoring the cracks of protests of his ankles and knees. Fuck getting older, just fuck it. He walked to his closet and eased open the door, spun the dial on his gun safe and eased it open with a well-oiled click. The box he wanted was on the top shelf, next to his ammo boxes. He pulled it down and took it to the kitchen.
It took a minute for his eyes to adjust to the bright overhead light, then he took another minute to start the coffee machine. Finally, settled at the table in boxers and a t-shirt, he flipped the top off the old box and started flicking through the contents. Photos. Hundreds of them, pre-digital camera, all developed and organized neatly by year, their negatives stowed behind each dividing tab.
He flipped all the way back to when he was twenty-seven, back to when Duane was president, and he was just a regular member and not an officer. Right after Olivia left him – and left him with Aidan. Back to when the best, brightest, most promising young member was Roman Mayer.
He closed his eyes and tried to recall the photo from the precinct, the man with the hood and the knife who’d killed the dog. He’d been tall and strong-looking, but that was all he could tell. Nothing about his posture or his clothes had given him any clues. Only the message: he wanted Ghost dead.
Roman had reason to want him dead, once. But that had been a long, long time ago. Since then, new enemies had come and gone. New tragedies had unfolded. After all that, could this really be Roman? Coming out of left field, without warning?
“No,” he said to himself, and slammed the lid back down on the box.
The coffee maker beeped and he got up to answer its call.
~*~
Maggie shuffled through her morning routine, nursing sips of Sprite and nibbling at exactly three Club crackers – Ghost counted them. His gut tightened in sympathetic guilt every time she pressed her knuckles to her lips and took a moment to compose herself.
“Maybe you should–” he started.
She gave him a look. “Stay home? Yeah, no. So everyone can think I’m shaking in my boots after a little police interview? No, I’m going.”
“Nobody’s gonna think you’re scared.”
She snorted and got up from the kitchen table like her bones ached. “Honey, when a woman stays home, someone always think she’s scared.”
“Not my woman,” he insisted.
She patted his cheek on her way to pour out the rest of her Sprite.
He followed her in to Dartmoor, half afraid she’d pull over to throw up. But by the time she climbed out of her Caddy in front of the main office, her color looked better, her game face securely in place.
“You okay?” he asked.
Her nod was firm. “I’m fine. Don’t worry about me.” And she gave him a grin before she let herself into the office.
But because she knew him, she had to know he’d worry about her. The worry was lodged in his esophagus somewhere, like heartburn. He watched the closed office door a long moment, wondering if it was shut because it was too cold outside, or because she just didn’t feel like having a portal open to the whole lot right now. Finally, with a sigh, he walked over to the clubhouse.
Walsh was waiting for him, sitting on top of a picnic table with a steaming travel mug of coffee and what was probably his third cigarette of the day; Walsh chain-smoked when he was worried, the only outward sign that he ever fretted about anything.
“I heard from Dennis,” he said, rolling off the table in one smooth motion and falling into step beside ghost, coffee and smoke balanced in the same hand. “He said he had a visitor a few days ago.”
“What kind of visitor?” Ghost drew to a halt just outside the clubhouse door and turned to his VP, hands on hips and heart feeling its age.
Walsh took a hard drag. “Someone who knew you had hold of his leash, and who was asking about you.”
Dennis was one of their newer dealers, but one of the most trustworthy. He was organized, clean, and ruthless about keeping his underlings on the up-and-up. Well…as up as anyone dealing dope could get. He wasn’t the kind of idiot who’d squeal and get them all busted. So Ghost knew Dennis hadn’t said anything he shouldn’t; it was the idea that anyone was asking in the first place that gave him goosebumps.
“What’d the guy look like?” he asked.
Walsh pulled out his phone and turned a blurry photo toward him. “He managed to take this. Can’t tell much, though.”
It was true; there wasn’t much to tell. Dennis’s phone had been moving, and held in shadow, when he snapped the picture. But to Ghost, it was like looking at a ghost – except, to his knowledge, Roman Mayer wasn’t dead. Roman would be older now, his own age, but the blurred figure in the photo had an unmistakable aura of Roman about him. The shape of his face and eyes, the little smirk tugging at his mouth, like he knew his photo was being taken and he didn’t give a shit.
No, Ghost thought. No fucking way. The Twilight Zone impossibility of having just thought of the man that morning and seeing what looked like his face now swept over him in a dizzying wave. He’d been on his way inside to grab more coffee, but now he thought a Scotch was in order.
Walsh detected his shift in mood. “What?” he asked, expression unreadable, eyes very blue in the shade.
“I think I know who that is.”
Walsh’s brows lifted a fraction. “Yeah?”
“Old buddy of mine,” Ghost said with a sigh, and opened the door. “Long story.”
Walsh followed him into the clubhouse, and then to the bar, face a mask of blank insistence. Ghost knew his expression: Long story or not, I’m your VP. Try me.
He reached over the bar top and plucked up the Jack, pulled a glass from the overhead rack. Chanel was over in front of the TV, feather duster in her hand. When she saw him serving himself, she turned toward the bar and said, “Oh, I can–”
Ghost cut her off with a firm shake of his head. Sent her a warning look.
“Right.” She rerouted. “I’ll just go check on the laundry.” She swept out of the room with a slap-slap of flip-flops.
When she was gone, Ghost took a long pull of Tennessee sour mash and sighed again, the weight of the years since then and now landing heavy across his shoulders. He fucking hated when the past came back to haunt him. Story of his life.
“Back when Duane was prez, I wasn’t exactly a…model member.”
Walsh kept a straight face, but he snorted.
“Yeah, yeah, laugh it up. I sucked, we all know that. But there was this kid who didn’t suck, who was up Duane’s ass all the damn time. It was creepy how much of a suck-up he was, to be honest. He had eyes on the head of the table, and everybody in the club thought he’d end up there.”
“Did anyone ever tell you,” Walsh said, “that history has a serious way of repeating itself when it comes to your family?”
Ghost flipped him the bird and kept talking. “His name was Robert, but we all called him Roman because he had this damn warrior complex. We got guys like Michael and Mercy, yeah, but they’re not ambitious, not like Roman was. He was bloodthirsty and he wanted to be the boss.”
“Dangerous combination.”
“Yeah. Anyway, he was the golden boy. Until shit went down.”
“Eloquent.”
“Shut the fuck up, English. Alright, so he proved to be…less loyal than we thought. I ran him out of town. Some people would see that as an opportunity to run very far away and not antagonize the largest outlaw MC in the world.”
“Or, someone might bide his time and seek out revenge.” Walsh tipped his head back and forth in consideration. “He killed a dog. That’s terrible, yeah, I’ll grant you that. But.” His face said look at the shit we do. “The question is: is this really him? Because if it is, and he’s got an axe to grind, then we need to take this threat seriously.”
“I don’t know the guy anymore. I have no idea where his head’s at. If it’s him.”
“Is it?”
“I’m starting to really think so.”
Walsh nodded. “I’ll call church for tonight.”
“Good.” His gut churned. His voice wavered. “Also, um, I should tell you. Before it’s out there.”
Walsh stared at him.
“Mags is…um…she’s pregnant.”
A second passed. Another. Another…
Walsh’s grin bloomed slow, but it was delighted. “Really?”
“Really.”
He laughed, one harsh bark that sounded strange to Ghost’s ears. “Congrats, old man.”
~*~
Maggie was no stranger to nausea. No one was. It was just that when she knew what the nausea meant that it grew heavy, and important, and she felt much more in tune with her body. She felt sick, but she had a bathroom, a waste basket, and a bunch of calls to make. She saw no reason to stay home.
Also, she wasn’t surprised that Ava showed up about ten-thirty, all three kids in tow.
“Aw, baby,” she said when Ava wrestled her stroller through the office door. “You shouldn’t have come.”
“No, it’s fine.” Ava blew her hair off her face and finally managed to get the stroller – and Millie inside it – parked in front of the desk. Remy and Cal flanked her, holding on to the tail of her sweater on both sides. “I wanted to check on you.”
“I’m not the one dragging three little munchkins around – hi, sweetie!” She opened her arms as Cal came around the desk to give her a hug. The top of his little blonde head smelled like No More Tears and the scent hit her right between the ribs, made her ache to hold the baby that was still so tiny inside of her.
Ava, the little Terminator, wasn’t so easy to shake off, though. “You talked to Dad?”
Maggie hauled Cal up into her lap, his head tucked beneath her chin, and sent her daughter a stern look. “Do you really have so little faith in your father?”
Ava shrugged. “Well…”
“Your dad is fine,” Maggie said, firmly. “You forget sometimes, I think, that he isn’t a bad man.” Drug dealing notwithstanding, went unsaid. “Besides, we aren’t stupid kids this time around. If anything, we’re even better prepared.”
Ava didn’t look convinced, but she nodded and dropped down into the chair beside the stroller. Remy climbed up in the chair next to her, as somber and grown up as usual. “Any news about the…” She gestured vaguely rather than say it in front of the kids.
“Not yet, no. Soon, I figure.”
“You know what I think?” Ava asked, but before she could say anything else, someone rapped sharply against the office door. Then it swung open.
Early sunlight framed Vince Fielding in an unforgiving way, illuminating the lines on his face and the way his hair was thinning on top. The way his body was a little sparer, his face rounder. Alcohol, most like. His uniform shirt had a little stain above one of the pockets.
Ava grabbed the stroller handle with one hand and Remy’s jacketed arm with the other, a mother lioness ready to snatch her cubs out of danger.
“Vince,” Maggie said, sitting up straight and clutching Cal tight into her stomach. She shouldn’t have been surprised to see him, not after what happened last night, but she was. “What are you doing here?”
He fiddled with his tie, seeming to forget it was clipped into the buttons of his shirt. “I was off rotation last night, but I heard what happened. I wanted to make sure you were alright.”
“Join the club,” she muttered. “I’m fine, we’re all fine, everything’s fine.” She was really starting to hate that word. “How about you and your guys just figure out who did it, okay?”
“Well, that’s the thing,” he said, shuffling his feet on the linoleum. “Down at the station, no one really…cares.”
~*~
“Talk to all your contacts,” Ghost told Ratchet, and the secretary bobbed his head, expression earnest. “Your courthouse guy, your lab guy, your fucking DOT guy, if you’ve got one. If someone saw something or knows something, I wanna know about it.”
“On it, boss,” Ratchet assured.
“Good.” Ghost started to step back from the desk, and heard the scrape of a shoe on the hardwood a moment before he was attacked.
Two arms strong and thick as tree trunks wrapped tight around his middle, squeezed the breath out of him, and lifted him up off his feet like he weighed nothing.
“Daddy!” Mercy crowed, laughing.
Ghost considered kicking him. “I ain’t your daddy, asshole.”
“If it’s a boy, will you name it after me? Can’t you just hear it? Felix Teague. It’s got a nice ring to it.”
Ghost did kick him then.
Laughing still, Mercy set him back on his feet. “Admit it, you like it.”
Ghost forced himself to turn slowly, and glower presidentially, when what he wanted was to slug the guy. “Is this how you wanna play this? Really?”
Mercy’s grin took up his whole face, and it was a little bit terrifying how happy he was. “Oh, really.”
“Is it too late to rescind my fatherly approval of your marriage?”
“Never had it, didn’t ask for it.” Mercy put his big paw hands on Ghost’s shoulders. “You gotta understand, Poppy. This is Karmic.”
“Getting my wife pregnant?”
“No. Sanctimonious, superior, joyless you getting your wife pregnant. Big difference.”
Ghost shrugged off his touch. “God, I hate you.”
“No you don’t,” Mercy said, cheerfully. “I’m your favorite son-in-law.”
“I’m not even gracing that with a response.”
“Hey,” Walsh said, leaning in from the front hall. “Fielding’s here.”
“Send him in.”
“He’s down at the office, actually.”
A hot, sudden surge of anger propelled Ghost forward. He tapped Mercy in the chest with two fingers as he passed. “Come with me, not-favorite son-in-law. You might have to bodily remove an officer from the premises.”
“That hurts,” Mercy said, but fell in behind him.
Fielding’s cruiser was parked beside Maggie’s car and Ava’s truck, like it belonged there or some shit. Ghost tried to tell himself that his anger was irrational – and it was, he knew that – but every time he blinked, he saw Maggie looking green and weak this morning. Seeing her sick felt like his own flank was wounded; like an integral part of his wall was damaged. She was his weak spot. And the thing about predators – they’d protect their weak spots to the death. He hated the idea of Fielding being in the same room with her when she wasn’t at the top of her game. Even if Ava was there…and that was nothing to sneeze at. Mags was a rock. Ava was a loaded gun with the safety off.
The office door was open and through it Ghost could see Maggie and Ava sitting on opposite sides of the desk, Fielding standing over them with the end of his tie in his hands, head lowered.
“Vince,” Ghost said as he entered, and the man jerked, startled. “I’m assuming you’re here because you have answers.”
The man looked decidedly guilty as he turned to face him. “Well, that’s what I was just explaining to Maggie–”
“Right. Because you thought it was appropriate to talk club business with my old lady.”
Fielding drew his shoulders up, taking the comment for the veiled threat that it was. “I was just–”
“Merc, escort the good lieutenant outside, would you?”
With a scowl and a muttered curse, Fielding didn’t wait to be “escorted,” striding out of the office with his head down.
Mercy sighed. “I never get to have any fun.”
His boys spotted him with happy shouts of “Daddy!” and Ghost left him to it, following the cop out into the parking lot.
Fielding slouched against the side of his cruiser and dug into a pocket for a pack of smokes and a cheap gas station lighter. Ghost caught the faint tremor in his hand as he lit up and took his first drag, and some of his ire faded. The man was an absolute wreck of a human being these days, and Ghost knew it was his fault.
He propped a hip against the driver door of the cruiser. “You don’t look so hot, Vince. You getting enough sleep?”
Fielding snorted and didn’t answer. “Who’s after you this time, Ken?” he asked instead, taking another deep drag. He stared ahead, toward the clubhouse. Walsh was sitting out front, tapping on his laptop and having another cup of coffee, hair golden in the morning light. Ghost had no doubt he was trying to read their lips from a distance.
“If I knew who it was,” Ghost said, aiming for mild, “I’d already have done something about it. Don’t you think?”
“I think your whole life is one stupidass bar fight after the next.” His gaze came to Ghost’s face, tired and haunted. “I think you’re a worthless, self-inflated thug who’s gonna get this whole city killed one of these days. Don’t take this the wrong way, but I hate your fucking guts.”
Ghost felt a smile tugging at his mouth. “Believe me, I’m not a fan of yours either.”
Fielding sucked down the last of his cig and ground it out beneath the heel of his boot. “So who is it this time?”
“Dunno.” Ghost sighed. “Might be an old rival. Might be somebody new.”
Over at the picnic table, Walsh kept sneaking covert glances at them over his laptop screen.
“That’s the problem with being on top of the pile,” he continued. “Someone always wants to knock you off.”
“Yeah, well, PD doesn’t care if you get knocked off. They’re not gonna pursue this if they think it’s just another club war. They’ll let you guys tear yourselves to pieces, and just send the body bags when the dust settles.”
“Good to know.”