It was time.

The afternoon had passed slow as a slug on a block of ice. I’d spent it in my office, pacing back and forth, going over the details of the plan again and again. It was simple. Clint would meet me at the place, shortly before the meeting time, around the corner. He’d hook me up with a wire.

I’d catch everything for him, and he’d bring in the cavalry when the time was right.

It was simple, and hopefully, it’d be effective, but Clint hadn’t answered my calls this afternoon, and the fingers of doubt had crept through my mind throughout the long hours that’d led up to the meeting time.

I cruised around the corner and parked a block away from the spot, a half an hour ahead of schedule as planned. I checked my watched, tapped my fingers on my steering wheel. Clint was due any minute now, but the darkened back road was empty, except for one beat-up old car on blocks.

It’d been abandoned, all the windows left rolled down, and it definitely wasn’t Clint’s chosen hiding spot.

“Fuck, where are you?” I muttered and checked my watch again. I ground my teeth, fished my phone out of my top pocket and dialed Clint’s number again.

I pressed it to my ear and listened to the ringing on the other end. It clicked over to his voicemail service and I waited for the beep. “Where the fuck are you?” I asked, then hung up. There was no use leaving my name or number. He’d know who the message was from, and I didn’t want to incriminate myself, in case that message somehow wound up in the wrong, grubby hands.

“Fuck,” I muttered.

I couldn’t wait much longer, but what was the point of the meeting if I couldn’t record the damn thing and catch Marcus talking smack, proving his guilt. If I didn’t have the cops to back me up, this meant nothing. It would only wind up with me in the shitpot.

Unless I used this opportunity to threaten the fucker. Or pay him off again.

Christ, as if I wanted to do that.

Whatever the case, I couldn’t bail on the meeting. Marcus would use it as an excuse to come after my family.

As a young single man, I would’ve flipped him off and continued on my way. Shit, I would’ve taken him on, likely have done something illegal and wound up in charge of the Crimson Riders. Now, my options were to face him or run.

And I’d be damned if I’d uproot my daughter from her school, unsettle her, and resettle her again. Who was to say Marcus wouldn’t follow? He’d already broken the rules once. He’d do it again. And then? The options would be the same. Run or stay and fight.

Better to end it now before it got out of hand.

I clunked my car door open, got out into the purple dusk of early evening. The distant sound of a car horn was my only accompaniment. It was too quiet. I walked the block to the warehouse, my mind focused on my lack of fucking weapon. I had guns, and in this situation, I’d usually be packing, but I’d have bet my last dollar that Marcus would have his guys pat me down at the door, and them finding a gun in my possession wouldn’t end well for me.

I turned the corner and walked up to the rusted chain-link fence that separated the massive warehouse from the street. The windows were dark above, completely black, in fact, and my brow wrinkled.

Once again, too quiet.

There were no guys waiting outside the front entrance, no guards with guns in leather jackets. I pulled the chain link fence open just enough to slip through then entered, a shadow of doubt settling on my mind.

I made for the side door, also metal, rusted, and tried it. Unlocked.

It squealed open, and I entered, my senses on high alert. I sniffed the darkness and scented nothing but dust and something else. Urine. Carefully, I lifted my phone and clicked on the flashlight app, casting the interior into sharp relief.

Boxes, nothingness, no one.

It was completely empty.

This was definitely the address. I hadn’t gotten it wrong, and this was the second time tonight hadn’t gone as planned. I stepped back out through the door, switched my flashlight off and stowed my cellphone again.

This was all wrong.

Firstly, my contact hadn’t arrived. Secondly, Marcus was a total no-show.

“What game are you playing?” I muttered and let myself back out of the warehouse’s chain-link fence, not bothering to shut it behind me. Something was fucking wrong with this picture, but I couldn’t place my finger on it.

I made for my car and reached it unharmed. Christ, unwatched, even. No sound of bike engines roaring out to meet me. Not even a double-cross.

This wasn’t right, and I’d find out exactly what the fuck was up. If Marcus wouldn’t meet me, then I’d got to meet him at the Riders’ HQ. Or rather, the pub they ran their operations out of. The Rusty Nail was a front for everything the Crimson Riders did, and the cops knew it too. Just couldn’t gather up enough evidence to take the guys down.

I started my engine, and took off down the road, speeding past the still dark warehouse, and out of the backroads. San Antonio was like almost every other city at night. Alive. With lights, cars, sometimes the odd thump of music from a restaurant or club. It was too early for partying, except at the pubs.

The Rusty Nail was on the outskirts of San Antonio, leading out onto the route that trailed toward the east out of town.

I pulled up outside it, and at least here the lights were on. A single man stood outside the front door, smoking a cigarette, wearing a leather jacket, and tattooed up to his neck. He wore his beard scruffy and long, his head bald.

This was definitely one of Marcus’s guys, but I didn’t recognize him from my days with the club. Which meant he was new. Likely faithful to that jackass.

I exited my SUV and walked up to him, past him, made to open the front door.

“What the fuck do you think you’re doing?” the man asked in a low growl.

“I’m going in for a drink.”

“You don’t drink here,” the guy said. “This is private property.”

“Private property, huh?” I asked and put up a smirk, even though my teeth were gritted, once again. Fuck, I hated having to deal with these mother fuckers. I’d spent too much of my life doing it already. Too long with a 1% club, when I could’ve just started my life before then.

“That’s right. Get lost,” the biker said and stepped forward, reached for my shirt.

I grabbed him by his jacket before he got the chance, walked him backward and tossed him against the wall. “You talk to me like that again and you’ll lose your will to live,” I said. “Where’s Marcus?”

“Who the fuck wants to know?” The guy pushed off from the wall, cracking his knuckles, but didn’t take a dive at me. Apparently, my mention of the president was enough to stay his hand.

“I want to know,” I said.

“And who the fuck are you?”

“Roman,” I replied, pronouncing it slowly, so the syllables would sink through his thick skull.

The guy’s expression transformed from angry to elated in two seconds flat. “You’re Roman? Ha, good. Great. Sure, man, go on through. Go the fuck on through.” He let out a husky laugh and settled back against the wall of the bar again, bringing out another cigarette from inside his jacket. “They been waiting for you.”

I ignored the veiled threat and pushed the front door open, stepping into the bar. My phone blipped in my pocket, but I ignored it. I had to focus on the here and now, and I highly doubted Marcus would text me. Clint too.

I strolled through the empty bar.

Empty. Again.

Wooden worn floors, pictures on the walls, bandanas, an ornamental gun, and other memorabilia. Being in here again was like stepping in shit. Old shit I couldn’t wipe off the sole of my shoe. I strode up to the bar and shifted one of the empty barstools aside.

The bartender was still the same old guy from back in the day. Petey wasn’t affiliated with the club, officially, but he ran the joint, kept it clean and didn’t complain when the members used it for whatever the hell they needed to use it for.

He looked up from polishing the counter and whistled low under his breath. “Well, damn. Didn’t think I’d be seeing you again, Roman. You back in the club? Can’t say I’d be unhappy about that. Lots changed around here, and it’d pay to have some of the old blood back in, way things are going.”

“What you mean?” I asked, leaning on the bar, my curiosity piqued.

“I mean, fuck it, none of them are around—” He looked left and right, then leaned in closer, lowering his voice. “I mean, that the new president is a total fucking dingleberry. Ever since he got the title, he’s been kicking out old and bringing in new cats who’re nothing like the kind of guys you need in a club.”

I quirked an eyebrow.

“Drugs, too much drinking, hookers,” Petey said, quietly. “You remember what the policy was on that. Griphon would’ve chewed someone’s ear off for doing it.”

I nodded, needing more information. More of this, to use against Marcus.

Petey obliged—he’d always been the talkative type, the opposite of what a bartender was supposed to be in the sense that he spoke rather than listened. “In the old days, guys joined the club to participate in earning a little extra, remember? Some of them even had regular nine-to-fives and were just passionate about the rides, the club, the fact that they had a family. Now, it’s all changed. Ain't nobody around here got a nine-to-five anymore. Place is rotten, and ain't nothin’ we can do about it. But, you’re back so that’s a good—”

“I’m not back, Petey,” I said, and his face fell. “I’m here to see Marcus. Where is he?”

“Not here,” he replied. “Not since an hour ago.”

“Do you know where he went?”

Petey licked his thick lips, smoothed the last of his graying hair over his bald patch and leaned in. “I don’t know, but it didn’t feel right. He was all riled up. All of them were. They got on their bikes and rode out, some of ‘em whooping and cheering. Lord knows what it was about, but whatever it was, it had to be trouble.”

“Marcus was with them?”

“Yes, this time.”

“This time?” I asked, holding my breath. There had to be something to this, and if anyone would know, it’d be Petey.

The old man nodded slowly and poured himself a whisky with trembling hands. I shook my head no to the offer of one. “I shouldn’t even be telling you this. That asshole outside hears me and I’m in deep shit,” he whispered.

I looked back at the front door, which was still closed, and at the silhouette of the biker through it. He stood looking out at the road, it seemed, the coal of his cigarette blinking red in the darkness.

“Marcus has been acting weird lately. Weirder than usual,” Petey said, and slurped down some of the whisky. “He’s been riding out alone to the east. My guess is he’s going out to the desert towns somewhere, but I don’t know why. He always comes back smiling. It’s—strange. I overheard some of the other men talking about a plan, but I don’t know what it is.”

“Shit,” I muttered. “You don’t know where he is? You got any directions for me?”

“No, sorry,” Petey said. “God knows I’d like for him to be out of the club, but I can’t help you, Roman. Wish I could, but I can’t.”

“I understand.”

Fuck, what option did that leave for me, now? I could go home defeated? Get on the road out of town and try to track him down with absolutely no idea where he was. There were plenty of towns on the outskirts of the Chihuahuan desert, more a desert by name than anything else.

I’d been out there a few times. There were no dunes, just rocky outcroppings, covered hardy plants, the odd tree. Some parts were greener than the others, but the area was too vast for me to explore now, especially in the dark.

“You sure I can’t interest you in a drink?” Petey asked.

“No,” I replied. “Thanks. I’m driving.” I walked out of the bar, ignoring the snicker from the member, and up to the SUV. I checked it for bombs—paid to be careful—then clambered in, shaking my head.

Something about all of this didn’t feel right.