Finn
Damn that woman. Those words were the only ones that had been flying through Finn’s mind as he tugged his bike out of his garage and plopped himself on it with enough force to make it squeak. He’d been home for three hours since dropping her and Oliver off, but all he could do was think about Cora and the cold, aloof way she had told him “thanks, but there’s the door.” Damn that woman.
He’d taken a shower. He had tried to read a book. He had even tossed back a couple of shots of whiskey and poked around on the list of old contacts, wondering if there might be someone among them who could make him forget about the ice queen of the business world. No luck. What was wrong with him? No, he thought to himself, what the hell is wrong with her?
The grips beneath his palms were cool from disuse. He tilted one and then the other as he kicked the bike into gear. It rumbled between his legs. He’d ridden a motorcycle before he’d learned to drive a car. His father had left an old Harley in the garage when he’d gone off to do who knew what. Finn had been young, too young to understand what a motorcycle could really mean to a man, but he’d gone out to the tiny shed where the bike had been stored and spent the next few years taking it apart and putting it back together.
It had been that bike that carried him out of the reservation and on to a different life.
She’d made him think of the reservation again, asking all those questions about it. Maybe he ought to go back for a visit, give his mom some money. Maybe he could finish up his degree and teach there, inspire the kids there the same way he had been inspired. Yeah, right. That would never happen. Cora was right about one thing: he was a criminal. What right did he have to dream of teaching or having a woman like her?
Finn shifted gears and felt the shudder as the tank pumped more fuel into the engine. The wind whipped along his face, tugging his hair out of the bandanna that he’d slung it into. It was a cool night, with hardly a cloud in the sky. It felt good to get out, to be free.
Instinct, or maybe habit, had him taking the route from his house to the pool hall. It was after three in the morning, and the sign over the door informed him that the place was closed, but Speed’s car and Titan’s bike were still parked in the back lot. So were a few other bikes. Looked like the club was hanging out tonight. Had anyone called him? Maybe. He didn’t know. Finn hadn’t looked at his phone since scrolling through the contacts. He used his key to get in.
There were twenty or so people still hanging out in the supposedly closed club. He recognized most of them. A good portion were club members. Speed and Titan were taking up a booth with a couple of ladies Finn had seen before but couldn’t remember the names of. He gave them a wave.
“Hey, stranger,” Titan’s voice rumbled. “Where you been at?”
There was a chorus of heys and hellos in the wake of Titan’s greeting. Finn nodded in greeting.
“Aww, you know where homeboy’s been at. You know. He’s been following my old buddy, my old friend, that sweet pretty thing with the red hair.” Speed bounced up out of his seat and gave Finn a slap on the back. A few eyes turned in their direction.
Titan smirked and brought a beer to his lips. A few inches disappeared down his throat. “That true?”
Finn didn’t answer at first. Instead he walked around the bar and used the toe of his cowboy boot to tug open one of the mini-fridges tucked between an ice bin and a wash sink. Seven brands of beer stared back at him, and not a damn one of them sounded tasty. He popped the door closed again and turned toward the bottles of liquor lined up on the wall. With a growl, he pulled down the Tennessee whiskey and poured himself a couple of fingers.
“Yeah,” Titan said when Finn started to pour himself another glass. “Definitely been sniffing at that Anderson girl.”
Finn snorted, in part because Titan had hit the nail on the head, and in part because he could just imagine how Cora would feel about being called “that Anderson girl.” He knocked back his second glass of whiskey—fourth if you counted what he drank while he was still at home—and then grabbed a beer from the mini-fridge and dragged a chair over to the table so he could see the television, too.
“Cora Anderson?” One of the girls sitting at the table spoke up for the first time. She was pretty, Finn had to admit. She had hair as black as his own and the kind of curvy body meant for bathing suits and leotards. “I heard she was back in town.”
“You know her?” Finn found himself asking even though he didn’t really want to.
“Tch, yeah. I went to school with her. Me and Speed both did. Speed was her friend, though I wasn’t. That bitch didn’t like female friends. Never has. Bet she’s one of those woman haters.”
Finn couldn’t find it in himself to agree with that. Yeah, he was mad at her, but Cora didn’t seem to hate women. She’d spent most of the barbecue talking with Misty, and there was no one in the world who was more of a woman than Misty.
“She told me to get lost.”
“Shit, man,” Speed said with a squeal of laughter before patting Finn on the back. “Man, what did you do?”
“Yeah, how’d you fuck it up?” Titan asked, turning his dark head in Finn’s direction. “Rumor had it y’all went to some big family barbecue tonight.”
“Jesus.” Finn popped his beer open on the side of the table. Maybe Cora wasn’t completely wrong. Apparently, everyone was related in this damn town. Related enough, at least, that they were yammering about a relationship that wasn’t anyone’s damn business. “I didn’t fuck it up, man. I didn’t do a damn thing wrong. Her mom got involved.”
“Sam Anderson is a piece of work,” Titan said, shaking his head until the short braids on either side of his head clinked against one another.
“Yeah,” Speed popped in. “But she fucks good.”
Finn nearly spit out his beer. “What?”
Speed shrugged his skinny shoulders. “Least she did a few years back. I was in the trailer park, visiting my mom when she comes out. It was summer and she was wearing this tiny little bikini thing and just sunning herself. Just flat out asks me if I want some. I wasn’t seeing anyone so I didn’t see an issue with it.”
Finn snorted. He had no right to talk. He’d slept with plenty of married women in his time, but Sam Anderson wasn’t one of them.
“Surprised you came out of that alive.”
Speed laughed. “Yeah, but I came, though. A lot.” There was a general titter of amusement between the club and the joke. Encouraged, Speed went on to say, “But she got more.”
The girl sitting with Titan and Finn laughed the loudest and bumped her shoulder against Speed’s. He gave her a grin and waggled his eyes suggestively at her. Finn watched as she leaned over and whispered something in his ear. Speed’s grin widened and he tossed back the rest of his drink.
“If you all will excuse us,” he said, slipping out of the booth and taking the woman’s hand. She giggled and followed.
Finn shook his head and rolled his eyes before taking the spot the pair of them had vacated. “Well, at least someone is happy.” He glanced around at the group of bikers. Most of them were wearing their kuttes. Some were done in leather, some in denim, but all of them sported the large white tiger with its head tilted back in a frozen roar. The Violent Spawn of Carson, Nevada, a small club when all things were said and done, but a good group of guys. Even Speed.
There was Moose, and yes, that was his given name. The man was nearly seven feet tall and weighed in at just under three hundred pounds, and nearly all of it was muscle. He volunteered at the youth club after school to make sure kids whose parents couldn’t afford daycare still had someplace to go.
There was Ken, a scrawny little dude who used to be an addict until Boss picked him up and helped him to quit the habit. He rode a hell of a bike and played a mean guitar now that his hands didn’t shake so much.
Cora was wrong. These men weren’t criminals; they were rebels. They stood for something. They wanted the freedom America promised but buried with its rules and laws. Rules, he thought, that were enforced by the assholes in blue who didn’t practice what they preached.
“You gonna listen?” Titan asked, interrupting Finn’s train of thought.
“Listen? To what?”
“To Cora. You gonna get lost or are you gonna keep going after her?”
Finn shook his head. “Neither. I’m here, and I’m going to be here. I’m going to help her with Oliver and…shit, man, I told her I’d be available once she gets her head out of her ass.”
Titan whistled. “Use those exact words?”
“Close enough.”
Titan’s teeth shone white as pearls against the darkness of his lips. “I thought you were a ladies’ man, Lieutenant.”
“Ladies, sure. But Cora is something else altogether. She’s this…force. You know? You ever met a woman who just gets up in your life and by the very act of being there turns everything upside down?”
Titan gave him a long look with those liquid dark eyes of his. He didn’t say anything at first; he just watched. Finn let him. Titan was a quiet man, prone to long introspection. Finn brought his nearly half-gone beer up and took a long swallow.
“Hey, Finn,” a woman said. A soft hand with bright red nails settled itself on his shoulder. The grip was familiar. “Didn’t expect to see you here.”
“Hey, Candy.”
Candy was a dark-haired Barbie brought to life. Her long legs were displayed beneath a short fringe of skirt, and she’d forgotten to button the top two buttons of her blouse. The edges of a lacy black bra were visible in the flare of open fabric. She had a nice rack, Finn knew from firsthand experience, but she didn’t have much else going for her.
She sidled up next to him, letting her fingers scratch the back of his neck ever so lightly. She was wearing a perfume that was strong on the vanilla. Not the good, warm kind that went with baked goods or expensive candles, but the cheap, overly sweet kind.
“I’m really glad you’re here.”
She brushed her magnificent rack against his shoulder, and he waited to feel the arousal he was sure should accompany that. He waited and waited as she leaned closer, her mint-gum breath blowing ever so lightly against his neck. Nothing happened, just a sick feeling in his stomach like he was doing something wrong. It took him a moment to realize he was feeling guilt. He, Finn Marks, who never felt guilt at the touch of a woman, was getting sick at the thought of taking Candy home.
He gave her a friendly pat on the hip but shook his head. “Thanks, hon, but not tonight.”
She pouted but didn’t push. With a sigh, she slid herself back up onto her stilts and gave Titan a questioning look. Titan shook his head. Finn realized he’d never seen Titan take a woman home from the pool hall, or from anywhere now that he was thinking about it.
“You in love with someone?” Finn asked suddenly.
Titan raised a dark brow. “What?”
“I was just thinking that I’ve never seen you pick up a woman, but I’ve seen plenty hit on you.” Finn eyed him. “Was wondering if you’re in love with someone.”
Titan went very quiet. “Been in and out of love a few times, Lieutenant. None of them were fun.”
There was something about the way he said it that kept Finn from asking anything else. A thought niggled at the back of his mind. He didn’t say it, but he started to wonder if Titan just didn’t like women for personal company. Finn wouldn’t have cared one way or the other, but he knew not everyone in the club would feel the same.
“Fair enough,” Finn said. “What’s everyone gathered up for?”
“Boss is coming back.”
Finn blinked and plunked his drink on the table. “It’s about damn time. When?”
“Tomorrow, maybe the day after if they stop up north and gamble away some of their share. Got the call around midnight. Tried calling you but…” Titan shrugged one massive shoulder.
Midnight. That was when he’d been arguing with Cora. Had he just not heard the call? Had he been that mad? Probably. He was still mad. It wasn’t as hot and bitter as it had been, but he could feel it like water on a low boil.
“That’s about the time Cora was telling me to fuck off.”
Titan took a deep breath and wrapped both hands around his drink, his fingers interlacing over the label. “You love this woman.” It wasn’t a question; it was a statement. Finn had been thinking something along the same lines, but he found himself wondering why Titan, who Finn hadn’t been spending too much time with the past few days, had come to the same conclusion. “It’s easy to see. Not just because you sent Candy off, or because you came in here looking like someone had run over your favorite pair of boots. It’s the way she makes you mad.”
“You lost me.”
“Do you ever get mad if the Anaheim Ducks lose the Stanley Cup?”
“No. Why would I?” Finn responded, his thumb beginning to scrape away the ring of paper on the neck of his beer.
“Exactly. I mean, it’s pretty obvious when you think about it. You haven’t much cared when other women turned you down. Or tell you they aren’t interested. You just move on. Didn’t happen here, did it?”
The ring of paper fell on the table in small strips. “No, it didn’t.”
“Well, that’s because it matters. It matters a lot, doesn’t it? It matters what she thinks about you and why she thinks it. It matters not just because she turned you down to start off with. It matters because you legitimately care what she thinks. Her opinion is one that you value and respect. That’s love, man.”
Finn shook his head and started working on the label of his beer, letting those glue-caked strips join the first as he thought about what Titan was saying. “What about all the fire? The passion?”
“Pretty sure y’all have that. But that’s not love, Lieutenant. That’s just interest. That big flare of look-at-that you get all messed-up with in the beginning. Right? Love is something else. It’s what happens when you think about the other person when they aren’t there, and not just about what’s in their pants. When you think about what they’re doing, how their day goes, and if they are doing all right. That…that’s love. That’s real caring.”
“Well, she doesn’t feel that for me.” Finn shoved his bottle away. It wavered on its side but didn’t spill.
“I can’t say one way or the other on that. I don’t know her that well. But, well…” Titan trailed off again. Finn found himself leaning in, wondering what the big man was going to finish that sentence with. “Well…here’s the thing. She told you you two weren’t right for each other, right?”
Finn felt the dull boil of his anger go up a few degrees. “Yeah. She did.”
“Well, that means she’s been thinking about a future with you, right? She’s wondering how you fit into her world, and if it would make sense. Now, some women, they might try to make it fit. They’d cut away pieces of you or pieces of themselves in this struggle to finish the puzzle that is their lives. But Cora Anderson? Naw, she’s played that game before. She tried to make herself fit here all of her young life, and it just didn’t happen. So instead of forcing it, she told you to get lost, because after evaluating her life, she said it wasn’t right.”
“And that’s…a good thing?” Maybe it was the liquor, or maybe it was the fact that he couldn’t imagine Cora picturing them together, but Finn wasn’t sure he understood what Titan was getting at.
“Shit, man, that’s the best thing when it comes to a woman like that.”
Finn frowned and dragged a hand through his dark hair. “I don’t think I’m following you, teacher.”
Titan laughed, a great big barrel laugh that burst out of his lips and rumbled across the room. “You can be really dumb for a college graduate, you know that? She wants you to fit, and she respects you enough not to demand that you cut away parts of yourself.”
“Huh,” Finn said, laying his chin on the top of the beer bottle, feeling the lukewarm kiss of glass against his skin. “Guess I hadn’t thought about it like that.”
# # #
When Finn woke up the next morning he decided he wanted to fit into Cora’s life, too. He hadn’t understood everything Titan, the love guru, was saying, but it had all stuck in his head. Cora Anderson wanted someone she could count on, depend on. Fair enough since she hadn’t been able to count on anyone but her own damn self as far as Finn could see. If she needed that in a man, he was going to be that man.
He was at the shop by eight, despite getting to bed at five in the morning. He started looking through money, going through some much-needed inventory. He threw himself into his work and began to understand why Cora found it comforting to turn to business when life was being too difficult to handle. With work, everything was laid out in a nice neat list. Life wasn’t half so easy to handle.
He hadn’t called her, though after a few more beers with Titan he had begun to think it might be a really good idea to do just that. It had been the larger, more levelheaded man who interceded. It was for the best, though Finn hadn’t thought so at the time. He’d been too drunk to sit on his bike. He hadn’t wanted to go home anyway—the couch probably still smelled like her. Instead he had slept it off at the pool hall and walked into work this morning thinking the brisk morning air might clear his liquor-soaked brain. It had. Well, that and two bottles of Gatorade, some Pepto-Bismol, and aspirin.
It had been a very long night, and if the way the phone was already ringing at eight o’clock in the morning was any way to gauge it, it was going to be a very long day, too. Good, Finn needed a long day. His uncle came in at nine thirty and helped out with the fixing, and Rodrigo, a local kid, came in at eleven to take over phone duties.
When the numbers on the screen matched up to the numbers on paper, Finn decided to get some of the real work done. He started with a minivan that belonged to a soccer mom who needed an oil change and new spark plugs, then moved on to a Toyota with shit suspension. Minutes ticked by and his hands got greasy, and Finn’s thoughts started to focus onto a single undeniable truth. He’d be whatever Cora Anderson needed him to be. He worked right through lunch and might have gone through dinner too if Uncle Bill hadn’t waved a six-piece of fried chicken and an order of mashed potatoes under his nose.
“Eat,” he’d been instructed. “And then go work your magic on the computers. I can’t make the order make sense.”
Finn had used the time in between number verifications to check his phone. His heart stopped when he saw a text from Cora. It was a few hours old but said, in that straightforward, no-nonsense way that she had, that Oliver was doing fine and she thought he’d want to know. That was nice, but it wasn’t all that Finn wanted to know. He went through three attempts at a text before her sent, Good to know, thanks for keeping me updated. You okay?
Then, before he could send her five more texts about nothing in the hopes that she would respond, he turned back to his dinner and the spreadsheet for the body shop. It was going on ten o’clock when everything was finally squared away. Rodrigo and Uncle Bill were long since gone. Finn realized he had put in a fourteen-hour day. Maybe he should head home, take a shower, eat something else because that chicken had done nothing but remind him he was starving. That was the smart thing to do, but he wasn’t going to do it. Finn Marks did not end his day with spreadsheets and ordering layouts.
Oh, management was all fine and dandy, but it did not compare to the glory of getting greasy under the hood of a real classic, and the sapphire blue ’78 Dodge Challenger currently sitting in bay three was definitely that.
“All right, beautiful. Let’s see what’s going on here.”
According to the diagnostics and the tinkering his uncle had done near closing, the Dodge was overheating for no reason at all. Not a good thing. A pretty car like this needed good, honest tending. He wondered who owned it, and if they’d be willing to sell. He had a decent amount of money tucked away.
Would Cora like it, Finn wondered. She loved fast cars, things that were sleek and shiny. Did they have to be new? Would she appreciate the soft lines and detail work that went into a classic beauty like this? He thought she would. He could already see her, sitting back in the driver’s seat with her hand on the stick shift, that mane of autumn colored hair flying around her face as she flew down the interstate.
“What the hell has put that stupid look on your face?”
Finn nearly thwacked his head on the hood of the car when the boss’s voice reverberated a few inches from his ear. For all the man was big as life he moved like a cat. Finn cursed and nearly threw a tool at the other man.
“Can’t you see I’m doing very precious work?”
Jace “The Boss” Robinson had a wide grin and a nose that had been broken at least twice. There was a small scar that ran through his left brow and made him look dangerous. In Finn’s opinion that scar was a warning, and lo to any and all who ignored it. His leather jacket was fringed down the sleeves and marked with a simple black square across the right breast with white capital letters that read “PRESIDENT.”
“Yeah, I can see that, but we got business.”
Finn raised his brow. “We do?”
“Yeah, we do.” The tone was so cold and sure of itself that Finn couldn’t help but think of Cora. Still, getting bitched at by a pretty redhead in a business suit was a little better than getting the voice of the ice king from the boss.
“All right.” Finn took a moment to close the hood of the Dodge. He wondered what had put that angry look into Robinson’s eyes, and why it was focused on him. Was it the fact that he hadn’t been at the pool hall as much lately? It wasn’t unusual for Finn to spend more time at his shop or at home than with the club. He was just a lieutenant, an enforcer, not second-in-command and not even third. Yeah, things had been left in his hands while the other guys had been gone, but that had been a cakewalk. He tossed his cleaning rag over one shoulder and leaned against one of the pillars that separated one work bay from the next. “What’s up?”
Jace crossed his arms over his chest. It made the tattoos on his bare forearms dance with the shift in hard wrought muscle. Finn had wondered once whether or not the boss had ever been one of those lifting champion guys. Not the pretty body on the front of muscle magazines, but the kind you might mistake for husky until they started swinging. The boss cleared his throat. “Did you or did you not use the club funds to get out that little scrap of nothing?”
Finn shoved his thumbs in the large pockets of his coveralls. Is that what this was about? The money? Seemed like a piss-poor reason for Robinson to come down here and be mildly threatening. “No, I didn’t.” When the president of the Violent Spawn continued to give Finn a thousand-yard glare, Finn held up his hands in surrender. “I thought about it. Even got the money out of the safe. But at the end of the day I didn’t do it.”
The boss dragged his tongue over his teeth and shook his head. “Goddammit! Don’t play this smartass college boy crap with me, Librarian. You took the money out with the intent of handing it over to the goddamned police to help your little friend. What did you have to go and do a stupid thing like that for? Oliver Anderson is a teenager who doesn’t have his head screwed on straight. He isn’t a prospect, and he sure as hell isn’t a member of the club.”
“I didn’t use the money for that. I put the money back,” Finn repeated.
“But you were going to, which is damn near as bad in my book,” the boss snarled, “We help club members and the family of club members only. Now, unless you have supplanted Rob and put yourself into Sam Anderson’s bed while I was gone, Oliver ain’t your kid. He ain’t your brother, and he isn’t—”
“He might as well be. He helps out in this shop. He runs things for the club. He’s a good kid,” Finn defended.
“He’s a stupid kid. He gets into trouble, and he’s a show-off.”
“Who in this entire club doesn’t fit that description once in a while?” Finn demanded. “Hell, we get Speed out of trouble every other month for being a showoff.”
“That little runt has put his time and efforts into this club. He’s earned the ability for us to come to his rescue. Oliver hasn’t. He’s a punk kid who needs to do a lot of growing. And since he isn’t family—”
“I’m dating his sister,” Finn spat out, pushing himself off the pillar and taking a step toward Jace. It was an aggressive movement, and both men knew it. “I’ve been dating her for a while.”
The boss froze. It wasn’t out of fear. Finn knew that. He couldn’t remember a time the boss had ever been afraid of anything. There was a small tic in the square jaw of the big man. For a full half a minute, he did nothing but stare at Finn. “You wanna run that shit by me again?”
“Cora Anderson came back into town a day or two after you left. We’ve been seeing one another.”
It wasn’t a lie, not really, but it wasn’t the whole truth either. It didn’t matter. Finn could handle the punishment that the club might deal out to him for using club funds to help out someone who wasn’t legitimately part of the club, but there was a chance the punishment might extend to Oliver, and maybe even Cora. Finn could lie to protect the two of them.
“You stupid little shit. You stuck it to Cora Anderson?” The scoff was loud enough to echo across the walls of the shop.
There was something about the way he said her name that had Finn standing up straighter. He said “Cora Anderson” like it was a prayer and a curse all at the same time. It was a well-known fact that Jace Robinson didn’t treat women particularly well. Even his Old Lady said as much.
“It’s a little more complicated than that, boss, but yeah. I am. What of it?”
“We don’t use money to help random bitches we plow.”
Finn felt his hand clench and unclench at his side. He didn’t like anyone talking about Cora like that, and he liked it even less that it was coming out of Jace Robinson’s mouth. He wasn’t sure why it bothered him so much. He’d heard him use far worse terms when it came to women.
“She’s not random.”
“You thinking about making her your Old Lady?”
“No, I’m thinking about leaving the club.”
Finn didn’t realize he meant it until the words came out of his mouth. He was thinking of leaving the club. He was thinking about leaving it all behind: Speed, Titan, and everyone else. Finn wanted to be good enough for her, and she had made it perfectly clear that she wasn’t willing to be with a criminal.
The boss looked him over and then cursed. “You mean it, don’t you, you stupid little—” Quick as a snake, Finn felt the boss’s hand on the back of his head, hauling him closer so their foreheads were pressed against one another like two rams who were midfight. Robinson’s breath was laced with cigarette smoke and brandy. “Does she know?”
“That I’m thinking of leaving?”
“No, nitwit, that you’ve got a two-inch pecker!” Robinson slapped his forehead against Finn’s with enough force that he saw spots. As an enforcer, Finn knew how to fight. As a lieutenant underneath Jace Robinson, he knew better than to fight back. He didn’t know who would win. Jace was a heavy-handed bastard who could use his fists like a hammer. Finn was faster and had dropped bigger men, but there was no upside to a fight. If Jace won, Finn would probably end up dead. If Finn won, the club would be forced to respond…and Finn would probably end up dead. So rather than fight, he stood there and took the headbutt and let the man sneer. “Yes! Does she know you are thinking of getting out?”
“No, I haven’t discussed it with her. She’s been dealing with Oliver.”
Robinson released him as suddenly as he had snapped him out. “I’ll just bet she is. I’ll fucking bet. Fine, you want out? We’ll hold a meeting, put it to a vote. See if you get out. You know what happens if you leave.”
“Yeah, I do.”
“It’s blood in and blood out. You know the rules.”
“I remember.” Finn did remember. He remembered just how hard the whole crew had hit him in order to make sure he understood what he was getting into, and what might happen if he screwed up. He knew. He knew it would be worse on the way out because some of the guys would feel betrayed. “Why are you so damn pissed about this? Plenty of men have settled down and left. Not all of us have Old Ladies like yours who want to be part of this life.”
Jace shoved one meaty fist into a pocket and pulled out a pack of cigarettes that had been squashed to hell and back. “I don’t want to lose my best lieutenant.” He tapped a cigarette out with an expert flick of his wrist. “We are thinking of expanding. Patching in the little crew in the next town over, starting to make a business that can really do some damage.”
Finn raised his brow. “I thought the Violent Spawn didn’t expand. That we liked local.”
“I’m not talking about going to Ireland, you wise-mouthed ass, I’m talking about making sure our area is ours. Not that complicated.”
“But then you’ll have more enforcers to choose from,” Finn said. “Some who are ex-military, if I remember the guys you are talking about. I’m not a great fighter.”
“Hell you aren’t. Maybe it’s all that Native blood running through your veins, but I’ve never seen a man take someone down as fast as you do. Besides, you know how to keep all the bikes running. That’s a hell of a skill no one else has.”
“I could still fix things for the club.” Finn shrugged. “Be stupid business not to.”
Jace took a long puff on his cigarette and shook his head. “Yeah, it’d be stupid. You’d also be stupid to think Cora Anderson would want to stay in Carson when she did everything she could to get the hell out of this town.”
It was the bitter way he spat out the words that had Finn thinking. Cora had talked about her ex, another guy who rode around on a bike and had used her all up. Jace had a real bad reputation with women, right up until Marcy had settled him down, at least as much as any person could settle Jace Robinson down. Finn’s fist clenched at his side as he wondered if Jace Robinson had put that cold distant look in Cora’s eyes as she talked about her past.
He was just opening his mouth to ask when the phone in his pocket started to vibrate. Finn thought about ignoring it, but since it was going on eleven at night there was every chance that it was someone important. When he tugged it out of his pocket, Cora’s name shined up at him.
“Is it her?” Jace asked.
“Yeah,” Finn responded, his finger already on the Answer button.
“Take it. I gotta head out anyway. I’ll let you know when the meeting is. You can make your case to the rest of the club.”
Finn shook his head and hit the button. “Hey, what’s—”
“I thought your little club didn’t deal in drugs, Finn. Isn’t that what you told me?”
Finn’s mind came to a halt. “What the hell are you talking about?”
“Oliver went to that stupid concert, and he was caught with drugs. Where the hell did he get them?” Her voice was loud and shrill enough that it echoed through the now empty shop.
Finn shook his head. Oliver? With drugs? It didn’t make any sense. The club had clear rules on drugs. They weren’t allowed. Anyone caught pushing drugs was dealt with immediately. No one sold in Carson, no one who wanted to keep their legs.
“I thought we decided he couldn’t go to the concert in the first place.”
“Really?” she sneered. “Is that what you are going to be taking out of this conversation? Don’t turn your guilt around on me.”
Finn felt a sick sensation crawl through his belly. Something else was going on here. There was something that wasn’t adding up. Oliver wasn’t supposed to be at the concert, with drugs or without them. He’d never known Cora to relent on much, and this seemed well outside of what she’d be willing to go easy on.
“I’m not,” he finally said. “I just feel like I’m not getting the whole story.”
“What more is there to know? Oliver went to the concert, and he was caught with…something. I don’t even know what. I was contacted by the security office. Does it matter?”
“Yeah, it matters. Was it pot? Was it crystal meth? It matters.”
“I don’t know,” she snapped back with enough force that he held the phone away from his ear an extra inch. This wasn’t like her—this wasn’t Cora Anderson. She was cold and confident, even when she was pissed. This felt wrong. Finn clenched and unclenched his fist.
“What do you want me to do?” he demanded. “I don’t even know what’s going on.”
“You could start with answering my question. Where did my little brother get drugs in this supposedly safe backwater town?”
Finn didn’t know, but he was damn sure he was going to find out. He hadn’t been lying when he told Jace that Oliver might as well be a little brother. The kid meant a lot to him, and he wanted to know what was going on.
“I don’t know,” he admitted. “But I’m going to find out. You stay here. I’m going to go get him.”
“What? Why are you going to get him?”
“Because, between the two of us, I don’t have a problem with paying some minimum-wage concert security dude to keep this quiet so it doesn’t go on Oliver’s record and immediately land him in jail. You are obviously incapable of keeping him at home, so I’m going to go get him.”
“I beg your pardon?”
He sneered, “Oh, sweetie, you don’t have to beg.”
He hung up the phone before she could respond. He couldn’t pinpoint the exact reason he was so pissed, but that didn’t stop the feeling from being a hot simmer in his stomach. Something was going on, and he was going to find out what.