Hunter and Claire walked into the little bar where they were meeting Chris. It was a cozy little bar for professionals, so Hunter felt comfortable taking Claire inside with him. Chris smiled when he saw him, and then raised an eyebrow and stood up, when he saw Claire.

“Hey, man,” Chris said, holding out his hand. Hunter took it and as they shook Chris looked at his other arm and said, “What the hell happened to you?”

“Long story. Thanks for meeting me. This is Claire. Claire, this is Chris, an old school buddy of mine.”

He shook Claire’s hand and smiled. “Nice to meet you. Have a seat. What are you two drinking?”

“I’ll have a beer,” Hunter said. Claire gave him a look that rivaled one of his mother’s as she took her seat. “I mean a Coke. Forgot, I’m on meds.” Chris looked like he was suppressing a smile. Hunter knew he’d hear about it later.

“And you, Claire?”

“Just water is fine.”

“I’ll be right back.” He went up toward the bar and Hunter asked her:

“You don’t drink?”

She shook her head. “No, not for a long time.”

“Oh…why?” The look on her face made him wonder if the question was too personal. Her father seemed to have a problem with substance abuse; maybe she did too and he’d just put his foot in his mouth.

“Long story,” she said, with a sad little smile.

“I’d like to hear it someday.” Chris was back, so Claire just nodded. Chris was drinking a beer, and as they all sipped their drinks Hunter told Chris the gist of what was going on. When he finished talking Chris whistled through his teeth.

“I’m disappointed. I really thought that kid was going to try and make a life for himself. For the past five years he’s been an absolute model prisoner.”

“What about before that?”

“He was a handful in the youth authority and came to us at eighteen. He spent a lot of years in the security housing unit because of his affiliations with the white gangs, the skinheads. There was a murder on the yard and he was somehow involved in the fight. I remember that they tried to pin that murder on him, but of course nobody saw nothin’. He was involved in a lot of fights over the first five years and spent a lot of time in AD SEG, and then suddenly, five years ago, he straightened up and started focusing on getting his GED and getting out.”

“Do you know if anything specific happened then, that made him want to suddenly be a good boy?”

Chris shook his head. “No.” He opened a file in front of him on the table. “What I know about this kid is that he came from shit, and prison was where he was headed from day one. The time I spent with him was interesting, to say the least. He straight-up told me that his mother was a whore. His old man, or the guy he thought was his old man, sounded like a regular piece of shit. But funny thing was, the kid worshipped him. He made some kind of hero out of him in his head.”

“Do you know where the old man is now, or have a name on him?” Chris was flipping through the file and shaking his head.

“I want to say that the kid told me he was dead…here they are…” He pulled some papers out of the file. They were stapled together and typed neatly. “This is my report.” He handed it to Hunter and while Hunter read through it, Chris made conversation with Claire. He heard her telling him about growing up in Italy and running the bed and breakfast now. He read the part of the file where Josiah Miller talked about his mother. Chris was right; sadly, the man had nothing positive to say about her…other than that she’d taken off. Chris had put in red parentheses that the man thought that was the best thing his mother had ever done for him. He turned the page and started reading what he’d written about the man’s father. Chris had put in quotations “He was a big son of a bitch, like a giant to a kid. He had this really deep laugh. He loved beer and pizza and motorcycles…he was in a club.” Hunter scanned the paragraph underneath it. The man had continued to sing his old man’s praises, but he didn’t mention what club the old man was in. There was also no name anywhere that he could see. At one point, Josiah mentioned Sam. What he said about him was “My dad has this friend, a brother, really, named Sam. Sam is like an uncle to me and he’s been the only one here for me since my father was murdered.”

“Hey, Chris, this guy called Sam Winters his dad’s ‘brother.’ Did he mention if they were in the same MC?”

“I think he did. He talked about the Skulls. Did I note anything about that?” Hunter skimmed through it again.

“I don’t see anything.” Chris opened the file in front of him again. Hunter waited while his friend scanned a few pages and then said:

“Yes, here it is. My partner put him down as affiliated when he first came to us from Youth Authority. He said he was affiliated with the Skulls. When the kid found that out, he went off. He even threatened to kill my partner if he didn’t take that out. Here, I’ll let you read that part.” Chris slid the file over. It was a safety report and the bottom was signed by a Tom Clark. Clark must be the partner Chris kept referring to. He’d written way back in 2007 about affiliating Josiah with the Skulls since that was who he told them his old man used to ride with. Josiah had come unglued when he found that out and demanded to see the P.O. Once in his office, he’d assaulted the correctional officer and threatened to kill Tom Clark if he didn’t remove that affiliation. He was quoted as saying “I’d never affiliate myself with trash like that.” Hunter took out his phone and excused himself. He walked a few feet away from the table and called David.

“Hey, Hunter.”

“His old man was a Skull, David. I think you need to talk to Cody again.”

“You think they had the same father?”

“Yeah, I do. Too many coincidences start adding up to fact after a while. Find out if Cody had any idea about this guy. I’m not finished here, still looking into who his cellie was and who he was hanging out with on the yard, so I’ll get back to you. I just thought that information might help you out.”

“For sure. Thanks, Hunter.”

Hunter ended the call and thought about Dax. This guy was willing to risk his first taste of freedom since he was twelve years old to go after Dax. Why? Something his old man told him? Or something Dax had done? Something in those photos, maybe? Hunter knew Cody’s old man had disappeared when Cody was a kid. This guy seemed to worship that old man, if he was one and the same. Maybe the kid was around the day Cody’s father “disappeared.” That would explain a lot. Fuck.

* * *

Hunter finished going through the file that Chris had brought. He made notes on his phone about men that Josiah had been close to in prison and those he’d been celled up with. The more he read in the P.O. notes and those of the psychiatrists who had interviewed him, the more convinced he was that this was Josiah’s vendetta, and he needed to talk to Dax.

“You’ve been a lot of help, Chris, thank you,” Hunter said. Looking at Claire he said, “I guess we should get going.”

“Hang on a second, Hunter. I had actually been thinking about calling you for a few weeks now. I thought maybe someone else did at first and that’s why you were calling me…”

“What do you mean?”

“We have an inmate…a lifer who was convicted of killing his sister. She died fifteen years before he was arrested. He was only seventeen at the time, so no one thought to suspect him. The case went cold and when the cold case detectives opened it up, they found some kind of new evidence that pointed at the brother. When they started checking out his alibi for that day, it turned out it was completely made up and no one had actually seen him that day. There was DNA on the blanket she was wrapped up in, but she was killed in 1996, so it was all really new. The cold case detectives matched that DNA first against hers and discovered she was related to whoever left that sample. Then they pulled him in and checked his and it matched. The case was a slam dunk, and he’s been incarcerated for about six months now. I don’t know this guy well, but his cellmate was getting ready for parole and he said something to me one day that got me to thinking…he said that this guy talks in his sleep, about killing women. When the cellmate asked him about it he said, and this is a quote, ‘There’s nothing in the world like the feeling of putting a bitch out of her misery.’”

“Oh, my fucking God,” Hunter said. The quote had been written in blood at the crime scenes of the killer he and Brett had been chasing. It was the killer’s signature, and never released to the public. “What’s his name?”

“Jon Bridges,” Chris said. “I know he’s not the guy that killed Brett. He was already in jail at the time, awaiting his own trial…but maybe he was there for one of the killings, which would mean he knows this guy well enough to maybe know where you can find him.”

“Fuck yeah,” Hunter said. “Can I talk to him?”

“Sure. Let me know before you’re ready and I’ll set it up.” Hunter was full of nervous energy when they left the bar. He felt good about the information they’d gotten on Josiah, and there was a possibility that someone knew where his brother’s killer was hiding. Hunter felt a thrill run through him at the thought. He wasn’t a killer by nature. He could have never done what his brother did, be a sniper. Hunter had ever only shot his gun in self-defense, but when it came to this man, the one that killed his brother right in front of him, Hunter felt so much hate that he couldn’t see straight. Killing him was going to be a release that Hunter had been looking for since Brett died, and he planned on doing just that…someday.