Page 28 of Necessary Evil

“It’s like a clown car, only less intelligent,” Sentinel said as he too dismounted, rolling his shoulders and bouncing lightly on the balls of his feet.

“I see you brought friends,” one of the large townies said. He was swinging a wrench. Sentinel put his hand casually on the pistol at the center of his back. Evil shook his head at him. No guns.

“Should’ve brought Ryder,” Sentinel bitched.

“It’s two each. Grow a pair,” Warden said. “I already softened most of them up for you.”

“Hey, shut up,” the townie said, looking around to make sure his friends had gotten out of the truck with him.

“Suck my dick,” Sentinel said.

And then it was on. Evil didn’t think talking would have done anything but delay the inevitable, but he still felt they could have tried. Sentinel, for all his whining, dropped his first guy with a throat punch followed up by a side kick that bent the guy’s knee sideways. Warden took on the guy with the wrench, breaking his arm—but got clobbered in the back of the head by his buddy. Evil tackled the buddy and drove his head into the pavement several times before two of the townie’s friends piled on top. It was all fists and elbows, and one of the pussies bit him. A red haze obscured his vision, and he barely felt the impact of the blows as he rolled to his feet. He broke the nose of one of his attackers and snapped another’s wrist, relishing the sound.

“Enough,” Sentinel said, and clapped a hand on Evil’s shoulder.

Evil was a hair’s breadth away from tugging on Sentinel’s arm and flipping him over his hip. But he recognized that the fight was over. The redneck he held up by the collar of his flannel shirt was hanging limp and the other one on the ground wasn’t moving, even when Evil stepped off his hand. Sentinel’s guys were moaning, and Warden’s two were attempting to drag themselves back to the truck.

“I don’t think so,” Evil said, and they froze. “We need to do a little motorcycle repair, and we don’t want to be interrupted by any officers of the law, understand?”

The two who were still mobile nodded.

“Once we’re on the road, you can call an ambulance for your friends. But for right now, you’re going to sit the fuck down and consider the fact that we could have easily killed your dumb asses. Was whatever brought you here worth dying for, you dumb sons of bitches?”

“No, man.” One of them flopped back to the pavement and put his head between his knees.

“I still say we ice the racist motherfuckers,” Sentinel said in a low growl.

Evil was pretty sure he was playing with them. But not 100 percent sure. He played good cop to Sentinel’s bad cop anyway. Warden just rolled his eyes and opened up the tool kit. “They learned their lesson, don’t you think?”

“I don’t know. What have you little pricks learned today?” Sentinel loomed over them. The other guy who had been standing also sprawled out in the parking lot. Luckily, at this time of night no one seemed to notice or care that there had been a fight. Of course, it’d been over pretty much as soon as it began.

“We—we’re going to mind our own business,” one of them stammered out through a fat lip.

“And fuck Mark when he says he needs backup.”

“Which one is Mark?” Sentinel asked.

Warden pointed to the guy who’d been wielding the wrench; he was unconscious from too many blows to the head. Sentinel stood over Mark. “I don’t think we can let him live. Don’t want him reporting us to the cops.”

Evil frowned at him. This was going a little far. He couldn’t possibly be suggesting they kill six dumbasses who’d wanted to go wild on a Saturday night—Sunday morning now. Lucy would be fast asleep in her bed. He wondered if she wore a nightshirt or if she slept in the nude. Maybe he could break into her place and be inside her before she even woke up….

Evil shook off the thoughts the blood lust had shifted into. He wanted to fuck or get into another fight. Mostly, he wanted to fuck Lucy into oblivion. “Mark won’t say anything to the cops,” the guy with the fat lip said. “One more disturbing-the-peace rap and he’s going to state.”

Sentinel arched an eyebrow at Evil. Yeah, they were safe enough.

“What about the rest of you assholes?”

“We’re not going to advertise we got beat by three strangers. We have a rep to think about.”

“Tell you what,” Sentinel said. “We won’t mention the ass-beating if you won’t.”

The guy with the fat lip nodded. “Deal. Now, can we go home? My wife is going to kill me as it is.”

“Go ahead,” Evil said, and even helped drag the unconscious guys to the truck.

When they pulled away, Sentinel said, “We should have planted Kramer’s wallet on them.”

“Not worth the risk of exposure if one of them decided to put the blame on Warden.”

“So where are we going to lose it?”

“Same plan.” Evil pulled out his phone and checked the time. It was after one in the morning. They weren’t going to be back on the Island until dawn. He considered calling Lucy, wondering if she was still up. Then he noticed the blood on his knuckles.

She was better off without him.

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