Page 40 of Drift

CHRIS

“Night, Mr Daniels.”

Passing the security guard, Chris didn’t look up from his phone as he mumbled something to himself. His missus wanted some shopping picking up for dinner, and as usual, he was left to pick his way through the supermarket because her work as a lawyer took precedence. “Bitch.” He got a look off the MC security guard who’d wished him goodnight, and he winced. “Sorry, Fred. Bad day, and it’s just gotten a little longer.”

“S’okay.” Fred tipped his hat and held the door for him. “It’s raining out there. Take this. It’s the last one.”

He took the umbrella, flicking it open to the hard pelt and forced himself to take wide steps to stop the belting. Monique sat warm and cosy up in the office with Brennan, and it was no doubt why she’d worn such a skimpy summer dress. She was out to… entice and really get a head… for the promotion. Blowjobs did that. Bit weird her lover sat with her, though. Always seemed such a difference between Monique and his own missus. Mia was too used to delegating shopping duties to him in order to keep her hands clean; Monique always ready to tie back her hair from her golden country-girl beauty to handle whatever life threw at her and use all that sexuality to her advantage.

Both bitches.

One he tolerated through three years of marriage, the other because of work.

He really understood the draw to being gay at times, but that offered… Jan. Too nice. Too polite. Like Monique, not bad at his job, but where one wasn’t into dick at all, the other was too willing to suck a boss’s to get ahead.

Waste of a woman, waste of a head for numbers when it came to Jan, because out of all three of them going against him for this promotion, Jan was wildcard enough to take it from him. Monique only had to offer a bit of those long legs and she’d get it.

Ben was already in his car, and he stopped and let him cross his path before heading out of the car park. Chris saluted his thanks, content enough that the breakdown had at least knocked Jan and Monique out of the game for the afternoon, taking Jan out of the office more than it had Monique. No foul really behind the water in the tank. Chris knew accounting, how piling on the numbers and playing catchup would be damage enough to throw the likes of Jan and Monique off their game. Doing it on the day would have been too damn obvious. No real harm done with the water Ben poured into it any way, bar inconvenience. Okay Chris had come up with the idea, but the touch on the watering can was Ben’s. He just hoped the mechanic Monique used didn’t screw her over too much for the… ballsy prank.

He made it over to his Mercedes, and the indicators flickered on as he opened up and slipped inside. The umbrella went in a specialist bag he always kept under the passenger seat for nights like this, anything to stop the rainwater damaging the leather seats, and he’d leave it with the guards at the main gates as per MC rules.

As he started to head out, he promised to buy her and Jan dinner tomorrow after the FRC had put them through the mill, just to make up and start afresh. He’d need them on side after the promotion, because it was always going to be his, even Ben kept silent over that. All three of them were the best to have on his team, they just needed to give him a chance to lead them through it.

He signed the umbrella back in with gate security, then it took another five minutes before he could hit hard on the accelerator and really work out on fuelling adrenaline. Mercs were the sleekest, but also the meanest ride in his book, and he’d long since come to terms with how looking the part had to come with a hard bite and skill to get someone where they needed to be.

Okay, his hard ride home would end up with a visit to Tesco in fifteen minutes to do some shopping, but he could at least enjoy the dark of the road and the feel of the engine before then.

The glare of car light coming at his side came fast, the slam of his own brakes even faster a few moments later, then burning rubber and smoke sent the world and his Mercedes spinning with the near-miss. The old oak tree he’d passed every day for five years took on a whole new dimension of “Fuck no” as his Mercedes slammed face-first into it, then the crunch of metal stopped his heartbeat for a second before a hurt-filled darkness he more than welcomed stole him away from the unnatural stillness of the night.

The reds and greens off the ambulance towards the middle of Broadhurst Lane had Gray resting an elbow on the door of his Merc, finger brushing his lip, as he sat watching the fallout of a collision with a tree. It echoed Kiyen’s and Fal’s accident in some ways, and he frowned over.

With the lane blocked off, he’d pulled up to the curb five minutes ago, but it looked like the firefighters had been trying to cut the driver free for a while. The old oak had withstood the damage, gaining a scar and losing some skin that the breeze and rain tried to soothe better, but the Mercedes hadn’t been as lucky. Despite being a sturdy build, the front of the car now gripped around the tree, as if it had found a new friend and didn’t want to let go itslove mehold. It had left the driver pinned inside with how the impact told tales on a private love for speeding. There was no other damage to the Merc that called out a collision with another car, but from the second arc of rubber on tarmac trailing from across the T-junction, it called out a second carhadcome close to bleeding in the mix. That skid had been controlled well enough to avoid trouble, but the car had fled the scene. Only the skid marks themselves would be the one to tell tales on who’d been at fault.

With it being close to the MC and a Mercedes, Gray had run the licence plate.

It would have kept him close by if that had been any member of the MC being lifted onto a stretcher. But with that being Christopher Daniels?

Jack had given Gray a call ten minutes ago to let him know his theory had been right. The computerised system in any car today gave a readout of when problems first occurred, and data highlighted the time and minor breaks in the combustion process in the morning. But the main damage came at dinnertime. The fact the damage had been implemented to cut the car before Monique and Jan got in was partway to Gray cutting Chris and Ben some slack, but the fact they’d targeted Jan and Monique in the first place?

Gray stroked at his lip again, annoyed someone had put Chris out of reach before he could have a word in his ear. Whoever had helped cause the collision had long since left the scene, and Gray snorted at the irony: there was no CCTV this far into the lane to catch anyone in the wrong, although there was always the onboard camera. It meant a lot of paperwork for the MC, but Gray really didn’t care.

Chris was out of the picture.

But he’d still ask Ray to request the onboard camera footage of Chris’s accident once official notification came through that there’d been an accident. He didn’t like loose ends, especially when he didn’t know the why and who behind it.

Gray flicked the key in the ignition, but as he did a U-turn for Thames House, a call came through. He flicked Answer. “Raoul.”

“Gray. It’s Rita. Are you clear to talk on a secure line?”

Blackwell… from Thames House, pathology. And his Merc was always secure. “I am.”

“I’ve got the results from the samples you passed over…” It fell quiet all for a car passing Gray by on the opposite side of the road. “Negative result for the Firethorn. No drug found. With the emesis sample, DNA was extracted, but after running it through the Dunbar database, it’s also a negative result.”

The former result was… surprising. Gray gave a rough sigh.

“But the prints off the piping,” said Rita, “that was strange.”

Gray turned his ear. “How?”

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