Page 47 of The Devil's Ice

“Black with sugar, please.”

“Got it.” He scooped some sugar onto a spoon, then added a bit more, handed her the cup. “And I ran out to the bakery a couple of hours ago and got a whole selection of pastries – croissants, cinnamon buns, some bun thing with chocolate inside, muffins…”

“Good God.” Vixen blew on the coffee, took a sip. “Youtryingto make me gain twenty pounds?”

“Morecurves on that delectable little body?” Ice growled. “Fucking yes, please.”

Vixen blushed, looked at the tray. “So you decided to start by test running the croissant?”

“Yep. I thinkeveryonelikes them, don’t they?”

“I sure do. Thank you.”

“You got it, baby.”

Vixen paused with the croissant halfway to her mouth, feeling a wave of happiness move through her as he called her that name again. She’d never have thought – not in a hundred years – that Ice would be willing to soften and sweeten enough to call her anything but ‘Vix’. Hell, she’d been touched at justthatmuch, so the fact that this hard man had a name for her, a special pet name, was indescribably moving.

“So.” She found her voice somehow, pushed down on her dizzying joy. “Any news? About anything?”

Those blue eyes were a bit distant suddenly, and she held her breath: she knew that MC business was secret to anyone and everyone outside of it, and she knew that she had to be OK with that, at least on some level. Having said that, shewassitting here with a pretty bad injurybecauseof the club, and as a casualty of things that had zero to do with her, Vixen felt like maybe she had a right to some information. Noteverything, of course, but maybe a hint. Even ahintof a hint.

“Yeah, I guess we need to talk about a couple of things,” Ice said. “I mean, you’re pretty involved, and Scars is so fucking grateful to you for Keira that he said it’s OK to fill you in a bit.”

“He did?”

“He did, and if he hadn’t, Zoe would kick his ass. She’s made it clear to her man that you get some information, as long as it’s safe for you.”

“I wouldn’t go against Zoe on much.”

“No kidding, huh?” Ice shook his head. “She’s a handful.”

“OK, so…” Vixen waved her hand in a circle, encouraging him to carry on. “I’ll eat and you talk. I mean, as much as you can.”

“OK, well, first things first. No word on Hannah and Joe. Not one.”

“No ransom demand? Nothing?”

“Nope.”

“But why haven’t you guys stormed into Utah and taken down The Hellions? I mean, unless Scars sent someone already, but I’d think that it’d beyou. Am I right?”

“It would be me,” he admitted. “I’m the one who gets sent to take care of shit like that… me and the twins always took point on this kind of thing. It wasn’t supposed to happen so much after Wolf took the club legit, so I focused on bouncing and personal training, but… well. Things kind of keep happening, so I keep getting dragged back in. We all do.”

Vixen sighed, drank some more coffee. “I guessed that much.”

“It wasn’t hard for you to do,” Ice said. “Life around us has been a never-ending hotbed of activity these past few years.”

“Which is what Wolf was trying to get you guys away from. I hate that it hasn’t worked out that way.”

“Me too.” Ice topped up her coffee, sweetened it for her. “But to answer your question, no. Scars hasn’t sent anyone to Utah.”

“Can I ask why?”

“Because he’s working on the assumption that Viper Grant has the babies, and Scars is worried that he’s got them close, and if so, they’d be in the direct line of fire. If Viper saw any of us show up – even just to talk to him, no action at all, just come in peace – Scars thinks that he’s unstable enough to hurt those kids. Healsothinks that’s why Viper took ‘em in the first place – to act as tiny human shields.”

“Oh, God.” Vixen was horrified. “I never thought aboutthat.”

“It’s not a great thing to have to think about,” Ice said heavily. “But Scars is. The truth is that we’ve been blindsided by Viper – none of us ever gave him even athought, not when we were dealing with Crusher Alcott. Next to him, everyone in that MC looked weak. But we got Viper way wrong, and now we’re playing catch up and the truth is that we’re way,waybehind him. We know he’s willing to kidnap babies and run kids down in parking lots… so the idea that he’d sacrifice Hannah and Joe at the first sight of us isn’t too out there.”

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