Page 35 of Beast

“She’s not my old lady.Yet.”I planned to fix that real soon.“Piper, meet Hawke and Thor.You weren’t at the clubhouse long enough to be introduced to all the riffraff.”

Piper crossed to my side and I draped an arm around her shoulder.“Nice to meet you.”

“Delighted to meet anyone who’s able to put up with this guy for more than ten minutes.”Thor crossed to the kitchen, eyeing up the counter.“Coffee and everything.”He turned a chair sideways and straddled it.“You’re not answering your phone.Given the circumstances, Ace wanted to make sure you were just too busy to bother with the phone.”

“Network’s down here.You know I’d never go offline without a good reason.”

“Which is why Ace got his shit in a knot,” Hawke grunted.

“A good host would offer to make us a coffee after we came all this way to save his ass.”Thor looked pointedly at the kitchen counter.

“You want to make these idiots coffee?”I looked down at Piper.

“Tap water or bottle?”she asked with a trace of laughter in her voice.

“Better make it bottled.They did come to check on us after all.Almost like they care.”I pulled a chair out and sat down, and Hawke did the same.

Piper pulled the camp stove out of the cupboard and lit it, setting the coffee pot on one of the two burners.Satisfied it was working properly, she came and sat on my lap.I liked that.I noticed Hawke narrowing his eyes as he took it in.

The room was silent except for the sound of the coffee dripping into the pot.Hawke held up his phone, staring at the screen.“You’re right.No signal.”

I snorted.“I already said that.I may not be a tech genius, but I can read a phone.”

“So here’s the deal.”Thor sat up straight.“The concert bus slid off the road during the storm.No way to prove it wasn’t an accident given the fucking storm, but Rattler and Deuce were following because of that threat Shadow intercepted.They say a big-assed pickup sideswiped it just as it hit a big puddle and lost traction.”

“Everyone okay?”Piper tensed.

“Yeah.Two guys got out of the truck, heading to the bus.Rattler says they were armed but when they saw our guys pull up, they aborted.Got back in the truck and took off.Rattler and Deuce made sure everyone on the bus was okay before they followed, and so far we haven’t heard back from them.Ace told them to bring the guys back to the pen if they manage to catch them.”

Piper frowned at me.“What’s the pen?”

I hesitated.Some things you don’t share except with patched members of the club, and their old ladies if it’s important.Piper belonged to me though, even if it wasn’t official yet.“It’s where we take people to interrogate them.Like the holding pens at a livestock auction.”

She nodded and looked back at Thor.“You sure the band is okay?And what about the bus?”

He shook his head.“Bus landed on its side in the ditch.Gonna need a crane truck to set it upright and back on the road.Until then, hard to say how much damage it took.”

“And the guys?”

“Mostly bumps and bruises.The driver broke his arm.They took him into the hospital to have it set and cast.Not so sure about the equipment though.It probably got tossed around a bit.At least it was contained in the back of the bus, so it didn’t get thrown out when the bus went down.Can’t think all that water would have done it much good.”

Piper looked at me.“You think this is Drake’s doing?”

I nodded.“Yeah.Smacks of mafia tactics.”

The grim look on her face didn’t bode well for Drake if she ever ran into him again.Not that that was likely.I planned to introduce him to his Maker as soon as possible.He’d put a hit out on my woman.Nothing forgivable about that.

“I suggest we saddle up pronto and get to the rally point.Ace is not going to be happy with all three of us going phone silent.”Hawke made a motion to stand up, but Thor put out a hand to stop him.

“Beast’s woman put coffee on for us.It wouldn’t be polite to leave without drinking it.And they’re coming with us, so it would be wasted.Not cool.”

“My name is Piper.Not Beast’s woman.”But she didn’t sound upset.“Coffee looks like it’s done.You two take cream and sugar?”

“None for me.I like mine black as a moonless night,” Hawke spoke up.

“Both for me.”Thor shrugged.“I need all the sweetening I can get.”

“Yeah.Janet mentioned something like that.”Hawke smirked.

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