Page 10 of American Hellhound
“Not yet, no. Soon, I figure.”
“You know what I think?” Ava asked, but before she could say anything else, someone rapped sharply against the office door. Then it swung open.
Early sunlight framed Vince Fielding in an unforgiving way, illuminating the lines on his face and the way his hair was thinning on top. The way his body was a little sparer, his face rounder. Alcohol, most like. His uniform shirt had a little stain above one of the pockets.
Ava grabbed the stroller handle with one hand and Remy’s jacketed arm with the other, a mother lioness ready to snatch her cubs out of danger.
“Vince,” Maggie said, sitting up straight and clutching Cal tight into her stomach. She shouldn’t have been surprised to see him, not after what happened last night, but she was. “What are you doing here?”
He fiddled with his tie, seeming to forget it was clipped into the buttons of his shirt. “I was off rotation last night, but I heard what happened. I wanted to make sure you were alright.”
“Join the club,” she muttered. “I’m fine, we’re all fine, everything’s fine.” She was really starting to hate that word. “How about you and your guys just figure out who did it, okay?”
“Well, that’s the thing,” he said, shuffling his feet on the linoleum. “Down at the station, no one really…cares.”
~*~
“Talk to all your contacts,” Ghost told Ratchet, and the secretary bobbed his head, expression earnest. “Your courthouse guy, your lab guy, your fucking DOT guy, if you’ve got one. If someone saw something or knows something, I wanna know about it.”
“On it, boss,” Ratchet assured.
“Good.” Ghost started to step back from the desk, and heard the scrape of a shoe on the hardwood a moment before he was attacked.
Two arms strong and thick as tree trunks wrapped tight around his middle, squeezed the breath out of him, and lifted him up off his feet like he weighed nothing.
“Daddy!” Mercy crowed, laughing.
Ghost considered kicking him. “I ain’t your daddy, asshole.”
“If it’s a boy, will you name it after me? Can’t you just hear it? Felix Teague. It’s got a nice ring to it.”
Ghost did kick him then.
Laughing still, Mercy set him back on his feet. “Admit it, you like it.”
Ghost forced himself to turn slowly, and glower presidentially, when what he wanted was to slug the guy. “Is this how you wanna play this? Really?”
Mercy’s grin took up his whole face, and it was a little bit terrifying how happy he was. “Oh, really.”
“Is it too late to rescind my fatherly approval of your marriage?”
“Never had it, didn’t ask for it.” Mercy put his big paw hands on Ghost’s shoulders. “You gotta understand, Poppy. This is Karmic.”
“Getting my wife pregnant?”
“No. Sanctimonious, superior, joylessyougetting your wife pregnant. Big difference.”
Ghost shrugged off his touch. “God, I hate you.”
“No you don’t,” Mercy said, cheerfully. “I’m your favorite son-in-law.”
“I’m not even gracing that with a response.”
“Hey,” Walsh said, leaning in from the front hall. “Fielding’s here.”
“Send him in.”
“He’s down at the office, actually.”
