Page 83 of The Wild Charge

The man smirked. “You aren’t the only one who planned for this tonight. Charlie.”

Fox tilted his head to an unimpressed angle, even as his pulse ratcheted up a notch. How did this guy know his name? Who was he? When he got his hands on Luis later…

“If you don’t mind,” the man continued, “I think I’ll take my boys back now. I’ll even let you collect yours. We’ll call it a momentary truce.”

“Feeling magnanimous?”

“Amused, more than anything.” His gaze slid to a point over Fox’s shoulder, and his smirk took on a mean, satisfied edge. “Hello, Reese. Good to see you again.”

What?

“You’re rusty, since I had you. Getting soft, huh?” He snapped his fingers, and the two men who’d been fighting Tenny and Reese stepped forward toward the van, the one Fox had shot clutching at his side, but still very much whole under his Kevlar.

Fox risked a glance over his shoulder at Reese, whose face had gone chalk-white in the places not covered with grease paint; his eyes shone big and vacant under the streetlight, his posture oddly slack.

“This is bollocks,” Tenny seethed. “You can’t–”

Fox caught him with a hand against his chest, and held him back. “No. Not now.”

The van door slammed, and it peeled away from the curb.

Sirens sounded in the distance.

Fox said, “Evan?”

“Yeah, I see ‘em. Maybe half a mile off.”

“We gotta move, then. Meet back up at the clubhouse, like we planned.”

Reese still hadn’t moved.

Tenny turned around and gripped his shoulder; shook him. “What’s bloody wrong with you?” His tone shifted, softer and worried. “Did that bastard get you? Where are you bleeding?”

Reese shook his head, as the sirens got louder.

Fox felt like he couldn’t get enough air in his lungs. Patrons spilled from Smokey’s, crying, clinging, still panicked.

Reese’s throat jumped as he swallowed. His voice was just a scrape. “That man…that’s…he’s…”

“Spit it out!” Tenny snapped.

“He sold Kris and me to Badger. He’s the one who trained me.”

Twenty-Two

Ghost was, predictably, pissed.

“Jesus Christ! Are you kidding me?”

“I know, I know.” Fox held up what was meant to be a placating hand, for all the good it would do. He’d taken the long way back, so the kids had beaten his return. Evan had slunk off, not wanting anything to do with the shitshow to come, and Reese had disappeared like the wraith he’d been brought up to be.The man who trained me. Every time Fox replayed those words in his head, his stomach did a flip. How? How could a ghost from the kid’s past show up now? Like this?

It was only Fox, Ghost, Walsh, and Tenny now in the half-lit common room, the clock on the wall obscenely loud.

If anything, the raised hand left Ghost bristling further. His shoulders were jacked up like an angry dog’s, appropriately, and he tugged on his hair for good measure, dark eyes slitted and dangerous. “A drive-by?” he said for the second time since Fox had first explained. “A goddamndrive-by, Fox? Do you know how long it’s been since we had something like that in this city?”

The last time was probably, Fox thought but didn’t say, that time the Carpathians had targeted Maggie and Ava at a café patio. Fox hadn’t been a part of things then, but word about chapter presidents got around.

“I know,” Fox repeated. “I know it looks bad–”

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