Page 98 of The Wild Charge

“This is my house, wanker,” Walsh muttered, until Emmie shoved a piece of toast in his face.

Fox kissed Eden goodbye out on the driveway, as the last stars winked out of view, then entrusted her to Axelle’s GTO, with Raven and Cassandra, a very sober Albie set to ride guard. Walsh lagged behind, because Emmie and Becca had to see to the horses, first, and arrange for George and one of their older students to look after them the next few days. Fox put on his cut, and hisgee-what-happened-officersface, and headed for Smokey’s.

The first pink blush of dawn was touching the skyline as he parked across the street from the restaurant, which still teemed with activity.

The whole lot had been cordoned off with fluttering yellow police tape, and windbreakered techs with white gloves came and went from a city van, toting cameras and plastic bins full of evidence. Forensics. If there had been a coroner, he had come and gone; there was an orderly calm about the process, despite the uniformed beat cops standing on guard duty.

Several of them flashed Fox a dark look, but he sat unbothered astride his bike, arms resting on the handlebars, analyzing the scene through his clear riding glasses. Nothing could point directly to the Dogs yet; he was a citizen, free to see and gape like all the other people that clogged the sidewalks.

One of the uniforms tilted his head to speak into his radio, and a moment later two black Suburbans rolled up onto the scene, hopping two tires up the curb onto the grass, disgorging men with dark suits.

Feds.

A frisson shivered down Fox’s spine, and legs, and tingled in the soles of his feet. They wore bulky blue windbreakers over their suit coats, and there was no missing the big, white block FBI printed on the back of each. Badges swung from chains around their necks, and one of them halted, turned his head, and made brief eye contact with Fox.

Fox didn’t move.

When the fed walked off, drawn along by whatever one of his colleagues said – both of them ducking under the tape and falling into step with a nervous-looking uniform – Fox let his gaze shift across the anxious, curious faces of the civilians who’d flocked to rubberneck so early. Many had their heads bent together, talking, speculating. A few snapped photos with their cellphones, the vultures. A few more dabbed their eyes with tissues.

And one was staring straight at Fox.

Another chill rippled through him, one accompanied by a ping of recognition in the back of his mind. The young man – dressed in a patchy black hoodie and dirty jeans – had one of those unremarkable faces easily lost in a crowd, his hair neither brown nor blond, but the way he held his face was something he’d seen on the regular for months now. Or, well,hadseen,for a while.

It was the same blank, inhuman way Reese had held his own face when Fox first met him.

The face of a killer without a shred of humanity.

He held Fox’s gaze a long moment, then turned and walked down the sidewalk. He was affecting a slouch, but there was no hiding the lithe, panther grace of his natural movements. He passed a trash can, and dropped something in it.

When he was out of sight, Fox crossed the street – casual, casual, whistling to himself – to the can and looked down into it. A crumpled piece of notebook paper lay on the very top. He smoothed it out against the metal rim of the can and found a note written in block capitals, dark lines, a hard slant.

GAY ST. BRIDGE. 9 P.M. COME ALONE.

Twenty-Six

Ghost was old hat at this.

At raids.

The first order of business was to make sure everything looked as normal as possible – for them to look like one big, loud family minding their own business.

Maggie already had the live-in girls and the old ladies bustling around in the kitchen, filling the whole house with the scents of brewing coffee and frying bacon.

But being old hat didn’t mean his belly didn’t feel full of thumbtacks.

Forgoing the whiskey-spiked coffee he wanted – damn it, but Mags was right about his dietary habits – he turned to business. “Sit there a sec,” Ghost told Vince, and pointed to a chair by the door. “Look out that window and tell me when the black cars roll up.”

Fielding rolled his eyes but moved to comply.

Ghost turned back toward the (mostly) controlled chaos unfolding before him, clapped his hands, and raised his voice. “Alright, everybody, listen up.”

Dishes clattered in the kitchen, and then stopped; Maggie and Ava stepped outside its door, Maggie wiping her hands on a dish towel. Holly and Mina were trying to wrangle the tired, cranky children who’d all been woken earlier than normal; Mina got the TV set on a Saturday morning cartoon, turned the volume to a reasonable level, and leaned over the back of the couch to give him her attention. The guys faced him, too, all wearing some version of the same tense, expectant expression.

“Obviously,” Ghost said, voice echoing in the sudden fall of quiet, “we’re on lockdown, but we can’t let it look like we are. I’m not worried about anything they’ll find in this house – save you three.” Here he pointed toward Reese and Tenny, the latter of whom was massaging his temples and leaning into Reese’s side on one of the tabletops – and also to Evan, leaning against a support pillar, who pointed at himself with lifted brows to sayme?“Go to your rooms, pack up your weapons, and then get the hell out. Take one of the trucks if you need to. Go get breakfast somewhere, whatever, but you can’t be here.”

Reese nodded, and tugged on Tenny’s sleeve.

Evan gulped, throat jumping, but nodded, too.

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