Page 22 of Givin' Me Fitz!
“He should be here at ten, so just buzz me on the intercom.” He pointed to the large phone in front of me, which was twice the size of the one on my desk. I’d never worked a goddamn switchboard.
“Okay, uh, which button is that?” I felt like an idiot, but hell, nobody had shown me how to work the damn thing.
Sparky smirked. “Sorry, man. You fit in with us so well, I forget you’re still pretty new.” He proceeded to show me how the phone system worked. Hell, the job paid the same whether I was answering the phones or out chasing a skip—as Sparky had pointed out to all of us more than once.
At quarter to ten, a tall, well-built man entered, theding-dongof the bell alerting everyone of an arrival. The guy stopped at the desk and stared at me. There was no way he wasn’t the trooper because he had that stick-up-his-ass look about him.
“Can I help you?”
The guy stared at me like I had a second head before he spoke. “Are you Jesse Sparks?”
I was guessing it was because I looked old. Hell, I was older than Jesse. Also too damn young to retire, so fuck the trooper.
“No. I’m Fitz Morgan. Are you Trooper Jagger Hansen?”
“Former Trooper. Just Jagger.” He extended his hand, and I shook it. I wasn’t rude. I wouldn’t treat him like a prick until I had confirmation that he was one—which I fully expected.
Monty stepped over to the desk. “Mr. Hansen? I’m Ryan Montgomery. Come with me.”
Turns out, I didn’t have to know how to use the intercom. Ryan Montgomery took the possible asshole back to Sparky’s office without me moving a muscle.
Chapter Eight
Sawyer
Tiny stood on the porch of my house when I opened the front door. “Hey, Tiny. What’s up?”
“I, uh, I hate to bother you, prez, but Tim Walton didn’t show up for work today. We’ve been friends since grade school, sir, and I’ve been trying to find him for a couple of days without any luck.” The big guy’s expression showed how worried he was.
I motioned for him to come inside and pointed toward the chair by the couch. Tiny sat down and the chair creaked, not surprisingly. The kid had to weigh at least three bills, and hewasn’tfat. He would be a force for certain. I wouldn’t want to meet the guy in a dark alley.
“Tim Walton? The new guy working at the clubhouse?”
I remembered the skinny red-haired guy who Tiny had introduced to me and asked if we could give him a job and suggested maybe he could prospect. I gave him a spot cleaning the clubhouse, and the kid had done a great job.
“Yeah. He’s got a shitty home situation, which is why I was trying to get him to move into the clubhouse and share with me. T-Roy told me he’d help me build a bunk bed in my room, and I told Tim to get his shit together at his parents’ house and I’d pick him up when he was ready. He hasn’t called me back.”
“You trust him? Did he have a hand in any shady shit?” Trust was hard to come by in our business. I had no idea if Tiny’s friend was trustworthy, which was why we hadn’t invited him to prospect yet.
“No, prez. Tim is a solid guy, but his folks… I’d like someone to go with me to check on him. I don’t want to hurt his parents. I might not be able to control myself if they did anything to him.”
“Okay, I’ll go with you.” I headed to my bedroom to slide on my boots and grab my cut.
I’d been moping around because I wasn’t sure whether I should call Fitz after the night we’d shared under the stars. What the fuck was with the lovesick shit I was going through? That wasn’t me at all.
But Fitz seemed like a damn nice guy, and he’d been in law enforcement, leading me to believe he might not be cool with some of the shit we had done to save our club. I couldn’t live with the worry that he might have a stronger moral compass that would lead him to do somethingImight regret—like turn me in to the cops if I told him some of the shit I’d done for the club that were still unsolved cases.
After stepping out of my bedroom, I headed to the gun safe in the hallway and punched in the code. Once I had it opened, I grabbed an untraceable pistol I’d picked up from an asshole who came to the North Woodchips house one night with the idea of robbing us while I was taking the watch.
Stupid motherfucker pissed me off the minute he stepped on the porch and tried to play it off that he had a reservation—which he didn’t—and insinuating I was a dick for not letting him in. At the end of the day, he was resting in the desert, and I’d had the final say.
I walked out of the bedroom and stood in front of Tiny in the doorway of my kitchen. “Bikes or truck?”
“Maybe the truck? His folks are religious fanatics, so the bikes might be too much. Tim’s a quiet guy, and I hoped prospecting with the club would bring him out of his shell.” Tiny pulled keys out of his pocket and flipped them around his fingers. Seemed like a nervous habit, but maybe there was a reason to worry about young Tim?
“Let’s walk up to the clubhouse and get Hobie to come with us. He has an SUV that will fit all of us when we find your friend.” I removed my cut and hung it over the back of a chair.
Tiny nodded, and we walked the hundred yards to the clubhouse. There were a few of the guys inside, which pissed me off. The old-timers I expected, but Spider and Derson had other places they should be—namely, at our business in the Las Vegas Valley, Tumbleweeds Dispensary on South Durango Drive—where they should have been providing security.
