Page 64 of O'Mega's Revenge
“Don’t let your sisters shave my head again. I want some hair left, got it?”
I wrapped my pinky around his. “Promise.”
“I ain’t promising shit.” Missile shook her head.
Chapter Fourteen
Along time ago, before I joined the Destroyers, I was in the Army. While in, I got shot in the leg. Same damn one that caught a rotten wooden spike through it. Jackson’s cover story was nearly the truth. The doctors didn’t question it. They worked hard to repair the damage and clean the wounds.
But nasty things live in the dirt.
Ask any soldier, and he’ll tell you that if it isn’t the water trying to kill you, it’s the dirt. I’d met a good friend in rehab my first time around. Now he sat at my bedside while they discussed things like “prosthesis” and revision surgery.
“Fixed the shifter to work from a hand lever.” Ice rambled on about the modifications the club was making to my bike so I could ride. All of it was overwhelming.
He slapped my chest. “You listening?”
“No.”
“Heh. Payback’s a bitch. Remember busting my balls at Walter Reed?”
He’d lost a damn promising career as a sniper due to a leg injury. At that time, a bad jump ended things and almost ended him. If it had happened two years ago, instead of ten, he’d be out there yet today, happily picking off all enemies— foreign, but not domestic. Instead, we got a damn fine enforcer. Because I didn’t let him give up. I told him about the club back home. About Sprout, his dad, the connection to a family that didn’t give a shit about rules and regulations. Someplace not Army he could call home. Now he was here, not letting me give up. Talking me through the worst of it. Being a good brother.
“They find anything else?” I was referring to the safe on the estate where Tits and Jackson offed the Surgeon, aka Luke Barresi. A low-level hood who climbed the ladder all the way to the top circle, but not a soul admitted to it. Nope, they were just grateful to Nonno for “recovering” more than one safe full of compromising photos. We kept some of the better shit in reserve. Stuff we didn’t have to hand over that might turn useful down the road.
Ice let the surprising shit fall into a friend’s hands. That guy had connections with the Pentagon and FBI. As long as the Destroyers weren’t anywhere near those investigations, we could afford to do our civic duty and expose the naughty little habits of a group of slimeballs sending our friends off to war.
“Some missing girls. The DHMC is tracking down the parents to give them closure. I hear they found one they’d been looking for recently.”
“Jesus.”
“How’s Tits?”
I smiled just thinking about her and her newfound sense of freedom. “Happier. And a pain in the ass. You just missed her.”
“If she’s already riding your ass, you are all set for the next obstacle, dropping a ring on that bitch.”
“She’s not a bitch.”
Ice leaned in and got in my ear like he was going to impart a deep secret. Instead, he whispered. “Married life ain’t all that bad. You should try it.”
I glanced at the black band on his finger. “Yeah?”
He leaned in a bit closer. “Sex. All the fucking time.”
He was so full of shit. As I prepared to razz him about lying, fear struck me. It would creep up like that. Laughing one second, the next paralyzing doubt about the future. My breath caught, and I had trouble getting the next one in.
“Shit. Stay with me, bro.” Ice clamped his hand around mine and talked me through box breathing. Then rambled on about his wife’s therapy and the diverse ways she had learned how to focus on staying in the moment.
“It gets better.”
God, I hoped so. “I don’t know how she does it.”
“Who? Killer? She’s tough.” He called his wife, Killer, cute. The girl was afraid of her own shadow.
“I meant Tits.”
Ice tried to hide a smile. “Heard about the head shots from Jackson. Your girl’s practically a legend.” He gave up trying to hide it and chuckled. Then sighed.
