Page 12 of Joker's Ghost
I down my shot, and Jimmy, one of our prospects, appears at my side. “Somebody just left this for you.” The prospect hands me a small box wrapped in brown paper.
I shoot Cobra a look. “Too small to be a bomb, right?” The joke falls from my lips, but with the crazy way I’ve been feeling lately . . .
I unwrap the square box and find a note folded in half.Again, Cobra and I exchange a look. I open up the folded paper and read it.
“Just a warning. Don’t mess with what’s ours, and we won’t mess with yours.”
I pull away the paper, and there’s a black stone embedded in something hard, brown and dried out. “What the fuck?”
Cobra leans in. “Ohhh, shit!”
“What?”
“That’s an umbilical cord.”
“Huh?” I drop it back in the box, trying to reconcile Cobra’s words with what’s staring back at me. I wasn’t there for little Deana’s birth, but I was for Derek’s, and the umbilical cord the doctor cut looked nothing like this dried-out shriveled thing.
Cobra takes the box from my hand and examines it closer. “Yeah, Sheena wanted to do something like this after we had Baby Shane.”
“Something like what?” I still don’t know what I’m looking at.
“Some people take the dried-out umbilical cord and make jewelry out of it or they save it in a box.” Cobra scrunches up his face. “I nixed the idea. Thought it was fuckin’ weird.”
The other brothers gather around me to see what’s going on, with Boa tapping at his phone. “Yeah, apparently it’s a thing people do. Kinda like a good luck charm for when the baby grows up.”
Boa plucks it out of the box, examines it, makes a face and goes back to his phone. A few seconds later, his face sobers. “Says here the Shoshones hold the umbilical cord in high regard, but when it’s set with a black crystal, it’s a warning of . . .”
“A warning of what?” I lean over to see his phone. “Shit!”
“What’s it say?” Rattler asks.
Boa scrolls through his phone. “It says Shoshones use the black crystal as a warning of death, and when it’s set inan umbilical cord, it’s sent as a curse for the newborn baby.”
We’re silent until Mamba says, “And Sheena and Daisy are both pregnant.”
My heart thumps hard against my ribcage. “But he sent it to me as a warning.”
Boa shakes his head. “That is fucked up.”
“I don’t like it.” My gaze is fixed on the box. “I think we oughta have another sit-down with the Nomads before we head to the safe house tomorrow.”
“The shipment is scheduled up from Tijuana for tomorrow morning.” Cobra scrolls through his phone. “There’s no time to change it now.”
I draw in a deep breath, knowing he’s right, but hating it just the same. We can’t afford to let another shipment get hijacked, or we’ll lose our buyers.
Cobra cups my shoulder. “Don’t let this bullshit interfere with business.”
“Yeah, Cobra’s right.” Boa’s words don’t match the concern in his eyes. “Whoever did this is obviously trying to mess with you.”
Out of all of us, Boa’s the most logical. Our computer genius has a master’s degree from USC and is usually the voice of reason when the rest of us pop off, but I can’t help feeling he’s worried too.
I nail the prospect with a dark glare. “Who gave this to you?”
“Never saw him before.” Jimmy shrugs. “I was out in the lot watching over the bikes, and a guy pulls up?—”
“On a bike?”
“Nah, it was a beat-to-shit pickup truck. Rusted out, looked like it was about to fall apart.”
