Page 10 of Tater
“Yeah,” Eagle said. They wasn’t when we got there.”
“That you or the boys?” she asked.
Eagle shrugged. “Storm, mud, fire, bullets. Lots of ways to die.”
The dragon hummed, displeased. It didn’t like unfinished business it hadn’t tended itself.
“Patches?” she asked. “You bring me souvenirs?”
Tater’s eyes darkened. “No patches.”
Ren blinked. “What?”
Eagle answered. “Every Hellhound we found in your burn radius had their colors burned clean off. Leather was scorched where the patch was. Skin underneath? Not as bad.”
The dragon purred, smug.
“So, I got creative,” she said. “They came to take mine. Felt fair.”
“Fair’s not the word they’re gonna use,” Eagle said. “You didn’t just kill their boys, Ren. You humiliated ‘em. Took their identity right off their backs. That’s gonna piss them off more than the bodies.”
“Good,” she said. “They started it.”
Tater scrubbed his hand over his face. “You didn’t do anything wrong. But we’d be idiots not to expect blowback.”
“Blowback how?” she asked. “More ambushes? Bigger vans? Grappling hooks?”
“Ren,” Tater said.
Ren looked at him. “What? You’re President. If they’re coming, we should talk about how. Sitting here pretending they’re just gonna go sulk in their clubhouse doesn’t change the math.”
Eagle sighed. “We don’t think they’re sulking.”
“Then what?” she said.
He nodded toward the hall. “You wanna tell her or you want me to?”
Tater’s jaw flexed. “I’ll do it.”
He looked at me. Really looked. The gray of his eyes had that storm warning in them again.
“Somebody filmed you,” he said. “Out there. In the clearing.”
The dragon went very still.
“Filmed me doing what? “She asked, like she didn’t already know.
“What do you think?” Eagle said. “Dragon girl lit up, Hades Hellhounds screaming, rain turning to steam. It’s not long, but it’s clear.”
Her mouth went dry. “And?”
“And about an hour after we got you back here,” Tater said, “a file came through the burner line we use when we don’t want cops listening. No message. Just the video. Hades Hellhounds watermark in the corner.”
“That’s not possible,” she snapped. “I burned everything within reach.”
“Not everything,” Eagle said. “You were busy bleeding, so I’ll give you a pass on missing the guy tucked back in the trees with his camera out.”
The dragon snarled, pissed at itself.
