Page 212 of Fury

“Right.” Her voice was laced with bitterness, irony.

“Lenore—”

“Go!” A plea. Desperate and despairing.

I pulled my hair back from my face. “All right, I’ll go.”

I got my clothes on and left. I started up my bike and glanced back at the open doorway. She still held the gun.

Ileft but I wasn’t goingto leave things like that. No. Something was wrong. Something had cracked wide open inside her, and she was desperate for me not to see and for her not to feel it.

I needed help.

I’d talked with Tania earlier that day, and she’d mentioned that tonight she would be going out with the One-Eyed Jacks for drinks over at Dead Ringer’s Roadhouse.

I headed straight there and interrupted her and Butler getting it on in a back room. I didn’t give a fuck, but he sure did. All the Jacks and their women shot me cold glares, but Tania was impervious to their protective shield. She strode straight through it and left with me, no hesitation.

“Are you going to tell me what’s wrong?” She blinked up at me, wiping her mussed hair from her pink face, taking in a gulp of the warm humid night air in the parking lot. “What’s going on?”

“Lenore’s flipping out,” I said. “She needs you. I made things worse. You need to talk to her, calm her down. Get through to her. Something’s wrong. Something she doesn’t want to talk about with me. But I think it’s got everything to do with me.”

“I’ve got my car here.” Tania gestured at a blue GMC Yukon. “But I’ve had a few margaritas too many.”

“Give me your keys.”

She did, and I handed them over to Slade who’d come over to us. “Take her car and get it to Meager. I’ll call you with the address.”

“You got it.” He got into Tania’s Yukon and started her up.

“We’ll take my bike. We’ll get there quicker. I’ll get you coffee.”

“All righty.”

On the road, I got us both caffeine, and we blew towards Meager, back to Lenore.

Less than an hour and a half later, I cut the engine in front of Lenore’s small clapboard house. Tania got off my bike.

I grabbed her arm. “Hey. Thank you.”

“Don’t thank me yet.”

She climbed up the small staircase of Lenore’s house and knocked. “Lenore? Lenore, it’s Tania. Open up, honey. Please. Lenore?”

The door opened a crack. Lenore glared at me through the darkness.

“Finger asked me to come see you,” said Tania. “He’s worried about you, and I want to make sure that you’re okay. I need to make sure. Please. Just me. We’ll stay up all night and drink and eat bad shit, like we used to.”

Lenore’s fierce eyes stayed on me.

“Lenore?” Tania moved closer to the front door.

“I don’t eat bad shit anymore,” Lenore replied.

“Okay, well, organic, sugar-free, gluten-free, whatever the hell you want—”

Lenore shook her head. “Stop.”

“Come on honey, it’s me,” said Tania. “This is between us. I won’t—”

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