Page 139 of Love Thy Brother
River nodded. “Loads of people saw me. I was there when the call came in about the fire. You can see me leave on the CCTV.”
They’d see him partying all night in the bar too, for all we’d only been there a few hours. I hadn’t seen hind nor hair of Alexei since this shit had gone down, but he’d be all over it. Covering tracks. Manufacturing evidence that we’d been nowhere near anything except an old-fashioned biker shindig.
“We’ll need to talk to you again,” the police officer warned. “Where can we reach you?”
River recited his phone number and address and the feds backed off, leaving us with a friendly fireman.
“You want to take a walk around?”
River blinked. “We can do that?”
“If you stay close and put your feet where I tell you.”
The fireman passed us hardhats and led us closer to the burned-out garage. It was still too warm to go inside, but with the windows blown out and half the walls collapsed, it didn’t much matter.
Fuck. Me. It was gone. All of it. The only thing I recognised was the old sofa. Somehow, the aged leather had survived the flames.
“Axel’s hog is gone,” River said. “He loved that shit heap.”
I rubbed his arm. “We’ll find him another one. Saint’s got loads of old bangers at his place.”
River hummed and drifted ahead to stare at the bay where he’d done most of his work. The Road King was long gone. In its place, he’d taken on a rebuild of a custom chopper, but he hadn’t been around to start and there wasn’t much left of it now. “Fuck, that’s gonna cost me twenty grand to replace.”
It was gonna costsomeone. And I silently promised him with every facet of my soul it wouldn’t be him.
So many emotions had battered me in such a short space of
time. Too many to list. To even contemplate. But as I watched reality descend on River. Watched the shock fade and devastation set in, pure rage became dominant, crackling in my veins. Boiling my blood. I had no words of comfort left. Only justice could make this right.
My phone rang. I exchanged a nod with Locke and stepped away to take the call.
“I have what we need.” Alexei’s cool voice came down the line, the Russian edge smoothed to a polished English accent that usually made me LOL. “If River wishes to join me, the time is now.”
“Understood. Give us a minute to figure it out.”
“You may have five.” Alexei rattled off a coded location and hung up.
I pocketed my phone and returned to River and Locke.
Locke was talking to the fireman. River was crouched on the ground, his hands in the sooty dirt.
I dropped down beside him. “You okay?”
A humourless chuckle escaped him. “This is my fault as much as last night was. How many times did you warn me this was going to happen?”
“None. I was more worried they’d kill you.”
“They could’ve done. I’ve slept here before when I’ve been too off my nut to go home.”
“Because Oscar was there?”
“Nah. Just didn’t want to be alone in my bed. Kipping on the couch here, someone always showed up eventually.”
“You could’ve come to me. Any night, any day, I’d have been there.”
“Would you?”
There was no accusation in River’s words. Just desolate fact. I was never home either. I was on the road. In someone else’s bed. Fucking some girl at the beach. Burying my head under Nash’s pillow or Embry’s. “I’m sorry.”
