Blood Lines (4 page)

>> Interstate 40

>> Outside Greensboro, North Carolina

>> 1619 Hours

Shel pumped gas at the small convenience store while Remy went to grab some burgers from the fast food franchise located inside. Max ran around the dog-walking area.

By the time Shel paid for the gas, cleaned up after Max, hit the head, and returned to the Jeep, Remy stood waiting with two paper sacks of burgers and fries and a tray containing a half-dozen bottles of water. They divvied the food, and Remy emptied one of the water bottles into a dish beside the Jeep for Max.

“Who's the fugitive?” Shel unwrapped one of the burgers and took a bite.

“A lowlife named Bobby Lee Gant.” Remy bit into his burger, then winced a little; Shel saw him try to cover the reaction. Remy's jaw was still swollen from the punch he'd taken.

Shel chewed, thought for a moment, then swallowed. “The biker guy who did the carjacking in Jacksonville back in April?”

Remy nodded. “That's the one.”

The carjacking, which had involved a young Marine and his wife, had been particularly heinous. The couple had been shopping in Jacksonville. The Marine had just returned from Iraq. While they'd been stopped at a light, Bobby Lee Gant and three of his buddies had driven up beside them on their motorcycles. Gant and one of his buddies had ridden doubled up.

At the light, Gant slid off the motorcycle he had been a passenger on, crossed to the young Marine's car, and smashed the window with a tire iron. Then he'd taken a pistol from his belt and shoved it into the Marine's face.

Just back from Iraq and the horrors he had seen there, the Marine hadn't reacted well to the open violence. He'd grabbed for Gant's pistol automatically and ended up getting shot in the face. He had survived but had been forced to undergo cutting-edge reconstructive surgeries to repair the damage. His right eye had been lost, and his military career had ended at the same time.

One of the other men had yanked the wife out onto the street. Then Gant had driven off in the car while his friends followed on the bikes, leaving the couple behind. Luckily the Marine's wife had her cell phone and was able to call for medical assistance immediately.

NCIS had been trying to get a lead on the biker for the last two months. It was the kind of assignment Shel enjoyed: danger with a hint of vengeance.

“How'd we find him?” Shel asked.

“Charlotte PD nabbed Gant's girlfriend on a holding charge. She's pregnant. A fall like that, she'd be inside county lockup and the kid would end up on its own. She tried to pull hardship, claimed that her family had disowned her and nobody would take care of her kid. Charlotte DA froze her out.”

“Hard.”

“Yeah.”

Despite the years of military life, wars, and what he had seen while with NCIS, Shel hadn't hardened to the struggles of others. He empathized with the young mother. A lot of people who trafficked in crime weren't evil. Not like Bobby Lee Gant. They were just people looking for an easy or quick way out of a bad situation.

“The girlfriend rolled on Gant?” Shel asked.

“Like a log.” Remy pushed the last of his first burger into his mouth, chewed, and swallowed. Afternoon sunlight glinted on his yellow gold lenses.

“Did Charlotte PD check her story out?”

“Maggie says no. They don't have any paper outstanding on Gant and we're not going to let them play on our court. They forwarded it to us.”

Shel unwrapped his second burger, then tossed one of the meat patties Remy had purchased for Max to the dog. The Labrador snapped the patty out of the air like a Frisbee and gulped it down.

“Don't see how he does that,” Remy commented.

“I trained him to eat like a Marine,” Shel said.

“I kind of got that from the way he chews with his mouth open.”

Shel ignored the gibe. He wasn't ready to play yet. “You think Charlotte PD took an honest pass on this and left Gant undisturbed?”

“Nope.”

“Me neither.”

“Gant will probably know something's up.”

“Yeah.” Shel dropped the wrapper into the bag. “So if Gant knows the police have located him, why's he still there?”

“Maybe he doesn't know. Maybe Charlotte PD has a stealth mode like none we've ever seen.”

Shel folded his arms across his broad chest. “Let's say they don't.”

Remy grinned. With the swelling in his face, the effort was lopsided. “Gant's daddy is in Charlotte. Maggie says he's a bad dude. Runs the local chapter of the Purple Royals.”

“Motorcycle gang.”

“That's the one.”

Shel sipped his iced tea. NCIS had encountered the Purple Royals before. They were a dangerous motorcycle gang fueled by meth and arms running. Most of the inner circle was made up of “one percenters,” men who were confirmed criminals.

“Me and you against a biker gang?” Shel asked.

“Well,” Remy said, “we don't have to bring them all in. Just Gant.”

“True.” Shel warmed to the coming encounter. He tilted his head back to look at the sun. “It's getting late.”

“Let's roll.”

>> Interstate 85

>> Near Salisbury, North Carolina

>> 1703 Hours

“Are you going to play that thing the whole way?” Shel asked.

Remy paused the PSP and pulled the earbuds out of his ears. “You want to talk?”

“Thought maybe you wanted to tell me about Gant's daddy.”

“We're not planning on hooking him up.”

“In case we happen to cross paths. I noticed you were looking through a file Maggie sent you.”

Remy put the PSP away and reached into the backseat for his backpack, then pulled out the small notebook computer all the team members carried as part of their equipment. He settled the computer across his knees and brought it to life.

“Victor Gant's in his late sixties,” Remy said. “He was a ground pounder in Vietnam. Pulled three tours.”

“Three?”

“Yeah. Put in his twenty altogether. Pulled the pin at thirty-nine.”

“Then turned to a life of crime as a biker?”

“Back then there weren't as many openings for military-issue as there are now. Especially not for somebody who liked to stay in the bush. Today he probably would have segued directly into the private security sector. He mustered out as sergeant first class after the first Gulf War.”

“Came back to spend time with Bobby Lee and his mom?”

Remy snorted. “Not likely. Bobby Lee's mother had already divorced Victor back in the seventies.”

“Any special reason?”

“Maggie didn't dig deep into this. She stayed with Victor Gant's crime side. It was intense enough. Besides that, he's not the focus of our little trip. Not long after Victor Gant mustered out, he got into a bar fight and killed a man.”

“Why?”

“It was part of a turf war. Maggie's notes indicate that the police investigating the homicide thought Gant should have taken a fall for murder one. The DA couldn't make premeditation stick, so he didn't try. Gant was convicted of manslaughter and spent seven years inside. He did his whole bit, so there's not even a parole office in his life.”

“Not much father-son time there,” Shel observed.

“No. But Bobby Lee started hanging around anyway.”

“Is Bobby Lee a Purple Royal?”

“No. They don't have an interest in him.”

“Except that Victor Gant's his daddy.”

“That's about the size of it.” Remy looked at Shel. “So what is it you hate about Father's Day?”

4

>> Tawny Kitty's Bar and Grill

>> South End

>> Charlotte, North Carolina

>> 1705 Hours

“You ask me, Victor, this is just wrong.”

Victor Gant glanced at Fat Mike Wiley and said, “Ain't asking you, am I, Fat Mike?”

Fat Mike shrugged and sighed. His broad, beefy face turned down into sadness only a basset hound could show. “No, I guess you ain't. But if you woulda asked, I'd have told you I didn't like this none.”

“Don't expect you to like it. Just keep my back covered while we're having this little set-to.”

“Ain't got no problems with that. I been there for you over thirty years.”

Victor knew that was true. He'd met Fat Mike in Vietnam. They'd hunted Charlie in the bush, blew him up when they found him, and partied hard in the DMZ next to Charlie. Those had been some crazy times. Some days—in a weird way he didn't quite understand—he missed them.

In those days Fat Mike hadn't been fat. Lately the man was starting to earn his name. He stood an inch or two over six feet and tipped the scales at nearly three hundred pounds. Back in the day, Fat Mike had been called Fat Mike because he rolled his marijuana joints thick as sausages when he blazed.

Now his biker leathers didn't fit him quite so well. But he wore his hair long and sported a Fu Manchu mustache like he'd done when they'd been in the bush, even though the first lieutenant they'd had at the time had tried to keep his troops disciplined and clean-shaven.

One night, while the lieutenant was sleeping and probably dreaming up new ways for his men to risk their lives out in the jungle, Fat Mike and one of his buddies had rolled a grenade into the lieutenant's tent. Three seconds later, they'd needed a new lieutenant. The one they'd gotten had been a little smarter than the last one and knew to stay out of their way.

Victor was gaunt and hard-bodied. No spare flesh hung on his six-foot-two-inch frame. He was sixty-seven years old and was still whipcord tough. He wore a full, short beard that had turned to pewter over the last few years, but he'd kept his hair, and it hung down to his shoulders in greasy locks.

He wore his colors, and his jacket covered the two Glock .45s he carried in shoulder holsters. His jeans were clean but held old mud, blood, and oil stains. Under the jacket he wore a sleeveless black concert T-shirt featuring Steppenwolf. Square-toed biker's boots encased his feet.

Fat Mike sat astride his Harley next to Victor. There were a lot of other sleds in the gravel parking lot. Tawny Kitty was a biker bar and not a tourist attraction.

There were a few cars there too. Victor swept them with his gaze. Some of the vehicles belonged to college kids still in town for summer classes who thought slumming would be cool. Or they belonged to young women looking for bad boys.

The bar was a rough-cut square of stone and wood. Neon lights promising “Beer” and “Live Entertainment” hung in the windows. Another sign advertised Open. The sign advertising Tawny Kitty showed a young blonde in revealing clothing with a saucy glint in her eyes. The years had faded the colors of the sign, but it still drew salacious attention.

Victor stretched and reached into his jeans pocket. After a moment of digging, he brought out a crumpled cigarette pack. He unfolded it and stuck a cigarette in his mouth, then lit it with a skull-embossed Zippo lighter.

Without another word, he swung his leg over the motorcycle and stepped toward the bar. As always, Fat Mike was right behind him.