Ink (The Haven Series) (28 page)

All she could hear, going round and round in her mind, was his voice. That line of questioning.

Does he make you happy? You gonna tell me you’re in love with him?

She tried to tell herself the questions simply didn’t apply. They weren’t together, so her happiness wasn’t his responsibility for a start. And of course she wasn’t in love with him – what did they know about each other really?

In all the time she and Colton had been acquainted, pictures of their lives had been painted solely in the broadest of strokes. He probably vaguely knew she’d left home years ago, she was aware his dad was dead and that his mom was the only family that mattered. They shared an interest in tattoos and a friend in Sketch.

If she was being at all honest though, she knew he was still deeper under her skin than any ink could ever be ...

For the second time that day, a knock at the door broke through her reverie and Callie closed her eyes in the vain hope that whoever it was would just go away, praying Michael hadn’t decided she was worth another shot.

“Miss Delaney?” called a female voice. “It’s the police ...”

***

“What the hell’s goin’ on now?” Sam muttered to himself, as he and Colton pulled their bikes up in the yard only to spot a crowd of bodies gathered around the front door of the clubhouse. Pulling his helmet off and slinging it over the handlebars before heading to see what was up, he didn’t have to go too far - not to make out the rush-job graffiti scrawled across the building. “Son of a bitch ...”

“What’s this shit about?” Colton demanded from behind him, pulling off his shades to get a better look at the red paint desecrating what was theirs. His nose wrinkled in distaste at the crude artwork and his dark eyes turned hard.

Already striding towards them, Jake jerked a head towards where a grim-faced Johnny and thunderous Will had stepped away from the hangarounds and were currently deep in a heated discussion. “I suggest you don’t ask how this happened in broad daylight.”

“Nobody saw anything?” the sergeant demanded in disbelief, raking a hand through his hair as he still surveyed the damage marked at least six feet high on their headquarters.

“They blacked out a couple of the cameras - heard a van roar outta here when it was too late. Will’s bike got marked too ... Hey, what happened to you guys?”

“Never mind that now. Just Will’s?” Sam exchanged a look with Colton, neither of them pleased by this development, and getting a nod from Jake. “What’d they spray?”

“Same damn thing,” came the answer. “We dunno what--” Jake broke off with an irritated look on his face as one of the girls split from the rest of the pack and came straight over to where they were stood, a half-smoked cigarette between her fingers and a worried look beneath her deep red bangs.

“Sam, can I talk to you for a second?”

“Not now, doll,” he shook his head, a slight warning edge to his tone that suggested she was already on thin ice by interrupting him with his brothers. He hoped this wasn’t the kind of thanks he got for his recent good deed.

Ashley wavered for a second but, albeit with a look of apology on her face, steeled herself to say her piece to the one man she seemed to think might at least hear her out. “I wouldn’t ask if it wasn’t important,” she tried again, rushing on in a bid to make him understand before she earned herself a backhand. “It ain’t ... personal or anything – it’s shit you need to know. About the tag.”

That got his attention. Jake and Colton’s too. “Whatever you know, spill it.”

“It’s used by the Norteños,” the girl explained, looking up at the three men with just a hint of nerves as they towered ov
er her. “I’ve seen it before. Not round here though, but in other parts of the city ...”

“What’s it mean, Ash?” Sam prompted impatiently, watching her like a hawk as she took a last shaky drag of her cigarette and exhaled a stream of smoke before pitching the butt to be crushed under the toe of a scuffed stiletto.

“Nothing good,” she told him, almost in a whisper. “One-eight-seven, it’s like from the law – what cops call murder, y’know? Sam, tagging it like that ... It’s meant to be a death threat.”

***

Sitting across from the young woman at her kitchen table and meeting those cool gray eyes, Veronica wasn’t sure what she had been expecting when it came to Corsada's other half, but this certainly wasn’t it.

Oh, she’d heard the stories and pieced together some of the jigsaw on her own. Young enough and attractive enough to be out of the league of even Michael’s silver-tongued charm - until, of course, you factored in those added qualities like his standing in the legal world or his bank balance.

But, taking that to be the case, she had counted on someone a whole lot ... well, flashier. Some airhead in one of those minimalist penthouses, with all the mod-cons extra convenient for having been bought on a lawyer’s platinum card. Not this seemingly low maintenance girl in her cosy little lived-in apartment, who’d been surveying her visitor rather shrewdly from the moment she’d arrived.

Veronica had even dismissed what she’d thought were merely rumours of some tattooed bad girl, until she spotted the ink revealed each time that over-sized hoody slipped off the little blonde’s shoulder until she tugged it back in place.

And then there was the one detail that really did throw her for a loop. That vicious black bruise marring her temple, a row of neat stitches at its epicentre. She’d bitten back the questions for as long as had been polite, but now – granted reluctant access and an even more reluctant cup of coffee – she had to know ...

“That must be very painful,” Veronica said, trying to tread carefully as she indicated what she was talking about with a slight incline of her own head. “Do you mind if I ask what happened?”

“Just a fall,” Callie shrugged, hands folded around her mug. Obviously still making her own internal assessments of her unexpected guest. “But if you don’t mind, I’d rather you got to exactly why you’re here. I’m on pain medication which does make me kinda drowsy ...”

The agent looked as if she might concede, but her lips pursed and she met the young woman’s gaze directly. “Did someone do that to you? A partner, boyfriend?” she asked gently, still trying to decide what she suspected more. That Michael had followed down the path she herself had led him and snapped over some uncovered infidelity - or that th
e girl’s connection to the MC really had gotten her in over her head with one of them.

“I told you what happened. I fell--”

“Callie, do you have any idea how many women fall or walk into a door or trip on the stairs until they just get a little too clumsy and wind up in the morgue? That’s a serious head injury – you don’t have to protect anyone.”

Obviously taken aback by the implication, Callie sat back in her seat and looked at her in what appeared to be confusion. But there was certainly a hint of anger lurking just below that calm surface. “Don’t come into my home and make me out to be some kind of victim,” she said finally, her voice just a little too tense. “And don’t presume to know things that aren’t any of your business. Now, if there’s something I’m supposed to be able to help you with, let’s hear it – otherwise, I think this is just a waste of your time and mine.”

Federal agent or not, Veronica couldn’t decide if she’d hit a nerve or just missed her mark, so she glossed over it for now. “Okay, I understand,” she said lightly. “And I apologise. I just came to make a few routine inquiries about some ongoing ... business in the area.”

“And why me?” Callie asked, no trace of defensiveness to her tone and no suggestion she was rattled. Just that quiet, easy confidence. “I mean, you say routine – but you called my name, so we’re not just talking door-to-door. Not unless you really did your homework. Do you know my neighbours’ names, Agent Hunt?”

“No. No, I don’t,” she admitted. “The inquiries are fairly routine, but I was hoping to speak to you in particular. Callie, you called the station recently, didn’t you?”

Veronica could have sworn she saw the dots being joined behind those gray eyes, but they never wavered from hers as the girl nodded. No further information offered. Usually people could be depended on to start babbling at some point, but not this girl. “Would you mind telling me why?”

“No – but since you know I called, you must already know why, so do we really need to make a performance out of whatever this is?”

Icy blue eyes narrowed almost imperce
ptible. This Callie was sharp, much more so than she’d expected, but that was okay because she could be just as sharp herself. “Tell me, Callie, how exactly do you know Sam Lewison and Colton Greene?”

“Through work,” came the simple answer, the elaboration only following at the prompting of a raised eyebrow. “I’m a tattoo artist and you may have noticed they’ve got quite the ink collection between them.”

“Right ...” Veronica nodded. “And is that your only connection to them?”

“Yes,” Callie said, but she didn’t even try hiding the confusion frown that creased her forehead at the question.

“So you’re not in a relationship with one of them?”

“What? I don’t see what that’s got to do with--”

“Just answer the question please, Callie.”

“No,” she said tightly. “I’m not in a relationship with anyone.”

Veronica knew she must look surprised by that and quickly shrugged it off, though she stored that titbit away for future use. “A pretty girl like you?” she started, before a thought struck her and she smiled. The girl really was a smart little bitch. “Ah ... I know how those boys like to operate. Not big on commitment, huh? So forget this relationship talk – are you sexually involved with Sam and/or Colton?”

But the snide little and/or jibe was a step too far and just the out Callie must
surely have needed right then, making the blonde bristle angrily and the feet of her chair scrape roughly over the floor as she rose from the table. “I’m not some clubhouse slut,” she snapped. “And I don’t think I’ve got anything more to say to you right now, Agent Hunt. With all due respect, I’d like you to get the hell out.”

Wishing she’d had the restraint to hold back just a little longer before showing her claws, Veronica stood. “Very well. But I hope you know what you’re doing, Callie.”

“Frankly, I don’t see that it’s any of your business. Even if I was screwing every biker from here to Mexico.”

“Actually, if you’re associating with known members of illegal gangs, that makes it my business,” the agent smiled sweetly, just a hint of venom creeping into her tone as she found herself on the wrong side of the front door. “Oh, and Callie? I have a feeling we’ll meet again. This is just what happens when you mix with the wrong crowd ...”

The door slamming behind her, Veronica took a deep breath and composed herself before walking away on high-heeled pumps. Her head was held high, confident that things had gone well enough for her and more curious than ever about what might have gone on between her latest target and Mr Corsada ...

But one thing she thought she could definitely be sure about - Callie Delaney might be a pretty cool customer, but she wasn’t going to be nearly as tough to crack as a certain Taylor Whitney.

***

CHAPTER 32

“Heard talk on the grapevine ‘bout what happened to Dixie ...”

Emerging from his cramped bathroom, a towel wrapped around his hips and a hand raking through his wet hair, Sam glanced at the young woman still perched at the foot of the bed as he reached for his jeans and rifled through the pockets for a packet of smokes. “Yeah? What’s the word?” he mumbled around a cigarette, leaning down to light it off the glowing tip of hers and inhaling the first drag deeply.

“Just another casualty of the drugs war,” Ashley shrugged, leaning back on one hand and crossing her long legs. But the look in the hazel eyes that roved appreciatively over his torso let him guess she wasn’t quite buying it.

“That it?” he pushed, needing to know if there was any suggestion on the street that the Fallen might be caught up in this shit. It didn’t usually take long fo
r blame to land at their door, whether deserved or not, and it was looking increasingly like the Norteños were in the market for revenge. The prospects were already trying to scrub off the tags and, despite Will ordering both his sergeant and his enforcer to take a break and get cleaned up, the rest of the club’s hierarchy was at the table to start discussing how to handle the latest security threat.

“Few rumblings that Dix didn’t snuff it in the fire. No names and none of it based on anything more than urban myths though. You know the score - all the usual conspiracy theories ... Including one little gem that it was all some big tax-dodge and he’s actually jumped state to go live it up in Vegas,” she smiled wryly.

“Sin City, huh?” Sam snorted, dropping down to sit beside her.

“Yeah. If I thought there was any kind of truth in it, I’d pack my shit up and head out there myself. Maybe Dixie could give me a new job lap-dancing for the high-rollers ...”

“What are ya gonna do?”

Another shrug. “Something’ll come up. Always does,” she said brightly, with all the optimism of youth. “Hey, maybe I’ll take this as a sign I need to move my ass on. Haven was only supposed to be a pit-stop after all.”

“On the road to?”