But it almost immediately starts buzzing again, her name returning to the screen. I’m trying to cup my hand over it to disguise the name, turning slightly away from the others.
Eddie raises a brow as he watches me fumble with the phone. “Might wanna pick it up, my man. Seems like it’s important.”
“Uh, yeah. Right. Give me a second. Probably just Rachel calling about the kids.”
The back of my neck burns with guilt as I think about how an hour ago my face was buried between his niece’s thighs, flicking patterns onto her little throbbing clit as she ground her hips back against me.
If Eddie knew what we were up to… I don’t have a doubt in my mind he’d see red.
I move toward the other side of the barroom for privacy, answering on the third ring while affecting an annoyed tone. “Hey, Rachel, this really isn’t a good time for?—”
“There’s a head on your doorstep!” Solana blurts out in a panic. “A fucking severed head, Silver—Spencer’shead! I heard a car in the drive and rushed over ‘cuz I thought it was you and then?—”
“Stay inside,” I command, clenching my phone against my ear. “Make sure all the windows and doors are locked. Don’t open for anybody, you understand? I don’t care who they say they are.”
“Silver, who would do this? What’s going on?!”
“Don’t call anyone and don’t touch anything. I’m coming right now.”
I hang up, suddenly pulsing with ten times the adrenaline I arrived with. My thoughts narrow to one subject and one subject only—the severed head Solana’s told me has arrived on my doorstep.
…which means whoever left it knew I was gone. They knew she would find it.
And they know about my conflict with Spencer in the first place.
I turn to the others who have carried on their conversations among themselves and announce I’ve got to go.
“An emergency, hermano?” Tito asks. “Are Rachel and the kids okay?”
My gaze pans from him to Mace, Sydney and the others. Then I give a tight nod, my expression ambiguous.
“Uh, yeah… yeah just something spooked her. I’m gonna go check it out. I’ll address this situation with the Peñas tomorrow with Tom. Everybody go home and get some rest.”
I don’t wait for their responses before turning and striding out of the saloon as quickly as I entered.
I tear into my driveway, cutting the rumbling engine and sliding off the bike seat. I don’t even bother taking off my riding gloves as I stride toward the front step and see exactly what Solana had been talking about.
It’s almost so jarring it makes me question if I’m on the set of some horror movie.
But it’s there under the dim light of the doorstep—Spencer Medlock’s decapitated head dropped off like some morbid package delivery.
His eyes are still open, his skin waxy and pale, telling me he’s been dead for a while. He’s probably been kept in some sorta temperature-controlled storage, like a freezer of some kind, which explains the lack of wet, fresh blood.
Only his vertebrae dangles from the severed throat like a cord.
I wish I could say it’s a replica. It’s some Hollywood magic in Pulsboro, Texas, but it’s very real. It’s really Spencer’s severedhead that’s been frozen and delivered to my doorstep as some ominous message.
I’m in the middle of unlocking the door when it flies open first. Solana tosses her arms around me, her whole body weight slamming into me. I catch her, arms instinctively wrapping around her back and holding her against me, stroking her hair and shushing her.
“It’s alright,” I murmur against her locs. I press a quick kiss to her temple. “You’re safe. But I’ve got to… take care of this. Fast.”
Before she has a chance to utter a word, I’ve let her go and gone straight to my kitchen, wrenching open the cabinet under the sink and grabbing the best options that I have on hand—rubber gloves and garbage bags.
Solana can’t bear to watch as I return to the doorstep and swiftly slide Spencer’s head into the bag, knotting it at the top.
I look up and scan my neighborhood street. As far as I can tell, nobody’s seen anything. I live on a dead-end street and half my neighbors are over the age of seventy with bedtimes at seven p.m.
With any luck, nobody saw shit. I have to believe that’s the case; somebody would’ve called the police if they noticed asevered headon my doorstep.
