"From you? Yeah."
She laughs, sets a plate on the table, and sits across from it and waits.
"Sit, Diesel. Eat. Then we'll talk about why I'm really here."
There it is.
I sit—not because she told me to, but because whatever she's selling, I'd rather hear it on a full stomach.
The pasta's damn good. Crow's all over the sauce—that perfect bloom of garlic that never burns. I eat while she watches.
"Spit it out," I say around a mouthful.
"Nova got a call this morning." Maya leans back. "Her old partner from Atlanta PD. Detective named Carver."
I stop chewing.
"Carver's been building a case against a man named Anthony Venetti for years," Maya continues. "Atlanta crime boss. Murder-for-hire, racketeering, the works. Almost a year ago, he finally got a witness. A writer who interviewed the wrong inmate for research. Guy started bragging about jobs he'd pulled—wanted to impress her. Turns out those jobs trace straight back to Venetti."
"Let me guess. She went to the cops."
Maya nods. “She did the right thing. Carver kept her off the radar for months, but six weeks ago her name hit discovery. He moved her to a safe house. Two nights ago, it got hit."
My hands tighten on the edge of the table.
"Night attack, coordinated. Someone knew exactly where to find her." Maya ticks off the details. "Two officers on protective detail went down. One took a bullet to the chest and didn't make it. The other, a detective working with Carver, took a round to the leg trying to cover her escape."
"She get hit?"
"Graze wound on her shoulder, cuts from broken glass, bruises." Maya pauses. "She barely made it out, Diesel. Ran into the woods and hid until backup found her."
"And now she needs somewhere else to go."
"Carver's had her stashed at some motel outside Atlanta since the attack, trying to figure out what to do. He called Nova this morning when he ran out of options." Maya's jaw tightens. "Their safe house location was locked down. No one should have found them. So either someone talked, or someone inside gave them up. Either way, he can't trust the system anymore."
She meets my eyes. "So he went outside the system to Nova. Nova brought it to Ash, Ash brought it to Vargan, and here I am."
I set down my fork. "That's not how this works."
"Diesel—"
"Nova to Ash, fine. Ash to Vargan, fine. But then Vargan takes it to the war room. We sit down, we talk it through, and Hammer weighs in. That's how the club works." I lean back. "Instead, I get Crow's woman cooking a bribe meal in my kitchen, which means Vargan and Hammer decided to skip the vote and run this sideways because they knew I'd say no."
Maya doesn't deny it.
I push back from the table. "There's a trial in—what, just over a week? She needs to be in Atlanta for that."
"Eight days. And yes. But until then, she needs somewhere no one would think to look."
"And you thought of me."
"The club thought of you."
"Then the club can find someone else." I stand. "Get Ash to do it. Or Crow. Or literally anyone else."
"Ash is the sheriff. He disappears for a week, and people notice. Crow would terrify her—she's been traumatized enough without waking up to him every morning." Maya stands too, her composure cracking. "Knox isn't patched. Vargan can't walk away from his responsibilities. You're the only one who can vanish without anyone asking questions."
"And why's that? Because I'm the one nobody would miss?"
