Nada.
Evidently, the club and its members were the best kept secret in town.
Or they’d blackmailed or threatened all those with any knowledge to keep them silent.
I managed to draw myself from the haze of fury long enough to highlight my mood by giving him the middle finger. “That piece of shit is my baby.”
“The only baby you’re going to have with the way you’re going,” Chase chimed in.
Even I had to laugh with the others. He could be right. I was a man of simple needs. A hot sports car, a few pieces of furniture, a fridge full of beer and steaks, some classic rock on the satelliteand I was good to go. We’d been friends for years, all members of law enforcement. We’d been down rocky roads and had seen criminals walk while innocent victims suffered.
And a few months earlier, we’d decided to do something about the atrocities by forming Raven Intel.
A select, secretive group of our own consisting of the five of us and now a dozen trusted individuals with extraordinary skills. Everything from highly specialized military training to hackers, ex mastermind criminals, a former multilingual spy, and members with powerful government and financial connections.
There wasn’t a person alive we couldn’t find no matter what hole they’d crawled into.
In our capacity, we’d pledged an oath to do whatever was necessary for justice to be served.
Including crossing the line of lawful into unlawful.
We’d been successful in our endeavors, providing peace to several victims. Once dealt with, our work and subsequent success was destroyed, never to be mentioned again. That’s how we kept our day jobs, and no one was the wiser because we were careful in choices made and diligent in our activities.
Did the situation brought to me warrant our interference? Yes, but this wasn’t a cut-and-dried case. In those before, we’d had a name, face, and information allowing us to move forward. Not this time.
Not a single name had been dropped of anyone involved.
The blip on my phone instantly made me tense. Once I pulled up my email, for a few seconds, the entire room filtered to a dead stop. No noise. No conversations. Nothing.
But Reese’s picture.
Dear God, she was beautiful in an angelic way: blonde with huge doe eyes and heart-shaped lips begging to be kissed. Everything about her screamed of innocence, including her smile. An instant tug of protectiveness filtered all the way to my cock.
Her sister looked very much like her, only in the photograph she had blue hair. Both were so innocent.
“You alright?” Chase asked. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”
“No,” I said quietly. “Just an angel.”
As the cards were dealt, I shifted back and forth in my seat. Not only because of my continued rage, but also because the drawing continued to haunt me. The artist had done an extraordinary job of bringing her features to life, which had driven me to near intoxication. Her photograph had shoved me into an unwanted place. No woman had ever affected me so darkly.
Maybe getting lost in a poker game was exactly what I needed to clear my head.
“So what gives?” Hudson asked after I’d won the third hand after barely paying attention to my cards.
And they all knew it.
We could read each other like books, although no pun was intended to Maverick since I’d yet to read one of his thrillers. I just didn’t have the time. Reese’s photograph lingered in the forefront of my mind, her image haunting me more than the sketch.
“What do you mean?” I yanked the nickels toward me, soon after heading to the bar for another beer. The first two had gone down way too easily.
“You won three hands. You never win. Ever. Now, either you’re cheating, or you have a case that’s pissing you off.”
With the cold brew in my hand, I glared at the newly married judge quizzically. He knew damn good and well I didn’t cheat at anything. My mama hadn’t raised a cheater. I was the original squeaky clean of the crew, or at least that’s the jab I’d gotten over the years. Maybe because I was a cowboy at heart.
I leaned against the edge of the bar. Why not toss out what I’d been dealing with. “You ever heard of the Privileged?”
Chase spit out his beer. “Like every other asshole in this town.”
