What he was, was Graham Black and Shepherd Ironside’s son.
And he’d been thinking it was either go to Jules and see ifhe could work with other kids on a volunteer basis or suck it up and enjoybuilding things with Georgie while he sold fan belts.
This was better.
Way fucking better.
“I’m glad you said that.Because what I haven’t told you yetis that Lee has also been in touch.They got so much business, it’scomin’ out their ears.In that, there’s a steady stream ofpeople who need him, approach him, but when they find out his rates, theygottatake a hike because they cannot afford him.He toldme he does a shit-ton of pro bono work, but he needs a good place to punt.Whatyou did with Carlyle, he reached out and asked if we wanted to be a receivingteam.I said I’d take it to the table.”
Dutch was back to staring at his brother.
It didn’t take long before he started smiling, slow.
It took even less time for Rush to return it.
And his was fast.
“I’ll call a meet,” Rush finished it.
“And I’ll be there.But justsayin’,I got as far as I got with Carlyle’s case mostly because of Georgie.”
“Is she going anywhere?”Rush asked.
“Fuck no,” Dutch answered.
Rush smiled again and this one was bigger.
And Dutch returned it.
They clasped forearms, Rush turned and jogged back to theCompound, and Dutch finished making his way to Cherry’s office.
He barely entered it when Elvira declared, “I love yourgirlfriend, and megettin’ to do this isn’t the onlyreason why.”
With that, she slapped a little black shopping bag againsthis chest that had white writing on it and a pretty flower stuck to it.
“Now, Igottaget back to thecommandos,” she said and walked right out.
Dutch looked to Cherry behind her desk.
“I think Georgie will really like them.But if she doesn’t,she can take them back and get what she wants.Don’t open the box and look,though, honey.They tie it up really pretty and she’ll want to undo it,” Tyrasaid.
He nodded and said, “Thanks.”
“Anytime.Seriously,” she replied.
He lifted his chin to her, walked out to the steps that ledup to her office and looked into the bag.
At the bottom was a little black box tied up with whitefabric ribbon and it had another of those flowers stuck on top.
Such total class, even if Georgie didn’t dig what wasinside, she’d like the packaging.
He’d stowed the bag and was back behind the counter of Ride,shooting the shit with Chill and a prospect they called Hugger (and they calledhim that because the dude hated to be touched) when his phone rang.
And he saw from what was on his screen, if it was what hethought it was, that day was going to be a very good day.
“Yo,” he greeted Eddie.
“Thanks for the heads-up, man.Dropped a few lines in a fewears, people started opening their eyes andwatchin’,then acouplasupervisors called in a few femaleemployees, and Jackson Stamper has beencreepin’ onthemsomethin’ sick.They didn’t want to say anythingbecause they thought they werebein’ too sensitiveand it was only them he wasgettin’ too close to,pushin’ for dates, andfindin’ways to rub up against them that couldn’t exactly be called sexual harassment,even when it totally was.He was let go this morning, and so they didn’t dothat ugly, he was warned not to ask for a reference, and told, in a nicegovernment HR way, he could go fuck himself for severance.”
