“He’s late,” I pointed out.
“Storm must have got him,” Miami said, grin crooked.
I turned to tell him to cut it out. That was when a second motorcycle came up the lane cold, lights off, rider black from boots to helmet, engine idling just above a whisper. Not ours. Not a friend.
“Show’s started,” Snake Eyes said.
The rider didn’t speak. He lifted a hand. The hand held nothing. That nothing felt like a gun.
“Hands,” I ordered. “Now.”
He didn’t show them. He looked at the cage. He looked at Miami. He looked at the bike. And then he reached behind his back slowly and smoothly and the night made a hinge sound in my head like a door beginning to open in a house that wasn’t supposed to be haunted.
Spade’s weight shifted. Priest rolled his shoulders. Turnpike forgot he was a prospect and started moving like a brother.
“On me!” I shouted.
The rider’s visor caught the flickering light and for a second my face looked back at me, thin andpale and already dead in the curve of glass. He tapped two fingers against the side of his helmet like a habit. Like a signal. Far off down the lane another engine woke up and then another answered.
Miami laughed under his breath. “Told you. Humming.”
We didn’t draw first. Not with the family key in our pocket and the Giorlando’s counting favors like casino chips. But my hand slid down and rested near the weight on my hip and my heart found a beat I trusted.Our drop site was a trap.
Blackjack’s voice snapped in low over the radio. “Status? Over.”
“Working,” 8-Ball said. “Guests arriving. Over.”
“Keep the floor clean. Over.” Blackjack said.
“Copy that.”
I stepped into the rider’s headlight and let him see all the ink I’d paid for and the quiet promise in my eyes. “You got business?” I asked, “you can call the office.”
He tilted his head. The helmet nodded no.
“Then you got a problem?”
He didn’t disagree this time.
Behind me, Miami’s hand went back to the black bike, fingers tracing the seam on the tank for the second time tonight, thirst and instinct and bad luck all pulling in the same direction. Priest watched with suspicion and worry. Snake Eyes breathed out once, steadily. Spade smiled without teeth.
The rider looked past me again. Straight at Miami. Straight at the thing on the bed of our cage that did not belong to any of usandbelonged to all of us because that was how the world worked down here. He put two fingers up again and pressed them together. The other engines down the lane cut out. The night went still. The gulls stopped screaming. Even the ocean seemed to hold its tongue.
I felt it then. Not a hum. A weight.
We weren’t going to bleed on anyone’s schedule. But weweregoing to bleed.
“This isn’t right,” I said. “We need to get it out of here.” I looked at 8-Ball who held his radio up. “Tell Blackjack to tell them the drop is hot. Get us another spot.”
8-Ball nodded but there was only static.
“Whatever this is, is hot,” I said to 8-Ball, keeping my eyes on the unknown riders. “We need to hold ground. Let Miami get it out of here. It’ll be faster off the cage…ifit works.”
8-Ball looked to Miami, then to me, then to the riders again. He nodded and glanced at Miami. “You heard Jersey. Get it out of here. You know our spots. Keep it low until the heats gone.”
Miami nodded.
The rider finally moved his empty hand away from his back and set it gently on the bar of his own bike.
