“Nothing’s happening,” I snapped back too fast.
Her brow twitched, like, Relax, I didn’t ask. Then she jerked her chin over my shoulder.
“Liberty wants the both of you,” Rosé said. “Now. In her office.”
I turned away before she could read more off my face. Since when was I wearing my shit that clearly? Since when did someone else see… whatever the hell that was between us, before I did?
Behind me, the mattress shifted. Jersey groaned himself awake.
“Morning,” he muttered, voice sandpapered.
“Up,” I told him, already grabbing my boots. “We’re wanted.”
He sat up, blinked blearily, then seemed to remember where he was and what day it was all at once. His jaw tightened. He shoved his own boots on without arguing.
Good. Cause I didn’t have the patience for soft.
We crossed the hall and cut through the main room. The clubhouse was in that early lull—some girls still in bunks, some already posted up on their rotations. Coffee smell, low music, the metallic drag of the gate outside shifting as Indigo checked it.
Liberty’s office door was cracked. Mink’s voice filtered through, fast and low, before cutting off mid-word.
Liberty hit end on the call as we stepped in. She leaned back in her chair, elbows on the arms, fingers steepled. Rosé slipped past us and took up her usual post against the filing cabinet.
Indigo was there too, shotgun propped in the corner within arm’s reach, arms folded. Her eyes slid to me, to Jersey, then back to Liberty.
“Good, you’re both vertical,” Liberty said. “Sit if you want. This won’t take long.”
I didn’t sit. Neither did Jersey. We just moved far enough into the room to be accounted for.
“Talk,” I said.
Liberty’s gaze cut to Jersey, then back to me. “Mink’s been combing chatter since last night,” she said. “Two things popped.”
She lifted one finger.
“One—Miami’s wrecked bike got logged,” Liberty went on. “It’s sitting in a junkyard on our turf, stamped and tagged, waiting its turn with the crusher. Paper trail says it’s scheduled to be processed today. Noon-ish.”
Jersey went still beside me. You’d miss it if you weren’t watching him.
“And?” I asked.
“And someone else asked about it,” Liberty said. “Not a cop doing inventory. Some ghost on a line leaned in and wanted to make sure that specific wreck existed, where it was stored, and when it was getting flattened.”
She held up a second finger.
“Two,” Liberty said, looking to Indigo. “Tell them.”
“Blacked-out SUV from last night came by again at dawn,” Indigo said. “Same shape. Same lazy crawl. Roll-by only. Didn’t stop, didn’t circle the block. Just made sure the fence and gate were still where they left ‘em.”
“Plates?” Jersey asked.
“Still can’t get shit through the tint and angle,” Indigo replied. “No stickers, no plates, no obvious dents. Just ‘generic government or organized crime asshole’ package.”
I rolled my shoulders, trying to bleed off the itch crawling up my spine.
“So,” I said. “We have a wreck in a yard in our territory with a clock on it, people sniffing around it,and at least one unknown doing drive-bys. What are we thinking? Vincinos? Steel Serpents? All of the above?”
“We’re thinking we can’t assume Miami got everything out of that bike,” Liberty said. “He was running scared. He grabbed what he found but that doesn’t mean there wasn’t something else buried in that frame. Something our friends in suits would love to put their hands on.”
