“Get out,” Calypso warns again, her voice sharp. Annabelle’s stroller squeaks from the back room, a small sound that shouldn’t belong in a moment like this.
Farris, Law Dog, Dalton, a member of the RoyalBastards, and Calypso’s Ol’ Man stand in the doorway. He looks like he’s one breath away from snapping the prospect in half.
Bones ignores it. His gaze pins me. “Someone’s playing banker with ghosts, and I don’t believe in coincidences. Maybe you don’t either.”
“Say what you came to say, Bones.”
He leans in, his breath hot against my ear. “You’re digging in the wrong grave, Rebel.”
His words creep under my skin, cold and crawling, because I’ve already been digging, and I don’t like that he knows it. I shove him again. “And you’re about one insult away from me burying you in one.”
His laugh is quiet, dangerous. “There she is, the girl who thought she could balance the books of the dead.”
Something inside me snaps. My palm meets his jaw before my brain catches up. The crack echoes through the shop.
French whistles low. “Oh, it’s that kind of morning.”
Bones’s head jerks sideways, but he doesn’t step back. He plants a hand on the counter beside me, close enough that his knuckles brush my hip. “Still hit like you mean it.”
“Still talk like you don’t.” For a second, everything hums. The machine, the tension, the years we never talked about.
Then he straightens, rubbing his jaw. The smirk returns, sharper than before. “You want the truth, doll?” His voice drops to a soft, lethal whisper. “You’ll choke on it.” He turns toward the door and tosses a name over his shoulder like a grenade. “Carter Bishop.”
It means nothing, but the way he says it makes it feel like a loaded weapon set on the table between us. “Who the hell is that?”
He stops in the doorway, light slicing his profile in half. “You’ll find out. You always do.” The door closes behind him, the chime ringing like a taunt.
For a long moment, no one speaks. The tattoo gun hums back to life as if it’s pretending nothing happened.
“You good?” French asks quietly.
I grab a rag, wipe the counter like it’s going to erase him. “Peachy.”
“Bullshit.”
Calypso finally sets her tattoo gun down, her green eyes sharp. “If Bones is sniffing around again, he’s not alone. We’ll handle it.”
“I’ll handle it,” I say automatically.
Calypso stands, all slow threat and sisterhood. “You don’t have to handle everything alone, Rebel.”
I meet her gaze. “Yeah, I do.” If I don’t, and this blows back on the club, it won’t just be my brother’s name in the dirt. It’ll be all of ours.
Outside, a bike engine roars to life. Deep, throaty, familiar. The sound fades down the street, leaving the scent of smoke and motor oil in the air.
Under it, something else lingers. Rumors, danger, the faint metallic name Divine mentioned last night when the firewall lit red. Iron Vultures. Maybe Bones wasn’t talking about ghosts after all.
I flex my sore hand and whisperunder my breath, “Carter Bishop… what the hell did you have to do with Alex?”
The machines continue to buzz, steady and relentless.
I realize Bones didn’t come here to warn me. He came to see how much I already know, and now he knows I’m close.
He came toprovoke me.
4
REBEL
