River pointed at him without looking. “You want to die tonight?”
Tank shut up, but his shoulders shook.
Nate grinned. “See? Experience.”
River dragged both hands down his face. “I have enough shit here. Tank and I are going to have to clean up this entire fucking mess while half the town pretends they don’t want to dance on our graves.”
Tarak moved then.
He had been quiet since the kids told the room what Destiny had been carrying. Too quiet. Haunted quiet. His face still looked like he was seeing two wrecks laid over each other, one from years ago and one from tonight, both with Mandy’s name bleeding through the middle.
He stepped to River and put one hand on his shoulder.
“This is why I backed you as prez,” Tarak said.
River went still.
Tarak’s voice was low, but every man heard it.
“This might be the biggest test you ever face keeping our club alive in our hometown. Not a rival chapter. Not a cartel. Not a gunfight in some dirty warehouse. This.” His gaze swept the room. “Money. Courts. Cameras. Rich people with clean hands and dirty hearts.”
Nobody said Mandy’s blood curse.
Nobody had to.
It sat in the room anyway.
The old fear.
The old story.
The dead woman whose shadow had chased Destiny all the way to a fire in the desert.
Edge’s hand closed tighter around Regan’s.
JD looked at Callum. “Would San Diego loan two men?”
Callum’s eyes flicked to me.
Then Nate.
Then Edge.
“Loan?” he said. “No.”
Nate’s grin faded.
Callum continued, “Assign? Yes.”
Edge’s expression didn’t change, but I felt the warning in it.
Callum walked closer, his voice calm. “Dylan found her. Nate covered your bike. They’re already in it. Sending two San Diego boys to Cabo as eyes makes sense. They watch Regan and Destiny. They watch for PIs. They watch anyone from Santa Fe who pops up where they shouldn’t.”
JD nodded. “Exactly. If Judge Carson or any of those families hire private investigators, they’ll expect Edge’s men. They’ll expect tattoos, cuts, trucks, boots, and bad tempers. They won’t expect two idiots pretending to chase margaritas and sorority girls.”
Nate brightened. “I was born for this assignment.”
“You were born as a warning label,” Callum said.
