Chapter Sixteen
NATHAN COCHRANE,dick doctor to the scumbags in town, spat a surprised mouthful of frothy, bright-red blood onto the concrete floor of the parking lot. He hunched over, shoulders curled in and the back of his hand pressed over his mouth and nose as he stumbled backward. His keys swung from one hand, but modern life had pared them down to a fob and a small locker key, so they weren’t going to be much use.
“What the fuck,” Nathan spewed between his fingers. Flecks of blood caught on the toes of Bass’s boots as he prowled along in pace with Nathan’s unsteady retreat. Nathan fumbled his wallet out of his pocket and half dropped it, half tossed it Bass. The folded leather dropped onto the ground about halfway between the two of them. “Here. Take it. Just leave me alone. I don’t want any trouble. Trust me, I have enough of my own.”
There was a greasy black stain on the richly textured leather when Bass picked up the wallet and a wad of notes inside that made it flip open. He peeled out the notes, because why not, and stuck them into his back pocket. The wallet itself he pitched away between the rows of parked cars.
“Thanks,” Bass drawled. “But I’m just here to pass on a message.”
Nathan finally unhunched long enough to squint at Bass over his newly crooked nose. He peeled his hand away from his face and wiped it on his shirt.
“From who?” he asked, voice thick with mucus and blood. From the flicker of fear on his face, he already knew the answer. He’d just decided to hang on to hope until he was done. “Look, I told them—”
Bass grabbed him by the tie before Nathan could stagger into a BMW, and reeled him back in. The muted pink-on-navy silk creased as he twisted it around his fingers.
“You know what,” he said genially as Nathan panted blood over his T-shirt, “I think we’ve pinpointed your problem, Nate. You don’t tell Shepherd anything.”
He bounced Nathan off the BMW. The jolt made it flash its lights and the alarm go off, and the nasal drone of it bounced back and forth from the high, bare concrete ceilings. It was like being at the world’s most irritating rave—a combination of off-beat light show and designed-to-pierce music.
“You listen.”
“Jesus,” Nathan blurted. His eyes flickered nervously around the room. “Someone’s going to fucking hear that. They’ll come down to see what’s happened.”
That was the point. It also didn’t matter. Depending on what POV you looked at the situation through.
“And what the fuck are you going to say if they do?” Bass asked as he leaned into Nate’s face. He could hear the gurgle of blood in the man’s broken nose and the nervy hiss of his breathing. Bass pulled his voice up into his nose, a nasal, singsong whine in his words as he went on. “You going to ask them for help? Whine about the big bad biker upsetting you?”
Nathan swallowed hard and shook his head. He looked like the photo Tancredi had given him in the station, with a narrow, pleasant face and blue eyes behind heavy, smudged glasses. What the photo couldn’t convey was how aggressively bland Nathan was. It wasn’t his appearance—he was reasonably good-looking, tall, and he wore well-cut suits that made the most of whatever was underneath—but the way he carried himself. He was anummmmade flesh.
“No,” he said in a small, tight voice. “I won’t.”
Bass pulled air through his teeth in a skeptical noise. “See, thing is, Shepherd ain’t so sure of that, Nate. He thinks that you’re feeling chatty, maybe wanna get some stuff off your chest.”
Nathan licked his lips. The taste of blood seemed to catch him by surprise, and nausea flickered over his face. Then he lifted his chin and tried to take a deep breath. It didn’t quite squeeze all the way past his chest, but he made the effort.
“Did you go to my house?”
“What? Am I not welcome?” Bass taunted. “Are you ashamed of me, Nate? And I thought we were friends.”
The sudden shove from Nathan, the heels of his hands angled up to hit under the breastbone, caught Bass off guard, and he rocked back onto his heels.
“You stay away from my family,” Nathan hissed through his teeth. His eyes shone wet through his glasses as he shoved at Bass again. “Isn’t what Shepherd did to my partner enough? My son has nothing to do with this, you son of a b—”
The words got stuck in his throat as Bass twisted the tie tightly enough to dig into Nathan’s neck. It wasn’t that he didn’t appreciate the sentiment, but it wouldn’t exactly be on-brand to let it go. He kicked Nathan’s feet out from under him and used the tie to catch him as Nathan went down onto his well-suited knees.
“Maybe you should have thought of that before,” Bass said. “You, your wife, that spoiled whiner of a son you got? All of you belong to the Brothers now, and we’ll do whatever the fuck we want to you. Just like Shepherd did to that pretty blond wife of yours. Tell me, Nate, was it worth it?”
Nathan shuddered and then folded in on himself in a welter of tears, blood, and snot. He slumped over Bass’s arm, as he shook with broken, horrible sobs. His collapse was so complete and unexpected that Bass recoiled from it. He wanted to push Nate to the point he realized this wouldn’t—couldn’t—end well for him, prime him to accept Merlo’s offer when the SSA made his approach.
He hadn’t expected success to be quite so immediate.
“Hey!” someone yelled across the rows of cars. The high beam of a flashlight cut through the dimly lit parking bay and flicked over the two of them. “What’s going on over there?”
Bass hauled the still-shuddering Nathan to his feet and slung a heavy, fake-companionable arm over his shoulder.
“My friend here just had a bit of an accident,” he said. “Fell into that car and gave himself a bit of a knock. He’s all right now, though, ain’t you?”
Bass slapped Nathan roughly on one shoulder and squeezed. He dug down through shirt and muscle to pinch the nerves against the bones. The bolt of pain made Nathan’s legs buckle under him for a second. Bass held him up until Nathan recovered and pulled a grimace and a tight excuse up out of somewhere.
