Nick looked from Marz over his shoulder to Easy and Shane. “Known the man for a while. Maybe I should just talk to him. See what I can find out.” Given how tight they were on time, that was probably the path of least resistance. Besides, Nick’s gut was usually spot on.

“Agreed,” Shane said.

Marz shrugged. “Your call, hoss.”

They spilled out of Beckett’s truck and congregated at the rear just as Ike neared. The man’s smile and greeting died on the vine as his gaze landed on the holstered piece on Beckett’s side he hadn’t tried to hide. Then Ike’s brown eyes went stone cold.

“Sorry,” Nick said. “It’s cool, Ike.”

Ike’s gaze scanned the group and landed on Crystal, tucked under Shane’s arm. “Everything okay here?” he asked. And that measured response to Beckett’s aggression and the hard-edged tension rolling off of all of them earned Ike a measure of respect in Shane’s book. The guy was tight and levelheaded. He hadn’t flown off the handle where a lot of tough guys might’ve.

“We had a bit of a situation,” Nick said.

Ike tilted his head and nailed Nick with a stare. “What’s going on?” He gestured at the group with the hand holding the helmet. “I’m not getting much of an old-friends-setting-up-a-new-business vibe here,” he said, referring to the cover story they’d told earlier in the week.

“Yeah.” Nick raked a hand through his hair. “About that.”

“You have something you need to say, Nick? Because I’m sensing some shit is going down for you. And that makes me concerned about blowback for Jeremy. Does he even know?” Ike shifted feet, growing agitation clear in his posture and the tone of his voice.

“He knows,” Nick said. “Turns out I brought some ghosts home with me from Afghanistan. Ghosts by the names of WEC and Jimmy Church. Mean anything to you?”

Ike braced his hands on his hips. “You gotta be shitting me. You’re on the wrong side of Church? That crazy motherfucker thinks he’s some kind of second coming of Christ.”

“So you know him?” Shane asked, his instinct sitting up and taking notice of Ike’s hostility. Maybe there was an opportunity here. An enemy-of-my-enemy-is-my-friend kinda thing.

“Yeah, I know him.” Scrubbing a hand over his bald head, Ike turned and paced, shaking his head and cussing a blue streak under his breath.

“He’s a Raven,” Crystal said, lifting her head off Shane’s chest and staring at the back of Ike’s cutoff denim jacket. A big black, white, and red patch of a raven perched on a skull with a knife through the eye socket covered his back. In black letters above and below, the patch read,

RAVEN RIDERS


MARYLAND

Smaller lettering above the state name read, “Death on Wheels.”

Ike pivoted, and his gaze cut straight to her. “Yeah. What of it?”

Shane tugged Crystal tighter against him, not appreciating the ice in Ike’s tone being directed as her.

She held out a hand meant to appease. “Churchmen hate Ravens,” she said. “Right?”

“Feeling’s mutual,” he bit out. “Has been for years.”

“So you don’t have to worry,” she said, looking up at Shane. “Ravens don’t get in bed with Churchmen. Ever.” This woman was smart, savvy, strong. So much to respect about her, and Shane knew he’d only scratched the surface. Her being able to confirm Ike’s independence from Church was a huge load off the team’s shoulders. Tension deflated from the air.

Ike chuffed out a laugh. “Lady knows what she’s talking about.”

A cell phone rang. Crystal gasped. “Oh, my God,” she cried. “What if that’s Jenna?” Shaking, she tore open her purse and removed the iPhone. The name on the caller ID read Bruno Ashe. “What do I do?” she asked, wide eyes flashing to Shane.

“It’s Bruno,” he said loud enough that the team knew what was going down. As everyone gathered closer round, including Ike, Shane cupped Crystal’s cheek. “Answer it on speaker so we can hear. You’ll do fine.”

“Hold up.” Marz held out his phone with the camera set to video recording. Smart thinking. Now they’d have the audio to play back just in case.

“Go ahead,” Shane said, nodding.

Crystal answered the call. “Bruno,” she said, her voice audibly shaken.

“Missing anything, baby?” he said, so smug and almost gleeful that Shane wanted to dive through the phone and tears his balls off by reaching down the asshole’s throat.

“What did you do with Jenna?” she asked. “She doesn’t have her meds, Bruno.”

“Oh, you mean the ones I’ve been paying for the past four years. And how did you repay me for that generosity?”

“I didn’t do anything wrong,” she said, hugging herself tight. The fear and pleading in her voice made Shane bleed for her. His chest felt on fire inside.

“Who’s the guy?” he nearly growled.

Her eyes flashed to Shane’s. He nodded and mouthed, “Doing good.”

“What guy?” she said.

Bruno made a sound like a growl. “Don’t play me, Crystal. The guy with the fucking prepaid. The one I found under my desk. Interesting place in its own right, don’t you think?”

How in the world had Crystal lost the burn phone in Bruno’s office? Unease crawled down Shane’s spine.

“A friend. Just a friend,” she said, pressing her hand to her face. Shane surveyed the group and found rage and disgust on every face. He was glad they had his back in this fubar. And hers.

“Did you fuck him?”

“What? No. You know I haven’t,” she said. What a fucking piece of trash this guy was. How the hell had Crystal ever gotten tied up with him? But Crystal was a class act and didn’t take his bait. “Bruno, where’s Jenna? The stress of this could cause a seizure. Why would you do this to her?”

“Eh, it already has.” Shane felt Crystal’s distressed gasp in his gut. “She’s out of it. Oh, and I put her up in your favorite room.”

What the hell did that mean?

The blood rushed out of Crystal’s face, and she swayed. Shane caught her against his side as she moaned. “What? Bruno, no. Please.”

“I didn’t do this to her, bitch. You did. Don’t forget that for a second.”

Tears flooded Crystal’s green eyes. “Bruno, please.”

“Here’s the deal, Crystal. You have a day to turn yourself in to me, for you to take her place. If you’re not here by tomorrow night, I’ll sell her, and you’ll never see her again. And I’ll still come after your scrawny ass.”

“No!” she cried, sagging against Shane’s body. The line went dead, and Crystal’s knees buckled altogether. Shane swept her into his arms and cradled her against his chest as she wept. The sound of her pain slayed him. And it made him all the more determined to make the man responsible for it pay. With his life. “We have to go to Confessions,” she sobbed. “Take me to Confessions.”

Not a chance. “We can’t trust a man like him to negotiate in good faith, Crystal. But we’ll figure this out. I promise,” he said, as she cried. No way Shane would ever entertain the idea of turning Crystal over anyway. Looking to his team, he said, “I want to get her inside. We can hash this out there.”

Expressions ranging from enraged to outright homicidal, everyone agreed.

“Can I come?” Ike asked, his expression matching the rest. “I’m not making any promises, but maybe we can help.” We, not I.

Shane didn’t know a lot about motorcycle gangs, but what he did know was that they tended to be heavily armed, unafraid to fight, and mobile. “It’s fine by me,” Shane said. “We could use the friends.”

Nick nodded. “I agree.” Easy eyeballed the guy and nodded, too. Beckett and Marz were the last to come around, but Shane saw in their eyes that they’d run the calculus of what an alliance with Ike and the Ravens could mean and come to the same positive conclusion. “Come on up, man,” Nick finally said. “And thanks.”

Inside, Nick led them to the gym, and all the men followed him in, leaving Shane and Crystal alone on the landing.

“Put me down,” Crystal said. “I’m okay.”

Shane gently placed her on her feet but kept his hands on her waist just in case. “My room’s over there,” he said, pointing in the direction of the Rixeys’ apartment. “Why don’t I show you around, and you can rest a while.”

She shook her head. “I want to know what’s going on. What the plan is.” Crystal hugged herself tight. “He means what he says, Shane. If I don’t go, he will sell her.”

“I know what he’s capable of, sweetness. I’ve seen some of it for myself. We’ll find another way. Trust me.”

“I do. But I still want to stay with you. Hear the plan. Otherwise, I’ll go crazy.”

“Then that’s what we’ll do. Whatever makes this easier on you, okay?” He brushed her cheek with his knuckles, and she nodded. “Come on.” He punched the code into the gym door and grasped her little hand in his.

Nick, Marz, Beckett, Easy, Jeremy, and Ike stood and sat around Marz’s desk at the back. Nick’s voice carried across the gym as he finished giving Jeremy the basics of the situation, including the fact that Ike knew a little of what was going on.

Shane noticed Ike soaking up the location information posted on a whiteboard behind Marz and the mug-shot identifications duct-taped to the brick wall. And let him look. Might as well know exactly what he’d be getting himself and his club involved in.

Shane made a round of introductions for the sake of both Crystal and Ike.

“I have something for you,” Crystal said, handing Shane her cell phone. “I snuck into Bruno’s office after lunch and found some papers that seemed relevant to your friends. If you hadn’t mentioned Becca’s name over coffee this morning, I might’ve missed it. I took pictures.” She shrugged. “I hope there’s something useful.”