Take Me, Outlaw(34)

“Do we know if it's usually got Thorn members on it?”



“No idea. This was literally everything Grady had on them, Rafe. And he was not happy to be asked.”



I got the point. “Thank you, Bard,” I said. “At least it's something for us to go on.”



Bard looked at his watch. “It's getting late,” he said. “And it's been a long day for all of us. Plus you'll probably need a few more hours' sleep to shake off that concussion before we get to work on this. We've got some sleeping bags in the trunk. We’ll bring them out so we can all get some rest.”



“As long as we can get an early start tomorrow,” Boomer said. “I managed to get a side gig with the city's Events Department, helping them rig the fireworks for tomorrow.”



“Why, what's tomorrow?” Jewel asked.



Boomer blinked at her for a moment, confused. “It's, uh, the Fourth of July. You didn't know that?”



I glanced at my burner, and saw that the date on the screen was indeed July 4th. Holy shit, I thought. We've been running around so much these past few days, we both forgot there was a holiday coming up.



Bard and Nic went out to get the sleeping bags. “Since when do you pick up extra jobs working for the city, Boomer?” I asked.



“Since I got my fuckin' Sergeant patch yanked off earlier today, Rafe,” Boomer said tersely. “My share in the MC's profits just took a goddamn dive an' I got child support to pay. Not that I expect you to give a shit.”



“Fuck, man, I get it, okay? I fucked up! I fucked up real bad! How many fucking times do you want me to say I'm sorry?” I asked. “Fifty? A hundred? Give me a fucking number and I'll do it, or else drop it and let me try to fix it!”



“You're giving me attitude over this?” Boomer snarled. “You wanna act like you're the victim, here? Jesus, really? Where do you get your fuckin' balls, man?”



“He's right,” Jewel said. “You should give him a break, all of you.”



“Oh, really, lady?” Boomer yelled. “And pardon me all to hell, but just who in the sunny blue fuck are you to tell me what I should do?”



“I'm the one who'd be dead if Rafe hadn't stepped in and saved my life,” she replied steadily. “He didn't have to stick around and protect me, but he did, and he's risked his life for me a bunch of times since then because he's a good person. And even if he screwed up as badly as you say he did, he's still doing his best in a terrible situation and he doesn't need to be put down by all of you.”



Boomer turned to me, sneering. “Really? Is that what you told her? That all this Jester stuff was some heroic gesture to keep her safe? That it wasn't all about you and your personal bullshit? God, you really are an asshole.”



Jewel opened her mouth, but before she could say anything, Bard and Nic came back in with their arms full of sleeping bags and pillows. They dropped them in the middle of the floor in a heap.



“Okay, everyone grab some bedding, choose a room, and try to get some shut-eye,” Bard said. “We've got a long day tomorrow, and probably a bloody one, at that.”



Bard chose a sleeping bag and went upstairs. Nic grabbed another and walked into the dining room, closing the tall double-doors behind him.



Boomer snatched up a sleeping bag and went to the stairs, pausing halfway up to give me a venomous look.



“Sweet dreams, hero,” he spat.





Chapter 32




Jewel



Once the Reapers had gone to their separate rooms, Rafe and I placed a couple of sleeping bags together and sat on top of them.



The mood between us was strange. Before Bard and the others had gotten there, Rafe and I had been sleeping curled up with each other. It should have felt natural for us to return to that, but something still felt awkward and uncertain. From the way he was avoiding eye contact with me, I knew he was waiting for me to ask him what Boomer had meant when he said none of this was about me.



But I had another question for him first.



“When they got here and you thought they were Jester's people,” I began, “why did you tell me to run to the police? Before then, every time I brought up going to the cops about all this, you said it wasn't safe. You said they'd be in on it.”



“They might have been,” Rafe said.



“You, uh, sounded pretty sure about it before,” I pointed out. I was trying to keep my voice calm and even. Whatever was going on, it was clearly a sensitive subject based on his exchange with Boomer, and I didn't want to make him angry or upset. Still, I knew if there was any chance for us to go back to holding and kissing each other, it couldn't happen until he was finally honest with me.



Rafe sighed. “I didn't want you to go to the cops,” he admitted. “There really was a chance that they'd have been involved in this, but it was kind of a slim chance, and I played that up so you wouldn't run off. Which was very shitty of me, and I'm sorry.”



I wasn't too surprised by his answer. I'd been thinking about it a lot since he'd told me to run earlier, and this was the most logical explanation I'd come up with. I knew I should have been angry, but I wasn't. I was curious, though. “But why? Why would you need me around?”



“I needed to know what you knew,” Rafe said. “I had to find out if anything you'd seen or heard in that alley could help me bring down Jester.”



“So you were already going after Jester when you grabbed me from the alley?” I asked.



“It was why I was there in the first place,” he said. “I knew Angelo hung out there, and I hoped he'd be able to lead me to Jester. But when I saw what was happening with you, I just yanked you out of there and improvised from there.”



I was replaying all of the things Rafe had said to me before in my head, trying to put them all together so they'd make sense. “You told me you just got out of prison after seven years,” I said, “and that you were innocent. So I'm guessing Jester's the reason you were sent there. Am I right?”



“Yeah,” Rafe said, nodding. “He framed me. Drugs.”



“Why?” I asked. “Had you done something to him?”



“Dated his niece,” Rafe replied. “She turned out to be kind of a nut job, and when I tried to break it off with her, she told Jester that I'd beaten her up and raped her.”



I sat in silence for a moment, thinking everything over.



Rafe chuckled bitterly. “Thanks for not asking whether I actually did that stuff or not.”



I looked at him, surprised. “Of course not,” I said. “I know you'd never do that.”



“I'm surprised you think you know me at all,” Rafe answered. “I'm surprised you aren't already out the door and running to find the nearest state trooper barracks after finding out how much I've lied to you.”



“But I know why you did,” I said, putting my hand on his shoulder. “He stole seven years of your life. You said while you were at Potawatomi, you'd been attacked four times. His people, right?”



Rafe nodded.



“So of course you'd go after him,” I continued. “Of course you'd do whatever it took. You probably couldn't live with yourself if you didn't, even if that meant going against the other Reapers. I understand.”



“How are you not fucking furious with me right now?” Rafe asked. “I mean, Jesus, you owe me a beating even more than Bard does. All that time you could have just gone to the cops and gone back to your life, and instead I was dragging you from one disaster to the next...”



“But you protected me, too,” I pointed out. “And the past few days haven't been all gunshots and explosions. There are some parts that I wouldn't have traded for anything.”



“Really?” Rafe replied.



“Really,” I answered. “So what happens now?”



“Now we get some sleep, like Bard said,” Rafe began. “Tomorrow we head back to Chicago and stash you and the memory stick at the Devil's Nest.”



“What's the...?”



“It's the Reapers' clubhouse,” Rafe said. “A bar up in Rogers Park. The other guys in the club can guard you and the stick while I head over to Belmont Harbor and see if I can figure out which yacht belongs to the Thorns. I tell them we've got the list of their members, and that unless they let me and Jester settle things on our own once and for all, the list will get leaked to the Chicago crime families and they'll all become fertilizer in a hurry.”



“That sounds like a big risk,” I said.



“It's one I'm willing to take,” he answered. “Worst-case scenario, they kill me and this ends anyway. I'm not scared of that. At least you'll be safe.”



“But what if you didn't have to?” I asked. “Rafe, what if there were a way for you to just walk away from all this? What if you had something to live for instead?”



“Like what?” he answered.



“I'll tell you,” I said. “But there's one last question I need you to answer, and I need you to be honest with me.”



“Of course,” Rafe said. “Anything. I promise.” I could see how much he meant it, how badly he wanted to come clean with me about everything despite how hard it was for him.