Page 29 of Kings of Sherwood

She looks from me to Scarlet to LJ—her frown deepening—and then back to me. “Sounded like you were all listening to the scanners. Anything come in?”

“Not on official airwaves,” Will says. He’s rolled up his sleeves to fiddle with the knobs, like it’s some kind of delicate experiment. Maren tips her head, interested—maybe looking for a distraction—and steps over to size up the setup.

I bound off of bed, not one to let Scarlet get all the credit even though he set the whole thing up. “See, I usually keep it tuned to UHF,” I explain, pointing to the relevant display. “That’ll be police, fire, EMS, all your standards.”

She glances back at me. “And?”

“Nothing,” Will answers for me. “Which is why I’m dialing it down to CB—”

“CB?” This, from LJ. “What, you trying to push through to BJ and the Bear?”

Both Maren and I give him a look. Scarlet’s too enraptured with his toy to notice.

“What?” LJ says. “No TV Land growing up?”

“CB is citizens band,” I explain to Maren. “Low frequencies for truckers and old-school rednecks like me.”

“Look who knows his shit all of a sudden,” gripes Scarlet. “Nothing coming in there.”

“Try GMRS,” I say, pointing, but he swats me away.

“I’mtrying,” he says, “if you’dletme.” He darts an icy glare at me. “You didn’t think to do this before I showed up?”

“I had a lot on my mind.”

“Question?” Maren actually raises her hand, which is damned adorable. She seems to have cooled off a bit—although not entirely. And from this close, I can smell the honey-salt scent of her body, which is not helping matters. I bite the inside of my cheek. “GMRS?” she asks.

“Frequency for—”

“Walkie-talkies,” Scarlet cuts me off. “Nothing fancy. Just the kind you can buy at Bass Pro or MegaValu. Sort of thing that any—”

“Shh.” I lean in and punch him on the shoulder to hush him up. “What was that?”

“Ow,” Scarlet says pointedly, but twiddles the dials and gets it clearer and louder:

...seen movement near the ridge. Could be him.

Pause. Then a second voice:

Copy that. I’ll swing wide. Be better if we can get in before this damn rain.

Yeah, yeah. You got the tranqs?

Tranqs, cuffs, the whole damn party bag.

Copy that.

Another pause. Then a different voice—lower, older, like it’s been smoked over a campfire:

Remember, they want Locksley breathing. Don’t fuck him up too bad when you catch him.

Silence stretches. No one breathes.

“Did they say—” Maren starts.

“Yeah.” I know what my own damn name sounds like. And right now, I sure don’t like hearing it.

Will’s jaw ticks once.

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