Page 96 of Stoker's Serenity

“This is bullshit,” Stoker growled.

“It’s also my only driving offense. We’ll go to court and sort it out there.”

“Good luck with that,” the patrolman snarked, and he went out through the curtain, and from what I could see, left it gaping as his boots thudded against the linoleum and he left the way he’d come.

“Fuck, I’m so sorry. It’s because of my patch,” he said.

“Don’t be sorry,” I said. “I’m going to be okay – you’re okay, that’s the only thing that matters right now.”

“You hang tight,” he said with a sigh. “I’ma go make a phone call. Call the club, give them the heads-up.”

“Call Linny, too. Her number is in my phone. Access code is 4193.”

“Got it.” He stepped out the curtain and whisked it back into place, hiding me from view, returning to me the semblance of privacy the patrolman had stripped away.

I lay there, and despite my calm words, I was on fire inside with all of the panic. Just what was I going to do?

29

Stoker…

“No, I’m not fucking joking, does it sound like I’m joking, motherfucker?” I growled at Radar.

“Slow your fuckin’ roll there, Turbo. I get it, your lady’s hurt and you got the pigs adding insult to injury. The question was rhetorical. I’ma put out the message and contact the club lawyer. What hospital did you say you were at?”

I rattled it off.

“Okay, now hang up the fucking phone and go be with your ol’ lady. We got you,” he said.

“Thanks. Oh, and I got this asshole’s plate. Doesn’t sound like he’s going to suffer through the criminal justice system so it’s on us for some good ol’ fashioned street justice.”

“Noted, gimme that too, while you’re on the line.”

I rattled that off, too.

“Got it. I’ll be in touch.”

“Thanks, Radar.”

“Don’t mention it. We’re crew and it’s just what crew do,” he said, with all of his savvy. I could already hear his fingers doing the walking across his laptop’s keyboard over the line.

“Later,” I said.

“Oh, you have no idea,” he said with a malicious sort of glee. He already had the dude’s whole life in front of him on his screen. I could see it in my mind’s eye.

“Thanks, man.” I disconnected the call.

No sooner did I have Linny dialed up on Serenity’s phone, than my phone started blowing up with texts and ringing off the hook. I grimaced and rejected the call coming in from the captain, so I could fill in my girl’s best friend.

“I thought you went off with lover boy,” was how Linny answered the phone.

“She did,” I said. “You best be sitting down for this…”

Jesus fucking Christ, Serenity knew how to pick her friends.

Linny was on it like sonic, asking if my girl would need clothes or this, or that, asking about prescriptions, rides, you name it. She was a one-woman organizational army, holding her shit together and getting shit done. She kicked me off the phone so that she could go to work, getting my girl everything she would need, and telling her manager to shove it when she said she was leaving early and I heard him balk over the line.

I smiled to myself and called my captain back on my phone before Serenity’s phone’s screen had a chance to go blank.

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