Page 72 of Lord Have Mercy Part Four: Big Son

Except…she wouldn’t have known where to look for Remy.

Frustration swelled up from the pit of her uneasy stomach; filled her throat, pushed hard on the back of her tongue. She closed her eyes and swallowed against it, but it had brought the tide with it, that awful surge of black waves that wanted to drown her.

They might never…

If they didn’t…

If Boyle was…

Something warm and soft pressed against her forehead, and she opened her eyes to realize it was Mercy, kissing her. He held a tin camp plate set with a modest portion of eggs, toast, and fried SPAM, as much as she could likely manage given her current state.

“Eat,” he said, softly, as he pulled back, and gathered up more plates to take to the others outside.

~*~

Devin had been out in the boat, and pulled back up to the dock while they were finishing breakfast on the porch. He leaped lithely up onto the dock, and tied off the boat like he’d been doing it all his life, further proof of his wild and storied background. He carried a thermos, and hoisted it in greeting as he walked up to the lawn. “Three of your lines are taut, big man. Strung tight as a guitar under the water.”

Mercy nodded. “That’s three caught, then. They’ll keep ‘til later.” He added his plate to the stack of dirties Gray was collecting. “We’re heading into town, now.”

Within ten minutes, they’d gathered what they needed, dosed Toly with Dramamine, and piled into Mercy’s boat to make for dry land. Ava rode up front, where the breeze of their passage flowed up over the boat’s low windshield and ruffled her hair. It wasn’t cooling, because there was nothing cool about the swamp in high summer, but the air flow eased some of her nausea. This was a much larger, finer boat than the narrow little thing Mercy had piloted on their honeymoon, but, somehow, she felt less safe in it. Like they were a big, white target gliding over the water, too-obvious and too-loud. She scanned each swag of moss, each low-hanging limb, each suspicious clump of yucca up high on the shore for signs of snipers or binoculars.

They reached the marina unscathed, though, where they’d left their vehicles.

Alex hesitated when they were halfway across the parking lot. “Actually…” he began, when Colin asked what he was doing. “I want to catch up with Dandridge and see if he’s learned anything new.”

“Too chickenshit to go back to the clubhouse?” Colin asked.

“No. I left my mother there, for God’s sake.”

“Yeah, but your mother wasn’t the one getting the dirty looks,” Tenny pointed out, grinning. He turned to Mercy and said, “You should have seen him. Shaking in his boots.”

“Shut up.”

“Fine, go,” Mercy said with a waving off gesture. “While you’re at it, get Dale to run Regina Carroll through the system and see what he can find out about her.”

Alex nodded, and held out his hand to Tenny. “Can I have the Jeep keys?”

When Tenny only gave him a narrow, suspicious look, Reese reached down into his pocket – “Hey, you wanker” – and tossed them over.

“Do you need me?” Ava heard Colin ask Mercy, quietly. “I feel like someone should keep tabs on him.”

Mercy nodded. “Yeah, go. Make sure he doesn’t go running back to his fed buddies.”

The rest of them weren’t all going to fit in the Rover, so they unloaded the bikes in the trailer. Mercy, Gray, and Toly mounted up. Ava leaned in to kiss him, before he started his engine. “See you there.” Devin jangled the keys and said, “Ladies?” He turned an extra wide smile on Tenny.

“Piss up a rope, old man,” Tenny said, without any animosity, and called shotgun via launching himself into the front passenger seat.

When they were on the road, Devin following along behind the bikes, Mercy leading the way toward the clubhouse, he said, “Now, Mrs. Big Man.”

“Ava,” she supplied, grinning despite herself.

“Oh, I know your name, love. But Mrs. Big Man is more fun to say.”

“What am I, then?” Maggie asked, chuckling.

“Mrs. Boss Man, of course.”

The parking lot, when they arrived at the clubhouse, waspacked. A full cadre of bikes slanted across the width of the porch, and trucks, and vans, and cars jammed in nose-to-tail across the gravel of the lot. The house itself, and its property was much smaller than Dartmoor, and for a minute, she thought they’d have to park along the grassy shoulder of the road. But a Dog stepped out through the gates, spoke to Mercy and the others, and then walked back to the window of the Rover. With a little surprise, and a little more amusement, she noted that he rounded the nose of the car and approached her window, rather than Devin’s.

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