Page 44 of Heartless
“Yeah.” He followed me, tying his hair back to keep the wind out of it.
That was new. Every passing day, he seemed to hide his face less and less.
Larkan came up a minute after us, after struggling to release himself from Noelle clinging to him on the front porch. We pulled up to the garage ten minutes later, parking in front of the spare bay that Dave, the owner, let us work out of.
Our prospect was in a surly mood from the get-go, barely saying a word to me while throwing tools around carelessly and grumbling to himself as he worked. Shadow was being a much better helper than him just by replacing a few tires.
“Quit throwing your tantrum like a bitch and spit it out already,” I told Larkan from where I lay on a creeper.
“If I do, you’ll tell Reaper, so no thanks, I’m good.” He proceeded to crank loudly with his socket wrench in a way that would surely strip the bolt.
“Hey, stop.” I rolled out from under the bike I was working on and sat up. “What’s this about? Your patch?”
“Yeah, my fuckin’ patch!” he huffed, throwing the tool on the ground. “I risked my life to protect his old lady, and what do I get? Jack fuckin’ shit.”
“You’ll get your damn patch, man,” I sighed. “I hear your frustration, but we have more important shit to deal with right now, like preparing for war.”
“I know, but—” He ran a grease-covered hand through his hair, leaving black streaks at his temples. “I wanna marry Noelle before shit gets bad. Set her up in case something happens to me, you know?”
“She’ll be fine with or without you,” I said. “As the president’s sister, she does have some power even if she’s not an officer.”
“It’s not just that, though. Like, I also just want to do it while we still can.”
“I hear you, man. I do.” I wiped my hands on a rag. “I’ll talk to him. See what I can do.”
Larkan’s jaw dropped and I entertained the thought of shoving the rag into his mouth. “You will?”
“Yeah, but don’t expect much. Mariposa has the most sway over him, and I know she’s been advocating for you. In all likelihood, he genuinely has too much on his plate to think about club shit right now.”
“Hey, a bug in his ear is more than what I could ask for.” He picked up his socket wrench, a new ease in his movements as he got back to work. “Thanks, Jandro.”
“Yeah, well Shadow and I owe you for that mission too.”
Larkan laughed lightly. “Man, if you could be patched in twice, Shadow sure as fuck deserves that. I still cringe thinking about when they got you with those harpoons, dude.”
“I didn’t feel it,” Shadow answered nonchalantly as he carried two tires to stack against the wall.
“Not even when you got sick?”
“Oh, I felt all of that.” Shadow’s hand drifted over his stomach as if recalling the nausea and feverish symptoms. “Mariposa made it not so bad, though.”
I ducked my head to hide my grin, turning to grab another tool. I didn’t even need eyes to see that Shadow was completely in love with her. It was pretty fucking cute how they were both utterly terrified of telling the other how they felt.
“Here’s what I want to know.” Larkan flipped a wrench in midair. “How’d they fucking hit you? Whenever you come up in conversation, someone always mentions how you’re untouchable in a fight.”
“They were long-range weapons.” Shadow shrugged like the answer was obvious. “It’s true, I’m untouchable in close combat. But a sniper can hit me from a distance if I’m dealing with something else up close.”
I paused in my work to listen. This was probably the most I’d ever heard him talk to someone he wasn’t close to.
“How’d you get to be so good at the close combat stuff?” Larkan asked, his curiosity about the big guy thoroughly piqued.
Shadow bristled, a sign that the real answer was uncomfortable for him. But he humored the prospect anyway. “Having to watch out for myself in prison. I also trained myself to listen for people approaching when I was young.”
“You gotta teach me some of that one day.” With that, Larkan refocused on his work, the conversation finished in his mind.
Shadow apparently wasn’t done yet.
The big dude finished stacking tires and approached the prospect with his hands spread out to his sides. And that look on his face…was hesmiling?
