Page 73 of Their Property
I smiled down at the quote. “I do miss hearing him say that.”
Grudge raised his eyebrows and tapped a finger to one of the many tattoos on his forearm.
“That would be a good tattoo idea. I think T-Bone needs it more than either of us though. Oh, speaking of tattoos,” I lowered my voice again, “have you heard from Shadow yet?”
Grudge shook his head and flipped to a fresh page.I sent a coded message the same morning we left. He’ll leave a reply by next week at the Kokopelli rock.
“You think he’ll take that long to reply?”
I dunno, he’s a dad now. He’s busy and shit.
One of the service center employees, a young woman in her late teens orveryearly twenties, walked out from the kitchen right then. Her blonde hair was thrown up in a messy ponytail, and she openly carried a handgun holstered to her hip.
“You guys good with chicken tortilla soup?” she called to us.
“Works for us. Could we get some whiskey?”
She disappeared through the kitchen doors without an answer but reappeared through another set of doors behind the bar moments later, some generic whiskey bottle in her hand. “I’ll find you some glasses.” She set the bottle in front of us, remaining an arm’s length away before running off again.
“Five of them, please. Our friends might come down to join us. Do you have any beer?” I remembered Kyrie’s face when she tasted our drinks at dinner that night, which felt like years ago.
“Yeah, we got a lager or something. Just let me know when you want it.” The girl set the glasses down and immediately hurried to the doors.
“Miss! Wait, hold on,” I hollered after her.
She turned slowly to face us, stiff as a board. “Yes?” The poor thing clearly didn’t want to spend a moment alone with us any longer than necessary, and I could only imagine what made her so jumpy around men.
“Have you heard anything about the territory a few hours north of here? Sevier?”
She shook her head. “We’re in a neutral zone here. We don’t get involved in any territory’s business.”
“Have you seen armies heading up that way? Or heard any guests talking about it?”
“No. I’ll get your soup, if you guys don’t need anything else.”
I offered my best non-threatening smile. “We’re good, thank you.”
She turned to leave before I finished speaking, but I noticed her posture had relaxed slightly, so at least that was something. Grudge had poured our drinks while we’d been talking. The moment she was gone, he wrote down,Maybe let Kyrie ask them questions. They must’ve heard something down this way. Rumors, at least.
“Yeah, that’s a good idea. Letting us stay don’t mean they trust us.”
Seems like they have their reasons.
“I know. I’m not mad.” I fidgeted in my seat, spinning my whiskey glass on the bar without taking a drink. Grudge noticed my antsiness and frowned but didn’t ask a question. “If we lay low here a few more days,” I mused, circling the rim of my glass, “you think T would be alright if I took off for a day, maybe two?”
Grudge glared at me then, grunting as he spread his palms out and shrugged his shoulders.
“You know where, man.”
He groaned in annoyance and downed his drink, shaking his head when he slapped the empty glass down on the bar.
“I have to. It’s been almost six months since I’ve seen him.”
Grudge wrote aggressively on his notepad.I don’t see why you can’t just steal him away.
“We’ve talked about this. I can’t just take my son from his mother.”
It’s what she did to you!
