Page 34 of A Wrench in the Plan
With a nod, she asked Agent Palmer, “Do you know someone by the name of Elvis Dustin Marshwood?”
“Yeah.” Pause. “Why?”
I could see Row looking at Prez, trying to find out just how much information he wanted to give away. With a nod from LT, she went on to explain.
“He rented a truck we clocked driving around the area where my brother was taken. Seemed suspicious, and we’re thinking that might have been used to transport them so no one would see. Come to find out, he’d been hanging around with one of the daughters from the club… the same one that’s gone missing. We need to figure out if he’s tied to The Bloody Jokers… or if this is something different altogether.”
“Do you have a reason to believe The Bloody Jokers would want to do something like this to your club?”
This time Row didn’t look at Prez. She knew damn well she wouldn’t be giving away that information.
“It’s the only club that has been messing around with ours. You saw for yourself that they were trying to get in with the Indiana chapter. If you followed me down here, what’s to say that they didn’t connect the dots and do so as well?”
LT sat back in his chair, smiling like a proud parent at Row.
She spat that out without missing a beat, making it sound completely natural and believable.
Well, to a normal person. I wasn’t sure if FBI guy would buy it.
“However your club got tied up in this, I don’t want to know,” he said. “But I’ll tell you, he’s bad news. The club picked him up after they started hanging around Possum Trot and Conception. Think it was about six months ago. He was patched in pretty quickly, but we figured it was because they were desperate to get their numbers up. He’s got a rap sheet a mile long. He’s wanted for questioning on two different cases. Both victims were tortured and raped. He’s also suspected of the murder of two women in his hometown. We’ve been trying to track him down for months.”
My gaze shot to B-ry. All the blood drained from his face, and he sat so quickly I was almost positive his legs had given out on him.
Acid burned up my throat, and the feeling I’d had of being helpless since I found out they were missing just skyrocketed.
It was a hell of a lot easier not to let your mind go there when you had no clue about who’d taken them. But now… now all the worst-case scenarios were playing out in my head. For all I knew, they were already dead, and they’d suffered in the most unimaginable ways before that had happened.
“Don’t go there,” Sidekick whispered gruffly right next to my ear.
I shook my head. How could I not? How could he not? How could anyone in this room not be thinking about all the horrible things Cat and Chry might be going through while we all sat here with no fucking clue what to do?!
“I’ll do what I can, but it might take me a little bit,” the agent said gruffly.
“I don’t have a little bit,” Sparrow growled as her eyes turned into deadly slits.
“Look, I know there are two agents on Ted Buckford.” A hint of recognition flashed in LT’s eyes. “Also known as Tiger, the Vice President for The Bloody Jokers. I found out about an hour ago that he and some of his men left out of Indiana late last night, but I’m pretty sure those two agents followed him. That said, I don’t know if I can get a hold of them.”
“Where were they headed?!” Sparrow demanded.
There was a heavy sigh, then the agent responded with, “I don’t know. And even if I did, you can’t go there sniffing around. Who knows if something’s happened or if there are more agents there now?” There was almost a softness in his strong warning. Then his agent mask went back into place as he gruffly clipped out, “I’ll call when I can.”
He dropped the call without giving Row a chance to push back.
Sparrow stood there fuming. If she could have reached through that phone and choked the FBI man, she would have.
“I need a minute,” Sparrow said, storming out of the room.
Sidekick looked to LT. The moment LT gave a knowing jerk of his chin, Sidekick was out the door, chasing after Row.
“What now?” I asked, feeling stupid and hopeless.
“Take a break. See if he gets back to us. Keep doing what we’re doing on our end,” LT answered. “I’m not waiting around for that fuck. We’re gonna find them. But right now, we all have a shit ton of stuff going through our heads, and it’s not doing us a lick of good. Go eat. Take a breather. All of you.”
None of us moved for a long time. I was hellbent to stay put and continue on with this fucking feeling of helplessness, but at least I’d be right there when they did find something. I had a good feeling it was that way for everyone in that room.
“Ain’t a request,” LT said, eyes pointedly catching each one of us. His gaze was so strong it made people start moving.
Mouse squeezed my shoulder. His hand stayed there until I got to my feet. Wordlessly, I left out of the room with him.
