Page 42 of Outlaws' Single Mom
The steady drip of cold rain onto the ground outside of the overhang makes me feel like I’m in some kinda noir detective movie, all shadows and sadness.
Hellfire shoves his hands in his pockets. “So? Whaddya got for us that made all this cloak and dagger shit worth it?”
“Look, I shouldn’t be here,” she says in a low voice, looking around to make sure no one’s observing. “But there’s a lot more happening than I think you know. The only reason I’m here is because I’d rather be dealing with you than anyone that would move in to take your spot.”
“What the fuck’s that supposed to mean?” Hellfire growls, low in his throat. He’s a grumpy fuck but usually pretty even tempered, unless the threat is to one of us or the club.
“You know it’s true. You wouldn’t be here if I kissed your ass and acted like Iwantto be in this position.”
He rotates his hand in a, ‘get on with it’ motion.
She nods as she straightens, like she’s about to debrief her chief. “I looked into the report on Georgia Vale’s accident and the autopsy results. Quite frankly, it stinks. Her car was found off the highway just outside the north end of Freemont, wrapped around a tree. The weather was fine, and there were traces of marijuana in her system, but that’s it. Nothing that would significantly affect her driving. Which is funny because the official report makes it look like she was off her head on fentanyl with a healthy dash of coke.” She looks serious, poking her palm with a finger to emphasize her point. “The only reason I noticed the discrepancy is because I scratched deeper when you asked and looked into the individual testing records in the lab and not what was put in the report.”
“You’re welcome,” Stiff grumbles.
She rolls her eyes. “That’s not it. Once I knew something was off, I looked deeper into the accident itself. Her car was totaled, so a few scrapes and dents don’t stand out, but her back bumper was crushed in a way that would indicate someone hit her from behind, and recently. Her internal damage was extensive, enough to kill her, but…”
“But what? Either the crash killed her or it didn’t,” I snap.
“Oh, it killed her, but the medical examiner believes she could’ve been alive for up to an hour after the crash.”
Stiff’s face goes blank, too blank. “She just bled out in there?”
“No. All the evidence points to someone getting her out of the car and leaving her where she was later found. There was wrist bruising consistent with being tied up for a short time, and no evidence of anything that could indicate that aid was given. Honestly, with the extent of her injuries, it’s difficult to tell if getting her help would’ve made a difference in the long run, but it looks like someone purposefully ran her off the road, held her for whatever reason, and then left her to die.”
“And all the system says is that a junkie had an accident?” Hellfire growls.
She nods. “Exactly. There’s no way all this was missed, but once the final report was slapped together, nobody would bother to look any deeper considering Ms. Vale’s general history of minor drug offenses.”
“They didn’t expect her to have anyone that gave a shit about her.” Lash wrinkles his nose in disgust.
“Sadly, you’re probably right. Which brings me to the reason I wanted to meet in person. A few hours before Georgia Vale’s car was driven off the road, a police officer was shot and killed not far from where she lived. The ballistics analysis matches a gun we have in our database. A service weapon that dropped out of the system a few years ago.”
Hellfire nods, like the pieces are falling together. “You think this is internal.”
She narrows her dark eyes. “I do, which is why I want your word that this relationship goes both ways. Someone sent in a tip that your members were spotted around Georgia’s apartment a few days ago, and that you’ve been putting pressure on the local businesses. Whoever sent it in knows enough that they implied that if we get a warrant, we might find the gun we’re looking for in your compound.”
“So why the fuck are we here and not being swarmed by cops right now?” I demand.
“Because I know bullshit when I smell it. I’m sure I’d find all sorts of interesting material if we raided your club, but I’m more concerned about the factthat one of my own might be covering up killing an officer.”
That I can understand. The only reason the Outlaw Sons are successful where so many other groups crumble or eat themselves alive is because of loyalty. We swear our lives to each other, and in exchange we have to know our brothers have our back. The instant that falls is the beginning of the end. We fought our way back from that brink once. It won’t happen again.
Hellfire looks like he’s thinking the same thing. “So where does this leave us? It’s not my job to take care of your bad apple. Unless you want to hire our services, but quite frankly, it would take ‘retire to the Cayman Islands money’ to make it happen because our names would be dirt if we started taking jobs from cops.”
“I told you. I’ll do what I can to mitigate the blowback, but I want to know that if I need to work outside the system, that you’ll do what you can to help.” Detective Chen’s expression turns dark. “You have a vested interest in the Vale case, and Ross was a friend of mine, and a damn good officer. They both deserve better than to get swept under the rug to save the skin of a dirty cop.” She holds out a smallthumb drive, which Hellfire pockets quickly. “Everything I could find about the accident is on there. I’ll be in touch.”
“You do that,” Hellfire says, a growl in his voice.
She pulls up the hood of her jacket and jogs across the parking lot until she reaches the street, where she gets into a completely forgettable car and drives off.
“Do we trust her?” Lash asks.
“Enough. I trust that she means what she says about this. For now.”
Stiff lets out a sigh. “Poor Dakota. It’s gonna break her fucking heart to find out her sister is just a casualty of some cop’s shitty decision making.”
“I don’t like keeping shit from her, but knowing it wasn’t an accident is bad enough. There’s no point in sharing gory details that won’t matter until we find out why someone left her to die. At least we can let her know she was right. Georgia wasn’t strung out. She was running from something and someone’ll pay for it.”
