“And tell him we told you to,” Dare said.
They left the skaters cowering there and headed back to the clubhouse.
In Dare’s office again, he said, “We’re going after Davis. Someway, somehow, he’s going down. The question is, how dirty do we want the club’s hands in doing it?”
On a troubled sigh, Maverick shook his head. “This sucks ass. With Jagger in jail, I feel like we’re on the radar too damn much to take out a cop ourselves, as much as I’d fucking like to since it’s that prick Davis. I say we go after him, not to kill, but to get him put away.” Slider nodded. The club had lost too much the past few months to take such a big risk themselves right now.
Caine palmed the cap on his head and let out a noise like a growl. “If we’re building a case that Martin might be able to use then we need more ammunition against Davis. The word of three druggy skateboarder freaks isn’t going to cut it.”
“Which means that dogfight just became even more valuable,” Phoenix said. “We place Davis there, and he’s toast. I think Mav’s right. It’s time to bring Sheriff Martin into this.”
Dare’s cell phone buzzed against the desk, and his eyebrows shot up. “It’s Marz.” He answered. “Marz, hey. You’re on speaker. The gang’s all here.”
“Yo,” Marz said. “I’m not gonna lie, I’m feeling like Santa Claus today.”
Slider stepped closer, the promise of good news luring him in.
“What you got for us, brother?” Dare asked, trading looks with the rest of them. The weight of their collective anticipation was thick in the room.
Marz’s voice came down the line. “A hit on that same truck. Two different cameras. Right by the Ravens’ property on the night of the dumping.”
“Fuckin’ A,” Maverick said, voicing the excitement they all felt.
“Am I your favorite person right now or what?” Marz said, making them all chuckle.
“There it is,” Caine said. “There’s the kind of solid physical evidence Martin’s going to need.”
“I’ll shoot it over,” Marz said. “And one more thing. I’m not finding anything criminal on the suit your PI talked to at Slater Enterprises, but what I am finding is that the guy is way behind on paying his taxes. Like, six figures kinda behind. And Davis seems to have a gambling problem, because he’s on the radar of some of the bookies here in the city. Which is making me think that Slater was in the habit of finding out and exploiting the dirty little secrets of the people around him to get them to do what he needed.”
“Or, at the very least, to keep them quiet or get them to look the other way,” Slider said.
“Roger that,” Marz said. “Anything else, hoss?”
“That’s a good haul for a Monday morning, Marz,” Dare said. “Thank you.”
When they hung up, the five of them erupted into an impromptu celebration. Whoops and hell yeahs and clasped hands.
“We just might be able to take Davis down and bring Jagger home all at once,” Maverick said. “God, that would be some justice right there.”
“And long overdue,” Dare said. “So let me tell Martin what’s going on and see how he wants to be involved.”
Caine jabbed his finger into the desktop. “But you tell him, either way, this is happening. With his help on the up-and-up, or our way without.”
Slider nodded, his gut clenching with the need for this to finally be over, and for them to be able to know that the people they cared about would be safe once and for all. “Davis framed the club, arrested Jagger for it, and threatened Cora. We can’t let this sonofabitch hurt us even one more time.”
Cora came out of the shelter to find Slider sitting on his bike, legs spread wide, boots braced on the ground. Wearing his cut and a pair of dark sunglasses, he was so freaking sexy she could barely handle him. And then he saw her and smiled.
“Hey, handsome,” she said, coming up to his side.
He put his arm around her waist. “Handsome, huh?”
“I just call ’em like I see ’em,” she said, pressing a kiss to the scruff on the side of his face.
“As long as you call me ‘yours,’ anything else is gravy.” His hand slid up to her hair and pulled her in for a kiss. Slow, thorough, almost lazy in the way his tongue explored her mouth and curled around hers. He moaned low in his throat, and the sound hit her right between the legs.
“Slider,” she whispered. “You’re making me wet.”
“Jesus,” he bit out, handing her a helmet. “Get on. And hold on tight.”
He drove them through town, the cool breeze making her chilly and giving her the perfect reason to snuggle in against all Slider’s heat. That closeness turned her on even more and sent her hands wandering over his chest and down to his stomach. His muscles clenched under her touch, and that drove her on to torment him more, until finally her fingers found the bulge filling out the front of his jeans.