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“I’m fine. The buzz will keep me going for a little while longer.”

Jax didn’t look convinced but left her anyway to deal with the cops and a very loud drunk.

“I didn’t do anything,” Tim bellowed.

The cop just kept reciting his rights to him as they led him to the patrol car, his hands shackled at his back.

“This is your fault, you bitch.”

She grinned at him. “I’ll add my charges to your wife’s.”

“We need to get your statement,” the cop called out to her.

“I’ll be back in a few minutes.” She made her wayaround the side of the building. Distracted by her aching face, she pressed her hand to her throbbing cheek and wasn’t really paying attention to her surroundings, until she was suddenly spotlighted in the headlights of the car beside her, the engine revved, and the car sped forward. She had only a split second to think and try to jump out of the way, but she mostly ended up with her butt on the hood, momentum throwing her back into the windshield as she slid and fell off the side of the car as it turned out of the parking spot and sped off.

She landed at a weird angle, wrenching her back and hitting her head on the running board on the side of a truck. Her head swam and her vision blurred as she sank into the ground, her body going limp.

Voices rang out, some close, others far off.

And then Aria’s face, her eyes filled with horror, came into her watery view. “Lyric? Can you hear me?”

“Hmm.” It felt hard to think, let alone talk.

“Call an ambulance,” she ordered someone. That was Aria, always taking charge.

Which meant Lyric didn’t have to do anything, so she let the dark swallow her.

Chapter Twenty-Three

Viper adjusted the gun on his belt and scratched at the mask covering most of his face, impatient to be done with this case. The wife he was supposed to kill tonight stood on a chair in the garage, her head bowed forward, a rope around her neck and draped over the beam the automatic garage-door opener was secured to.

“Try not to move,” the crime-scene guy instructed as he snapped another photograph getting most of her in the picture, except her feet on the chair. “That’ll do it.”

They’d spent the last ten minutes setting this scene with the wife’s enthusiastic help. Brave lady. Still, all this for one picture.

The tech handed him the phone. Viper checked the picture, thought it looked legit, and texted it to Maria with the messageDone.

He slipped the burner into his pocket and glanced across the garage at Nick. “We good?”

“The husband is in custody. Ambulance is on the way. The fake-news report links are all set. Maria clicks on any of the ones you send her, or googles the victim’s name and suicide or hanging, she’ll see what we want her to see.”

“Great. Then, I’m heading back.”

“To meet Maria, or someone else?” Nick asked just as Viper’s phone pinged with an incoming text.

He ignored his brother’s pointed question and pulled out the burner. No message there, so he pulled out his cell and saw the text notification from Lyric. He was about to put his phone away and look at it later, but something set off an alarm inside him and Rick popped into his head.

He pulled up the text.

LYRIC:I know for sure your day was better than mine.

It took a second for the picture to pop up.

“Holy fuck.” His heart stuttered, then kicked into high gear as his adrenaline and fear surged. He couldn’t believe the bruises and cut on her beautiful face.

LYRIC:It looks bad, but I’m fine. Nothing broken. Mild concussion. A drunk and a car. 2 separate things.

LYRIC:Hell of a day.