Page 52 of Nothing More

“Dude, that’s why we’re here,” Pongo said. “We were hoping you guys had heard something. We set it up to look like it was the Italians who ratted them out to the cops.”

“Yeah, well, that was pretty clever until your little filmed assassination,” he said with obvious distaste. “No one thinks the fancy British man wearing the mask was attached to the Italians or the Russians.”

“Yeah, yeah.” Pongo rolled his eyes. “We put a target on our backs, we changed the game. You’ve said it all before. But Raven’s a damn big fish to try and catch just to piss us off.”

Again, Kat’s gaze shifted to Toly, sharp, too-knowing. “I don’t really think it’s aboutyou, plural. The Dogs.”

“Say what you mean,” Toly growled.

Kat sipped more coffee, considering. “How many times has the bratva tried to have you killed since you joined the Dogs.”

“None.”

“That you know of.”

“If they haven’t tried before, why now?” And the better question, the one that was bringing up goosebumps beneath his clothes: when had they seen him with Raven? How had he slipped up?

Kat shrugged. “They’ve got a real grudge with the club, now. New, better leadership. Seems as good a time as any.”

“Well,” Pongo said, “that’s comforting. Guess we all need to be sleeping with one eye open.”

“You should be doing that anyway,” Kat said.

But Pongo wasn’t understanding, not in the way Toly was, with steadily-mounting dread. Pongo hadn’t picked up on what Kat’s pointed glances meant. The bratva wasn’t going to firebomb the clubhouse, or gun down Pongo on the street. They weren’t going to kidnap one of the old guards’ old ladies. With Misha at the helm, the thuggish way of doing business under Oleg had changed: Misha wassmart. If he wanted to take down the club, he would use Toly to do it – or at least start with him. Toly, who’d never had a weak spot to exploit in Moscow…but who might have one now.

Pongo was talking, running his mouth as usual. Toly threw down the rest of his drink and pushed him out of the booth so he could stand.

“Hey, what–?” Pongo protested from the floor.

“Thanks,” Toly said to Kat, tersely.

“Hey,” Pongo called after him, as he wended his way through the maze of tables. “Dude!”

He kept walking, footfalls nearly as rapid as the pulse pounding in his ears.

Twelve

“Hello, Melissa, Raven again. I’d appreciate a return call, thanks,” Raven said to Melissa’s voicemail, and hung up with a sigh. She’d called the detective four times today, and, so far, couldn’t get so much as a return text to let her know the voicemails had been received. At this point, she suspected Melissa had no intention of sharing any lab findings, and would instead go straight to the boys with any information gleaned. It was more than a little bit infuriating – those body parts had been mailed to Raven specifically, not the Lean Dogs generally – but she thought she’d kept a civil tone in her messages.

“Raven.” Cassandra climbed onto the kitchen stool opposite and adopted a Very Serious expression. “I know you aren’t going to tell me what’s going on, but I know something’s going on.” Her tone turned wheedling. “Can’t you tell mesomething? Why did things suddenly get, like, a thousand times scarier than they were before? Why” – her nose wrinkled and she jerked a thumb over her shoulder – “do we have to havehimhere?”

“Himcan hear you!” Shep called from the living room.

Both sisters cringed at the absolute butchering of the English language.

Raven said, “Darling, I don’t want you to worry.” Also, she didn’t say,I don’t want you to accidently blurt out to your friends that someone sent me an ear by post.

“But I already am worried.”

“I know. But–”

“I thought things were supposed to be better. I thought it washandled.”

She sighed. “Unfortunately, our family’s problems seem to be like hydras: cut off one head, two more sprout in its place.”

Cass frowned. “If it’s that bad, why don’t you call Fox and have him come up? That’d be better than…” A tilt of her head Shep’s direction.

A good question. And one she’d asked herself more than once today.