Ride Steady (Chaos #3)(135)

Slade was where men who put shit in their hair and women who spent eight hundred dollars on shoes went to hook up. So the only times Joker had been there were times like this. When it was empty, silent, cavernous, a huge shell of opulence that was creepy by daylight.

As he walked across the massive space, he saw Tack, Hop, and Shy heading his way.

They stopped in the middle.

“Knight heard about Heidi,” Joker started it.

Tack jerked up his chin. “Needless to say, this didn’t make him happy.”

“Do we want him in this?” Joker asked. “When it comes to shit like this, he has no off button and he doesn’t mind mess.”

“Considering Valenzuela’s involvement and the fact Knight keeps his ear to the ground, when he heard about Heidi, he didn’t go gonzo and tip Armageddon,” Tack told him. “Which would be why we’re here now. And why Mitch and Slim are up in Knight’s office with Hank Nightingale and Valenzuela’s on his way.”

That was a surprise.

“You’re shittin’ me,” Joker said.

“No,” Tack replied. “He’s got somethin’ to say and he wants a sit-down to say it. Whatever it is, Knight agreed not to cave his head in and instead act as mediator.”

“What he did to Heidi, we’re here, we sayin’ we’re not gonna cave his head in?” Joker asked and went on before any of them could answer. “And if that’s true, why?”

“Knight says he makes a convincing case he didn’t do it,” Tack said.

“Bullshit,” Joker bit out.

“You know Sebring’s no idiot,” Shy said quietly.

He did know that.

Fuck.

But if Valenzuela didn’t do it, who did?

Joker looked to Hop and Shy before turning his gaze back to Tack. “This is the sit-down I think it is, not sure why I’m here, brother. I’m not a lieutenant.”

“’Cause a woman had your name carved in her stomach,” Hop stated, and Joker looked back to him.

That was good enough reason.

Joker nodded.

“Let’s go, but Joke,” Tack started and Joker gave him his eyes. “Knight wouldn’t lead us into an ambush, either verbal or otherwise. There’s a reason we’re here. But Valenzuela is a wildcard. He wouldn’t blink at f*ckin’ Knight’s good intentions to do something to bare the beast in any of us. So whatever that motherf*cker has to say, do not give the beast to him. Keep your shit tight.”

Joker nodded again.

They moved the rest of the way across the space and into a hall to a door that had one of Sebring’s boys, a man called Live, standing outside it. They made nonverbal greetings as the guy opened the door, and they headed up a set of stairs that led to Sebring’s sound-proofed office.

Like Tack said, Knight was there, as were Mitch, Slim, and Hank, as well as Knight’s right-hand man, Rhashan Banks.

Greetings were extended, and they just got done with that when Rhash’s phone buzzed. He looked at it and then to Knight.

“Valenzuela’s here,” he announced.

The minute Valenzuela entered the room with his soldier, the air turned stagnant. Not a single man there wanted to be in the presence of the two who walked in, and as copasetic as this was supposed to be, that was communicated.

Men took seats at Sebring’s conference table by the window that overlooked the club and Joker watched how this happened so he could be where Tack needed him to be.

Knight sat, as did Tack, Mitch, Brock, Hank, and Valenzuela, at the table. Shy lounged on Sebring’s couch. Hop sat on the arm of the couch. Valenzuela’s soldier stood close to his back. Rhashan leaned against the door.

So Joker took his seat on the arm of one of the chairs in front of Sebring’s desk.

Valenzuela started it.

And he did it with a surprise opener.

“I come to barter.”

“Barter what?” Knight asked, looking displeased because whatever he thought this was, that was not it.

“I know who killed Heidi. I give that up, you…” Valenzuela eyes went to Tack, “retreat to Chaos.”

“And how would you know that?” Mitch asked.

Valenzuela looked to Joker. “I got birds who sing too.”

Joker’s back snapped straight, but he kept his seat when Hop’s eyes sliced to him.

“We’ll consider our territory eight miles around Chaos, you give us the name,” Tack said.

Tack was giving up two miles for Heidi.

Said a lot about him but it f*cked their cause.

It would be worth it.

Valenzuela looked to him. “Retreat to Chaos,” he stated. “By that I mean Ride.”

Shy shifted from ass in the couch to ass on the edge of it and Hop took his feet but hung back.

They did this because that was an insult. Heidi’s life was worth a lot, but Chaos giving up what they’d given blood for, which meant giving in, giving up, and letting filth infest their turf was asking too f*cking much.

Brock, who had more experience in a very real way, living among scum like Valenzuela when he was undercover for the DEA, stood. “This is a waste of time.”

“Don’t be hasty, detective,” Valenzuela urged.

“Then make an offer that isn’t bullshit,” Brock shot back.