Ride Steady(90)

He grinned and replied, “What’d he give you?”

“Teacher, like you said he was before. A high school in Highlands Ranch. Tenured. Married. Pays his taxes. Five years into his current mortgage—”

Joker cut him off. “I dig that Nightingale was thorough, but I don’t need to know that kinda shit.”

“Clue me in. What do you need?” Tack asked.

“He got a family?”

“Married. Once and still. They been that way for eleven years,” Tack told him.

“No kids?”

“Lee didn’t mention kids.”

“I’ll call Lee.”

There was a pause before, “Got it.”

“And Tack?”

“Yeah.”

“Thanks,” he muttered, grabbing his wallet and shoving it in his back pocket, loading the chain onto his belt.

“Anything, Joke,” Tack muttered back and disconnected.

Joker picked up his keys, shrugged on his cut, and moved to the door, his attention back to his phone, his thumb moving to Nightingale’s contact.

He listened to the rings long enough he figured he’d get voicemail before Lee answered on, “Joke.”

“Lee. Callin’ for some follow up on Robinson,” Joker told him.

“What do you need?” Lee asked.

“He got kids?”

“Nope.”

Fuck.

“How thorough were you?” Joker pushed.

“How thorough are we usually?”

He had everything.

“I know he and his wife lost a baby eight years ago. Wanna know where that led.”

“They’re still married.”

“Need more, Lee,” Joker said quietly. Having walked through the building, he was pushing through the front door to the Compound.

“Retained enough to report to Tack. Don’t know specifics of the file. I’m out of the office. Hang on, I’ll patch in Shirleen.”

Shirleen was Nightingale’s receptionist, and Shirleen used to be one half of a formidable aunt and nephew team that dealt dope in Denver. Shirleen and her nephew pulling out of that shit years ago opened it up for Valenzuela to wreak havoc.

Regardless of the consequences, it took balls, huge ones, for Shirleen to do that. He’d met her. He liked her. Because of that and because she was f*cking hilarious, said it like it was, and had been a cold-as-ice drug dealer that hid a heart of gold, a heart she let shine now, it was impossible not to like her.

Suddenly Shirleen piped in. “This better be good. My nails are wet.”

“Shirleen. Got Joker on the line. Need you to pull up the Robinson file,” Lee ordered.

“You’re lucky clickin’ on my mouse don’t mess up my new manicure,” she muttered.

Joker stopped by his bike and grinned at his boots.

“File up, need direction,” Shirleen stated.

“Medical records. The wife,” Lee told her.

“What am I lookin’ for?” she asked.

“Babies,” Joker told her.

“Scanned the file already, son. Man’s got no babies,” Shirleen confirmed unnecessarily.

“Attempts at getting them,” Joker clarified.

“Oh. Right. Hang on.”

Joker waited.

Lee waited.

Shirleen came back. “Three miscarriages. A stillborn, which breaks my heart. Another miscarriage. More of Shirleen’s heart breakin’. Looks like after that, they gave up. Hang on again.”

Joker hung on, but he did it feeling his entire chest squeeze.

“Another file. Luke just added it this mornin’,” Shirleen said. “They adopted. Momma pulled a fast one, took their money to keep her all good during the pregnancy. Handed over the baby, they had him ten days and she changed her mind. I’m scannin’ as I’m talkin’ but what I see, seemed the girl was legit. She was young and scared. Took one look at her baby, changed her mind. Her prerogative. Still breaks my heart yet again for your guy and his woman.”

“Jesus Christ,” Joker hissed.

“That what you need?” Lee joined in.

It was. It wasn’t want he wanted, though.

“Yeah.”

“You wanna share with us why you want that shit on this guy?” Lee asked, and Joker knew it wasn’t a request. He also knew Lee wasn’t big on sharing in-depth information about a man that was good on paper with a random curious biker.