Shelter From The Storm (The Bare Bones MC Book 6)(21)
“There was something Fox said about an explosion?” I said meekly. I was too weak to pull my arrows from the hay bales—hell, I was a biochemist, not an athlete—so I had to use this rubber clamp thing to yank them. Even then, I was straining so badly I had to put my knee against the target.
Wolf frowned. “Explosion?”
I lowered my voice. Slushy and a real buff, macho older guy named Sax were taking their arrows out of two more bales ten yards farther than ours. “The other day, at The Hip Quiver. Fox said there was an explosion, and the two of you ran off.”
“Oh. That.” He sauntered over, sticking his arrows into his own hip quiver that was slung jauntily around his waist. Then he babbled like a boy on Christmas Eve. “Yeah, it was something! One of the Leaves of Grass transport trucks exploded! Well, it didn’t spontaneously explode. Someone firebombed it to sabotage our weed shipment. Just to be *s. It was acramazing.” To add to my hot and bothered mood, Wolf easily whipped my six arrows from the bale like taking candles from a cake. He grinned ear to ear as he handed me the whole sheaf.
“Oh. So I guess you guys…finished whatever you needed to do?”
Wolf lost the grin, and huffed. “Just ask what you want to know, woman. We like plain talk around here.”
“Do you? I mean, every time I accidentally ask a question about Lytton, or Ford, or even about August who isn’t even a member of the motorcycle club, I get hit with this stony stare. Like I was asking for a backdoor into a terrorist’s cellphone logs.”
“You want to know where Fox went.” Wolf started walking back to the shooting line, and I had to jog to keep up. “Just speak plain English! Women never fail to amaze me with their roundabout, backstabbing, completely obtuse—”
“Yes,” I cried to get Wolf back on track. “That’s what I want to know. I don’t really care about your business. I want to know if Fox is still around.”
“I thought as much. You know, women and cats will do as they please. Men and dogs should just relax and get used to the idea.”
“Actually, in this case it’s the men who are doing as they pl—”
“Ah, women are like a scaly wall, unable to be climbed!” Wolf froze, his fist accusing God of wrongdoing. “Wait. Women are like a fortress you cannot destroy. Wait.”
“Tracy again?” Slushy and Sax had returned their arrows to the arrow holders, so I followed suit and took my bow off the rack. “Maybe you should date someone else, Wolf. Get your mind off Tracy.”
“Who said it was about Tracy? Weren’t we talking about Fox? You know, why buy the cow when you can get the milk for free?”
I paused, about to nock an arrow. “Why buy a pig just to get a little sausage?”
Wolf looked confused, so I shot.
Aside from getting me away from my work, I was really enjoying archery. The indoor range was all right, but someone had set up this whole outdoor range behind the hangar, and it was like being on the moon. Maddie told me that hippies often came up there to meditate, believing it to be a powerful vortex for their kundalini or some such horseshit. I could see why, though. The vista was open for miles, a vast landscape of sandstone castles formed by eons of wind. The Army, of course, had chosen the best site for their airbase back in the early twentieth century. The whole base was shut down, mothballed, being turned over to civilian use. A few facilities still housed Navy men, and I’d seen some officers with government plates. The Bare Bones had just taken over one of their unused hangars, and it came with views a realtor would give her left bunghole for.
“Anyway,” said Wolf, effortlessly getting another bullseye, “Fox is still around. We haven’t completed our op yet. He’s staying with Lytton and June.”
My arrow went wild. I had “thrown it away,” as Fox would say, and damned good thing someone had built up that earthen mound behind the bales. Or someone in the not-so-nearby town of Cottonwood would be running around like William Tell’s son.
What the f*ck? Fox was staying in the same house as June? The girl I spent hours talking to each day? And she hadn’t bothered to mention it to me? I’d told her how Fox had saved me from a ticket, although I’d left out the part about his lawyer background just in case he was entrusting me with a secret. I’d like to think so, anyway.
I’d spoken of him in glowing tones to June. I’d even asked a few blunt questions, like was he married, but June said she’d only just met him, too. She thought he was a smoking piece of man candy, too, but being in the hitman trade made him sort of, well, undesirable. June said something about his expiration date probably coming up soon. That was true.
But I’d seen her at least three times since then and she hadn’t mentioned Fox was living with her? I could always casually drop by there on my way to or from Leaves of Grass. I could make up some plausible story about sharing a new brainstorm I’d had, something I didn’t want to text her, like there was mold growing on some early-flowering Young Man Blue plants, so I’d moved my medicinal Dabba Doo seedlings away from them. Or the forecast called for a five degree drop in temperature, so we’d better roll the awning—
“Pippa!” brayed Wolf. “Are you at all interested in hitting that hay bale? I’m not walking down to that berm. I’ve spent enough time crawling around behind dirt walls.”