Page 52 of Bad Attitude
“The idiot turned up at Kurt’s unit, didn’t he? Started yelling at Raven, threatened to go to the cops. So Kurt took him aside, and less than an hour later, the guy left town. Good fucking riddance.”
“Where is he now?”
“Word is, a week later he rode into a pickup in San Fran. Survived, but with brain damage. Guy’s a vegetable.”
“Yeah,”Cole says, tone as dry as dust.“Sheer fucking coincidence that Kurt is originally from there.”
“So the moral of that story, friend Declan,”Dario adds,“is you fucking watch yourself with Raven, or Kurt will be having a ‘little chat’ with you, too.”
“What’s this?”Cole asks sharply. His bike brakes ahead of mine, and I’m forced to pull up too. It’s a moment before he gets going again.
“It’s nothing,” I grind out. None of their goddamn business.
“Raven turns up Saturday morning,”Dario replies,“then leaves half an hour later. Then Loverboy here turnsup two hours after that, looking for her. Tasha blows him off.”
Cole is quiet for half a mile, while I’m seething. I was making progress, and now my relationship with Genesis is threatening to undermine everything I’ve achieved. I know better than this.
Never,everget personally involved with people in an operation, Declan.She’s a tool, nothing more. Manage her like one.
“I like you, man,”Cole says at last,“but I like her a hell of a lot more. You hurt her, all Kurt will have to do is get rid of your body.”
And I believe him, too.
“I just went out for a walk and some fucking breakfast,” I mutter down my mic. “She was gone when I got back.”
“Wait, wait, wait,”Cole says.“You had Raven in your bed and you go for a fuckingwalk? Are youinsane?”
Dario chortles over the comms.
There’s no comeback to that. Damn Mercer and her face-to-facecheck in.
“I won’t hurt her. It’s the farthest thing from my mind,” I say instead, because it’s what they want to hear. I ignore the way it also rings true. “If I do, I’ll stand still and make it easy for you.”
“No need for that, Loverboy,”Dario replies.“If Cole comes for you, running, standing still, or hiding in a bunker? None of it will make any difference.”
“Let’s see what you can do, Loverboy.” Dario hands me a Glock 17, a pistol I could strip and reassemble blindfolded.
We’re at the Angeles Shooting Range, a long covered shelter with benches, paper targets set against a natural backstop of pale earth and rock. There’s a scatter of guys using it, but it’s quiet enough that we have our own space. We’ve all lost our jackets, bare from the waist up. It’s too hot anyway, and the stiff Kevlar armor in elbows and shoulders isn’t conducive to firing. My tattoos draw some interest, but no comments.
I’m first up, and I know these guys are good—Cole, at least. And I’ve already told him I was in the Marines.
The range is 50 yards, enough to make it a little challenging, but there’s no wind. I put eight rounds in a three-inch group, and Dario slaps the bench in respect.
Cole looks bored. “This is pointless.” He punches my shoulder, right over my Eagle, Globe and Anchor Marine tattoo. “Let’s go a hundred yards.”
He leads the way a few stations farther down, until we have paper silhouette targets at the right distance. Dario leans forward, squinting. “Uh… I think I can see those.”
“You’re not that fucking old.” Cole waves him forward, and I hand over the Glock. It still has nine rounds left.
Dario puts them all into center-mass, taking his time, a few good shots with some outliers. It’s not abad effort for someone without military training. He grimaces, not bothering to reach for the spotting scope we’ve borrowed, and sets the empty weapon down on the bench. “Your turn, Limey,” he says to Cole. “Don’t hold back.”
This, I want to see. Just how good is Cole?
The issue is the weapon itself. The Glock is a service pistol, not a precision instrument. Stock sights, and the trigger is striker-fired, not match-grade. At this range, anything better than a five-inch grouping is luck.
And I’m not the only one with tattoos, though Cole only has two: a Pegasus on one arm, a parachute with wings on the other,Utrinque Paratusbeneath. So I’m not surprised when he puts eight rounds into the silhouette’s head, tight enough to cover with a hand. It’s still damn impressive.
He sets the weapon down, leans forward to peer at the target, then sniffs like it was nothing. “It’s no fun when they’re not moving.”
