Page 66 of Tiny's Testament
The van pulls off the gravel, suspension groaning under the weight of too many sins. The engine hums steadily. Bones treats that piece of shit like it’s a firstborn, and we slip into the night without so much as a headlight flare.
We don’t go straight back to the clubhouse. Bones takes the long way of two loops through an old industrial town, a cut through a dark alley behind a half-shuttered salvage yard, then another mile past the storm drain channels where Dagger dumped two bodies last summer.
Just in case someone’s tailing us. Just in case someone cares enough to watch this kid vanish. No one does. Which tells me everything about Lattimer’s army.
When Bones finally slows, I know exactly where we are. The old packing shed on the Royal Bastards' property. It’s off-grid with no cameras. Smells like mildew and secrets. A place I don’t want Syvannah near, but I know she’s been here before when Nadia, Exleigh, and Syvannah killed Josiah.
Dagger cracks the van doors, and I climb out, dragging the guy behind me. A string bulb hangs on a far wire, swinging lazily and splashing the shed with a sickly yellow that screams “gallows.”
Trigger jerks his chin. “Wake him.”
I haul the courier upright, feeling the zip tie cut into his skin as he starts to struggle.
Time to open him up. And time for me to lose a little more of who I’m trying to be.
I crouch beside the courier, watching the pulse flutter in his neck as he starts to come around. Trigger rests the muzzle of his pistol on his knee, pointing nowhere, meant for everywhere.
The kid’s eyes blink open, unfocused. He sees me first.
“Welcome to the Bastards,” Trigger says dryly. “We don’t do hospitality. You’ll get used to it.”
The kid blinks awake to my shadow. He’s not as young as the one on the road, but he wears his borrowed swagger the same. Hellhound jawbone tattoo, half-healed. Bad work, but a fresh earn-in.
“Want me to read him his rights?” Trigger asks, tone so dry it’s almost kind, even though it’s not.
“Only one right that matters,” I say, squatting eye-level. “The right answer.”
Dagger stands at the door, a blade resting lazily in his hand.
Red whispers in my ear,“Phone’s clean. Wiped after every send. But look at the transaction alerts cached. Drops from a private equity shell. That name ring a bell?”He reads it. It rings like a gunshot in my bones.
Lattimer. Spelled in a suit’s handwriting, but the same throat.
My face must change because the kid grins, split lip, and bravado. “Oh, you know him.”
Trigger’s voice is almost conversational. “What’s your name, son?”
“Wolf,” he says, laughing.
“Try again,” I say, almost bored.
He juts his chin. “Wolf.”
Trigger pulls up a rickety chair and turns it around, slow and polite. “Here’s the thing about wolves,” he says, folding his arms on the backrest. “They think the pack saves them. But the packdoesn’t come when you’re in the trap. They let you gnaw your leg off and call it loyalty.” He nods at me, almost indulgent. “Ask your question again, Cap.”
“What hub does your spoke feed?” I keep my tone soft, almost gentle. It scares men worse than shouting.
He spits near my boot. “Bite me.”
“Ah, ah, ah,” Trigger says, standing. “Wrong answer.”
The first hit is an open palm, just enough to rock him. The second is my knuckles to his solar plexus, a lesson in humility. The third is Trigger again, a body jab that steals his breath without breaking ribs.
We escalate in inches. You don’t break a radio by screaming, you tune the frequency. Dagger slides a crate over so I can sit. He doesn’t need to say it. I’m going to be here a while.
“Try again,” I say.
He spits blood this time. “Lattimer,” he wheezes. “Pays on time.”
