Page 50 of Bad Attitude
“R1.”
I nod in approval. “That’s a decent bit of Yamaha. You want to go out for a couple of hours?”
“Sure, why not.” He looks at Dario as he keeps exercising. “Coming?”
“Yeah, but I drove.” Dario slides his phone back in his pocket. “I’ll have to go home and get my bike.”
“Do you all ride?” I ask.
“Can’t be part of Kurt’s crew if you don’t ride,” Dario replies.
“Or do art,” Cole points out. “Graffiti is his thing,” he tells me, “but Tasha’s tattoos are the best I’ve ever seen. She doesn’t ride.”
She’s sitting right there, ignoring us. I don’t think she likes me.
Or she likes Genesis a whole lot more. Completely understandable.
“Where are you thinking of going?” Dario asks.
Cole pauses at the top of a rep. “Mulholland Drive?”
I shake my head. “Too built up and slow traffic. San Gabriel Canyon?”
“If you want a canyon road, how about Little Tujunga?” Dario suggests.
“It’s pretty short,” I reply. I want a bit longer withthem if they’re going to accept me.
“So we run it twice, there and back,” Cole proposes. “Then hit the range at the bottom.” He looks at me in challenge. “Can you shoot?”
“I’ve been known to fire a few rounds.” In the Marines, anything less than Expert on the rifle was considered underperforming.
“Sounds like a day,” Dario pushes himself to his feet. “Give me half an hour, I’ll meet you at the bottom of Tujunga Canyon. Tasha, you got comms for us?”
Better and better.
She gives a long-suffering sigh. “Now I’m kitting you out for a jolly?”
“You’re kitting us out because you love us.”
“Fuck that. But I’ll do it for some peace and quiet.”
Cole’s Yamaha R1 is the same size as my Fireblade, and he handles it pretty well.
It’s sharper than my bike, the ride position higher, but Cole is leaner than I am, and it suits him.
“Been riding long?” I ask over the comms.
“Since I was sixteen.”His voice is tinny in my ear.“Dirt bikes near where I grew up.”
“Which was where? England?”
“Wales, actually. But yes, I’m English.”His accent comes through more strongly on that line.“Do you know the Brecon Beacons?”
Oh, yes. It’s where the British SAS train. I wonder if he’s had first-hand experience. “Sure. The Brits talked about it often when I was on tour in Afghanistan.”
“You were in the army?”
“Marines. Two tours, three years.” Then my degree, and after that the FBI came knocking.
