Page 15 of Thick

I looked at Crip. “This fucker’s serious, isn’t he?”

Crip’s mouth twisted into a smirk. “He sure as fuck is. If it wasn’t for brother ‘Nut, you’d still be in there. Hell, you’d have been convicted and sent up the river for five years or more.”

I looked at P-Nut and lifted my chin slightly. “Appreciate it, ‘Nut.”

“Wasn’t nothing.” He shrugged. “Hell, I enjoyed it.”

I scanned the men. “So, the fucker’s still alive?”

Crip nodded. “Yep.”

“Not for fucking long,” I said through my teeth.

“Nope,” P-Nut said. “We’re done with that fucker. Had to promise him when I let him go that there’d be no retaliation. I gave the prick a choice. Either get you out of prison, or I was going to kill him. He picked first deal.”

I looked at Crip.

“Don’t look at me,” he said. “‘Nut made the deal.”

“So, that’s it? We just forget it? I’ve been locked in that shit-hole for months. Hell, I paid thirty grand for an attorney.”

“This wasn’t an easy deal,” Crip said. “The fucking ‘Nut found out he was a cop, and he kidnapped him and hauled him out in the middle of the fucking desert. Hell, he had the fucker--”

“Edge,” P-Nut interrupted. “He was at the edge of the desert.”

Crip looked at P-Nut, let out a heavy sigh, and then shifted his eyes to me. “Edge,” he said. “He was at the edge of the desert. Hell, ‘Nut had the fucker in that storage container for over a month before any of us knew about it. He was getting ready to kill the prick, and his Ol’ Lady stopped him. If it wasn’t for that, you’d be long gone.”

I looked at P-Nut. “Ol’ Lady? You’ve got an Ol’ Lady? Since when?”

He shrugged. “While back. Since you been locked up. Remember Smudge? My neighbor?”

“The lesbian that lived beside you?”

“She ain’t a lesbian. And, yeah. We’re together now.”

I would have never guessed P-Nut could commit to be with anyone. Truthfully, it seemed like all the club’s principals had Ol’ Ladies. Well, everyone but me.

“I’ll be damned,” I said. “Never would have guessed that’d happen.”

“When the right woman comes along, a man’s a damned fool if he argues it,” he said.

“No argument from me on that.” I glanced at each of the men. “I met a chick in jail. She was cool as fuck.”

Everyone gave me the same look of confusion.

Pee Bee chuckled. “In jail? You met a chick in fucking jail?”

“She was one of the guards.”

Crip’s eyes thinned. “A fucking cop?”

“She’s not a cop,” I said. “She was a prison guard.”

“What’s the difference? She works for the feds. A cop’s a cop.”

“She helped me keep my cool in that place. I can tell you that much for sure.”

“Maybe you should send her a fucking card and a box of See’s candies,” he said with a laugh.