Page 74 of Wraith

I pour cream into my coffee and take a long drink just to prove a point I’m not sure I understand, but feel I have to anyway, because this man and his tea-bags and his tight pants and his muscular ass unnerve me.

June sits beside me and Gator sits beside Goldie, and for a moment we’re all just looking at each other across the table. The awkwardness is thick enough to cut.

“So,” Gator says finally. “You want to tell me what the fuck happened?”

June takes a breath. I can see her organizing her thoughts, deciding what to say and what to leave out.

“The Sons found my apartment,” she says. “Sent two guys. Bruiser and Hawk. They were going to take me. But Wraith stopped them.”

Gator’s eyes move to me. There’s no gratitude there. Just cold assessment. I don’t blame him. He knows the history between June and me. “Why? What the fuck were you doing around my sister?”

“Because I didn’t want her taken,” I say simply.

“You’re a Son. Were a Son. Whatever. And either way, a piece of fucking trash,” Gator’s jaw tightens.

June reaches across the table and puts a hand on Gator. “Evan…”

He sighs, twice. “Why would you turn on your own club for her?”

“Because I love her.”

The words come out easier than they should. June’s hand finds mine under the table and squeezes.

Goldie’s eyebrows go up slightly, but his expression remains peaceful. “That’s beautiful, brother. Really. Love is the highest vibration we can achieve as humans. But it also complicates things from a practical standpoint.”

“No shit,” Gator mutters.

The waitress returns with coffee for everyone but Goldie, who gets a mug of hot water with a Lipton green tea bag on the side. He examines the tea bag with the care of a jeweler inspecting a questionable diamond, then dunks it and sets it aside to steep.

“There’s something else,” June says, and her voice goes quieter. “Something I need to tell you about when I was captive.”

Gator leans forward. “What?”

“I wasn’t the only one there.” She’s looking at her coffee now, not at any of us. “There was another man. A prospect in the Sons. Young guy. Maybe twenty-five. They found out he was an informant. Federal informant.”

The temperature in the booth drops about twenty degrees.

“Jesus Christ,” Gator breathes.

“They tortured him,” June continues, and her voice is steady, but I can hear the effort it takes. “For days. Trying to find out what he’d told the feds. What evidence he had. Who else was involved. And then when they’d gotten everything they could out of him...” She swallows. “They killed him. Shot him in the head. And then they cut his body into pieces and took it to a hog farm three counties over.”

Silence.

Even Goldie’s serene expression falters slightly.

“You witnessed this?” Goldie asks quietly.

“I heard most of it. Saw some of it through the door when they brought him past my room.” June’s hand is shaking slightly around her coffee mug. “I know where the farm is. I know who did it. I know what info he gave them. He was very loud.”

“Fuck,” Gator says, and his face has gone pale. “Junebug, that’s... you’re a witness to a capital crime against a federal informant. You understand what that means?”

“It means the Sons won’t stop coming for me.” June’s voice is flat. “I know.”

Goldie pulls his tea bag out of the water and sets it carefully on the saucer. He takes a sip, makes a face like he’s tasting battery acid, but drinks it anyway.

“That could bring down their entire organization,” Goldie says, and now his tone has shifted from Zen surfer to something sharper. More focused. “If you testified, the feds would jump on this. They’d dismantle the Sons piece by piece.”

“But June would be a rat,” I say, and the word comes out harder than I intend. “She’d have a target on her back for the rest of her life. Witness protection maybe. Years of trials. And even after the Sons are in prison, their associates, their allies, anyone loyal to them — they’d all be looking for her.”