coyotes don’t find him first. I wouldn’t worry about it.”
I poked him in the chest. “Of course you wouldn’t worry about it. You’re just a kid! This job was on me. And if it wasn’t cleaned up properly, that comes back on me too. You two had one job!”
Blaze put his hands up in surrender. “I tried to work as fast as I could, but some people were a little squeamish around the dead bodies. I had to lift one of the guys by myself! It took forever.”
Ryder pushed me aside and got right into Cruz’s face. “Is this true? Could you not handle it?”
Cruz blew up. “You know I can handle it! And I wasn’t being a pussy. I was just interested. Wanted to see how they died, I don’t know maybe I’ll be like Bones one day. Get into the medical field or something. Don’t you think that’s kind of important?”
Ryder put his hand over his eyes. “Sure, Cruz, that’s important. But not when you’re trying to get rid of dead bodies, you dumbass. Guys that we killed.” He shook his head and walked back toward the clubhouse. Cruz followed, his head hanging in shame.
Blaze and I stood outside in the waning sunlight for just a few more moments, as I waited to see what he would say. Finally he spoke. “I think it’s going to be fine. He was really far down there, and there wasn’t any other evidence of a crash. No one will even look for him. The cops will just drive through, see that no one’s still around, and move on.” He paused and looked straight into my eyes. I couldn’t help but melt a little, no matter all the stress I was feeling. Those eyes always reeled me in. “Trista, there’s nothing tying this back to us. The cars aren’t even here, and no one knows about the warehouse.”
I rolled my eyes and threw my arms up, backing away. “For now. The warehouse is crawling with Red Dragons. They had to find a couple new buyers because we grabbed more cars than we were supposed to. Chen seems to think he has it figured out, but I just thought we got out of there unscathed. How did it all go to hell once we got back?”
Blaze stepped to me and lifted my chin with his knuckle so that our eyes met. “It’s going to be fine. Now, let’s go in there and celebrate with everyone else that no one got killed today. We can worry about the rest later.”
He laid a soft kiss on my lips, the stress melting away with his touch. I nodded, and he walked past me and into the clubhouse. I took one more deep breath, and followed him, just praying that nothing else would go wrong tonight.
SIX
TRISTA
The place was hopping. Everybody had a drink in his or her hand, even my dad who was on the couch, holding a pack of ice to his face with one hand and clutching a beer in the other hand. He didn’t look quite as beat up as I initially thought. He must’ve just gotten one really good punch to the face, which knocked him out. Thank God, whatever Mexican had done that to him, had decided not to end it with a gunshot too. We’d been lucky. Blaze grabbed a bottle of beer off the bar, and walked upstairs toward the pool room. We had a few great memories there, and I was hoping he wanted to relive them. A little stress relief would be nice.
Larry wiped the bar down, and then tossed the towel over his shoulder before coming to a stop in front of me. He nodded his head toward me. “What are you drinking?”
“Anything strong.”
With a smile, he headed over to the hard liquor, grabbing a bottle of vodka. As I waited for my drink, I scanned the bar watching everyone celebrate. My eyes fell on Rocco. He stood alone staring at his phone. There was something… off with him, but I couldn’t quite pinpoint it. When he noticed me looking at him, he hurried up the stairs, and I followed him. Blaze would have to wait a moment. The panicked look in Rocco’s eyes didn’t sit right with me.
I crept slowly the stairs, careful to avoid the ones I knew creaked, and, when I reached the top, I held up my finger to tell