13
Mercy
By the timeKaige had directed me to a small, inconspicuous warehouse on the outskirts of Paradise City and we’d parked the truck inside, Rowan had caught up with us in his car. He and Wylder ambled into the narrow loading bay, Wylder jerking the garage-style door shut behind them.
I looked them over quickly, trying not to let him see me checking for wounds. I didn’t want to show I cared, but I was relieved to see that other than a scrape on Rowan’s forehead and a ruddy blotch on Wylder’s arm that was on the verge of bruising, they appeared to have made it through the shoot-out uninjured.
“Did all of the Noble people get out okay?” I asked, assuming they’d been in touch with the men from the other car.
Rowan nodded. “One of them took a bullet to the thigh and another had his ear clipped, but nothing Frank can’t deal with.”
Kaige chuckled as he opened up the back of the truck. “We gave out a hell of a lot better than we got.”
He climbed into the truck and opened up a crate that must have been one Wylder had opened earlier, its lid came off so easily. He picked up a baggie of pale gray powder and made a face. “Is this whole truck full of this stuff?”
“It looks like,” Wylder said. “I’m guessing it’s that new drug we’ve started hearing about on the streets. They’re calling it Glory, right? Bryant would have been counting on getting a lot of funding for his operations out of selling this load. Not anymore.” He grinned viciously.
Kaige opened the baggie with unusual care and took a quick sniff. “Holy shit, I can already tell that’s strong stuff.” He shook his head, his expression darkening. “So what are we doing with it? I vote that we incinerate the whole load.”
Having seen his fondness for weed, I was surprised he wasn’t advocating we all party with it, but maybe harder drugs weren’t his thing.
Wylder motioned for him to get out of the truck and shut it again, sticking a padlock on the door for good measure. “For now, we hang on to it until we decide the best way to make use of it. No point in destroying a potential resource.”
Kaige grumbled wordlessly but didn’t say anything else.
“At least losing all this should slow the Steel Knights down a lot,” I said. “And it showed their supporters that the Nobles are stronger.” The thought of the former Claws guys who’d sold their souls to my father’s murderer made my stomach roil. Every former Claws member who’d joined the Steel Knights had better be regretting their choice.
“Right,” Rowan said. “This was a pretty big shipment. I wonder if the Steel Knights are the ones who’ve been doing most of the distributing of the stuff. If so, they’ll be low on stock now.”
“Well, that’s even better,” Kaige said, swiping his hands. “We screwed over Colt and got all this crap off the streets. That’s even more of a victory than we expected. I say it calls for some celebrating.”
Wylder’s gaze darted to me for just a second, and I could tell his momentary hesitation was because of my presence among them. But I wasn’t going to bow out because he had his head up his ass. I wanted to focus on the good things about tonight, not the parts that’d unsettled me.
“I’m in!” I said. “What are we doing?”
Kaige’s face lit up. “We haven’t gone to the Gilded Walls in forever. And there isn’t much else that’ll be open.”
“Sounds good to me,” Rowan said with a questioning look at his boss.
Wylder looked as if he’d restrained a sigh, but then he smiled. “Let’s do this. Gilded Walls it is.”
“It’s the best place,” Kaige told me excitedly as Rowan drove us there. “The husband’s from India and the wife from China, so they serve both kinds of food and all this fusion stuff. I could eat a whole table of it.”
I laughed, letting my gaze skim over his massive torso. “I’ll bet you could, and the table too.”
He caught my gaze and waggled his eyebrows suggestively. “And I know just what I’d like to eat for dessert.”
I couldn’t help licking my lips. I might just be up for that.
Wylder stirred in the front seat, but if he had a problem with Kaige’s insinuation, he didn’t say anything about it.
The restaurant was tucked away between two larger, flashier places, its sign a little faded. True to its name, a gold leaf pattern was etched on the walls. Even at a little after midnight, a couple of the tables were occupied. The rich, spicy scents that hung in the air immediately had me salivating.
A bronze-skinned man with close-cropped black hair hustled out of the back as we ambled through the cozy room, flashing a brilliant grin. I guessed this was one of the owners.
“Sir,” he said to Wylder. “It’s a great privilege to have you joining us again. I’ll see to your service myself.” Perks of being a Noble, I guessed.
Wylder clapped him on the shoulder. “Thanks, Rahul. You always take good care of us. You know our favorites.”