They turned to leave, but Shades stopped them.
“Wait up.”
When Ghost turned back to look at him, he pulled an envelope from his back pocket and passed it to Ghost. “Can you drop that by the clubhouse on your way home? Butcher’s waiting for it. Save me the trip.”
Ghost took it. “Yeah, sure.”
They moved down the stairs, around the house
and climbed on Ghost’s bike.
Twenty minutes later, as the light was fading from the sky, they pulled down the alley to the back gates of the clubhouse.
Yammer sat on the ground, leaning back against the wooden fence by the gate.
“Hey, Yammer. Open the gate,” Ghost called, his bike idling.
Yammer didn’t move, his head hanging as if he’d fallen asleep.
“Yammer!” Ghost barked.
When he still didn’t respond, Ghost shut his bike off, and he and Jessie both climbed off as he moved toward the prospect.
Jessie watched as Ghost kicked him.
“Wake up, motherfucker.”
Yammer slumped over onto his side, and Ghost stepped back.
“What the fuck?”
A gloved hand clamped over Jessie’s mouth, and a strong arm grabbed her around the waist, pulling her against a solid chest, her purse falling to the ground. She watched as another shadowy figure immerged from some bushes and charged Ghost. He was caught off guard as the man brought what looked like a pipe down on his head with a crack.
Jessie tried to scream as she watched Ghost crumple to the ground. A moment later, a dark sedan was barreling down the alley, its lights off. It stopped, and the man that had ahold of her was suddenly shoving her face forward down over the trunk, yanking her arms behind her back and cuffing her wrists. He yanked her back up, and she was able to see the other man rolling Ghost to his back and cuffing him as well. Then he dug in Ghost’s pocket, pulled out his cell phone and chunked it across the fence into the clubhouse yard.
The man behind her held her tightly; his hand over her mouth while the driver popped the trunk open, jumped out and helped the other man carry Ghost to the trunk. They hefted him inside, the car dipping with his weight.
Then she was being shoved toward the trunk, lifted and tossed on top of Ghost. She landed with a thud against his chest. With their hands cuffed behind their backs, she could do nothing to break her fall against him. She heard him grunt as she rolled partially off him. And then the lid slammed down, and they were trapped in utter darkness.
“Ghost,” she whispered frantically, and he moaned. “Ghost, please, please, wake up.”
She was afraid for him. She wasn’t sure how hard he’d been hit, but it had been enough to knock him out, and that couldn’t be good. And she admitted to herself that as selfish a thought as it was, the thought of going through this alone terrified her, and that’s what she’d be if she couldn’t get him to wake up.
The car rocked when the men climbed inside. She felt the car begin to move, slowly at first, and then making a turn and picking up speed.
“Ghost. Ghost. Baby, please wake up. I need you. You have to be okay.”
He moaned again, and then he murmured her name.
“Jessie—”
“Yes, oh, thank God. Are you hurt?”
“My head feels like someone took a baseball bat to it.” And then he began to squirm, as if just realizing something wasn’t right. “Where are we? What happened?”
“Some guys jumped us at the back gate. They hit you over the head. We’re in the trunk of a car.”
“Fuck. You okay, sweetheart?”