Adler (The Henchmen MC 14)

It was the first time she showed a soft spot, making me flip to the page in question, scanning through the notes from the medical examiner.

I wish I could say it sickened me, that I was shocked by it. But I had lived in the deepest, ugliest places in the world, had brushed shoulders with the vilest of human beings. Very little managed to catch me off-guard.

This woman, barely more than a girl, who had the face of a cherub, all plump cheeks and bright eyes, making her appear at least five years younger than her actual age on the missing persons flier that had been on the page before the medical examiner's report, had been beaten, sliced, burned, and raped before she was finally given the sweet release of death. By strangulation, it was reported.

"How'd he even get bail?" I asked, exhaling hard.

At that, Lou snorted, disdain filling the little sound. "A sympathetic judge."

"Sympathetic of what?"

"The long life he had ahead of him, I imagine," she said, referencing the somewhat young age of the man in question.

"Before he took the life away from someone else."

She shot me a look over her shoulder, something full of a mix of resignation and disgust. "There's nothing just about the justice system these days."

Couldn't exactly disagree with that.

It was why I had been so fucking busy all those years when I was finally on my own, able to make my own life. People who couldn't get justice in the traditional ways. So they came to me. To deal with it in an old-fashioned way.

It was almost impressive how many sick fucks managed to escape cages or lethal injections.

"Ya ain't just in this for the money, huh, duchess?" I asked, watching as she took one hand off the wheel to gather a handful of her brown hair, the movement making the silky strands catch the sunlight, revealing strips of gold and auburn mixed in with all the mahogany as she twisted it and settled it on one shoulder, so it stopped blowing in her face.

"You mean do I enjoy getting the scumbags off the street? Yes, I do."

"And rough 'em up a bit in the process."

Her lips curved up at that, teasing up the corners of her eyes. "Only if they try to run."

"How many try to run?"

This time, when she smiled, she sent the whole thing my way. And it fucking lit up her whole face. "All of them."

We fell into a companionable silence for the next hour or so, pulling down toward the boardwalk.

It was a ghost town, many of the summer shops shuttered for the cold season. Snow capped some of the buildings, the dunes, blanketing the familiar wooden planks locals and tourists alike would flock to once the weather warmed.

As it was, though, the area was all but abandoned save for a lone female runner, her purple-sneaker-clad-feet landing easily on the slippery snow, her high blonde ponytail bouncing with each stride forward.

"I hate AC," Lou declared, exhaling hard.

"Got a problem with gambling?"

"Got a problem with places that pretend to be something they're not. All lit up at night as if they could shine a light in all the dark, seedy corners."

"Unlike the Bronx?" I asked, not exactly one who easily let things go. And she hadn't been forthcoming about her past. Hell, she hadn't even wanted to tell me her name. "Where all the ugly is all up in your face?"

"At least it's honest," she said with a shrug, side-eyeing a duo of men standing just to the side of one of the buildings in town, right there in broad daylight, painfully obviously making a drug deal.

"Where are we staying?"

"I will figure out where I am staying after I have put some footwork in. No point getting a room if I need to skip towns. You should check out the local train schedule, and get your ass back to Navesink Bank."

"And miss all the fun?"

"Don't you have street gangs to arm with assault rifles?" she asked, pulling into a spot, throwing the car into park, giving me her undivided attention for an almost unsettling moment.

"Don't insult me. We only arm large street gangs with assault rifles."

"And you feel no guilt in that? Even knowing how many innocent people get shot during gang wars?"

"It's just a job, duchess. None of us are saints. But that's a problem to face up if you get hauled in or when ya are facing up the pearly gates lookin' for absolution."

"You believe in the Pearly Gates?" she asked, head cocked to the side slightly.

"Ya don't?" I asked, reaching outward, watching her eyes as they watched my hand reach for her neck, picking up the Saint Paul medallion she wore around her neck, the gold tarnished a bit with age and wear. "Then why wear this?"

"It was my mother's," she declared, jerking away, cutting the engine, climbing out, and slamming the door.