Low Sided by A.J. Downey (best detective novels of all time txt) 📕

a slow smile painting his lips which I think was meant to put me at ease but… yeah… “Rat City is lousy with ‘em,” he finished.

“Shoreman’s,” I said, and didn’t like telling him where I worked, but… hell. In for a penny, in for a pound, I thought to myself. There wasn’t really any going back on this one, and I guess there were worse things than being in good with The Sacred Hearts for a minute. At least I wasn’t on the outs with them like I seemed to be with so many other factions around these parts. Law enforcement in particular.

“Thanks,” he said, and he woke up his phone in his hand and tapped something out.

“Mav, what’re you doing?” Glassjaw called.

“Having the prospect pick up Mace’s bike from where he left it.”

“Oh, got ‘cha.”

Maverick wandered back in the direction of my bedroom and I felt some of the tension leave my posture, the water starting to boil behind me. I sighed and brought down my teapot and three cups.

It was one of my best possessions, the teapot. A stellar find at a second-hand sale at a church. A genuine Brown Betty. I brought down three of my cracked, but still pretty teacups and spooned in some of my vanilla bourbon rooibos tea into my little brown pot. Pouring the water in after the tea, I dropped the lid on with a satisfying little clatter and set my kitchen timer for a three-minute steep time.

“What’re you doing?” I jumped and turned around, eyeing Glassjaw over my shoulder.

“Making tea.”

He gave me a sort of crooked grin and asked, “For bikers?”

“Only if it doesn’t threaten your fragile masculinity,” I answered flippantly, tempering my words with a smile. His smile grew, and he barked a laugh.

“Fair, fair,” he said and stuck his hands in his pockets. “Look, about earlier…” He fixed me with a look, and I swallowed hard and stared back. “Took a lot of balls coming up on us cold like that. I appreciate it and I apologize if I scared you.”

“Tea?” I asked evenly, and he smiled.

“Not my usual thing, but sure,” he said back with a nod.

Cool.

3

Mace…

It took a couple of hours for the doc to get to Raven’s. He was retired out of Vancouver, Washington, right there on the border with Portland. His medical license had been revoked by the state for assisting a terminally ill patient to the other side. That shit was legal just across the border, but his wife had been so bad, and you had to be a resident in Oregon for a year or some shit and, well… he couldn’t stand watching her in so much pain. She’d begged him and he’d done his time.

As soon as he’d gotten out, he’d moved across into Portland and tried to rebuild his life. The club had helped; his cousin had brought him in. Now, he was on tap for emergencies like the odd beatdown like mine, or even a non-life-threatening gunshot wound or two.

He was also one of the reasons we were in the illegal prescription drug trade… he was our contact throughout the south and still had his finger on the pulse of where the drugs needed to go. He was also still in touch with old colleagues who knew how fucked the American healthcare system was. They were as fuckin’ over it as he had been at the point when he’d given his wife the medication that she’d needed to skirt a lingering death from her inoperable brain tumor.

We filled a much-needed fucking gap, poured some filler in the cracks, and not a goddamn one of us was sorry for it.

“Shit, buddy. You look rough,” he said, sliding his soft-sided med kit off his leather-clad shoulder and setting it down next to me.

“Concussion, fractured ribs for sure…” Raven’s voice was soft from the doorway. She stood leaning against the doorframe, her arms crossed over her stomach, putting her ample chest on somewhat of display. She wasn’t lying about the dreads being some wig. She had them off now, her dishwater blonde hair in a sort of sloppy, looping knot at the base of her skull as she turned her head, not looking at anyone. There was a sort of strange reaction as everyone in the room fixed their attention on her.

“Yeah, well, let’s just have a look at ‘cha here.” Eulogy kneeled down next to me. That was his road name. Although his real name was Jack, a surefire way to get punched in the mouth or get him to hate you would be to call him “Eulogy” to his face.

That was the thing about road names. You didn’t get to pick ‘em – they were given to you. His was a reminder of the worst time in his life, of the life he took, but when the person you killed was your wife and the act didn’t come from a place of angry passion or malice… well, needless to say, sometimes your brothers were fucking dicks and didn’t quite know when to quit.

“Tell me what you need me to do, Jack,” I muttered and he chuckled.

“Right now? Nothing. I need you to lie there and hold still until I can figure out how bad you are. You look like shit, bro.”

I huffed a laugh and immediately winced.

He checked me over, and sat up a little straighter and asked, “You do this?”

Raven stood up straighter from where she slouched tiredly against the doorway now that all eyes were off her and on me. She said, “Yeah.”

“I’m impressed,” Jack declared, and he sounded it. “There’s nothing for me to really do here that hasn’t already been done. Her assessment and diagnosis are spot on. You shouldn’t move for a few days. Rest, plenty of fluids, some pain relievers and let things set and your body heal.”

“What kind of pain relief?” I asked. “Because shit, I could really use some.”

“I’ll give Mav a list to get outta your chapter stores. Some oxys