“Yeah,” Scott says as his little partner jots down notes. Of what, I have no clue, but the chick is getting busy with the pen and paper. Scott ignores her and walks up to me. “I had my name on the FoCo department waiting list for a few years. Full-time position finally opened up, so I took it.”
“Hey, Barney Fife?” Drake says. “This ain’t Mayberry. I want him arrested for stealing my bikes!”
Scott holds up a hand to me and then turns to Drake. “Mr. Cikes, we have a procedure, so why don’t you go give your side of the story to my partner over there, and I’ll handle Mr. Shrike.”
Drake scowls up at him and then does a quick turn.
“OK,” Scott says as he looks around, spies Ford, nods, and then takes in who all’s here. “I know what you’re gonna say. Talk to Ronin. But I don’t see him and I’d like to just get rid of this little twerp.” Ford walks up and stands next to me and Scott directs his talk to him as well. “So just tell me what you two were doing outside his shop last week and we’ll call it good, OK?”
“We weren’t outside his shop,” Ford says, taking over. “We were parked down the street. And the last I heard, we still live in America. Where people are free to park on any public street they want.”
“They were smoking a joint in the truck, ask them about the pot they were smoking in the truck!” Drake yells from across the room.
Scott rolls his eyes, but he’s got his back to Drake, so Drake can’t see. “Were you smoking pot in the truck, guys?”
We laugh. In fact, Griff, Ryan, and Fletch are all in the lunch room again now, and they laugh too.
We might be criminals guilty of a lot of bad shit. But we don’t do drugs and everyone knows that.
Scott leans in. “OK, come on, guys, you know anything about this? I don’t think you did it, but if you know anything—”
“He blames me for his bikes going missing,” Drake yells again. “And he stole my shit to get even.”
“Drake,” I growl. “Your shit is shit. Look around, ass**le, do you think I need to steal your crappy bikes? You’re nobody. Those seven bikes stolen from my showroom are barely a blip on my bottom line. It’s called insurance, dumbass.”
He lunges at me, plows right through the little girly cop and sends her crashing backwards. The whole garage sucks in a collective breath as she skids across the polished concrete floor and comes to a stop against Ryan’s leg. Ryan leans over and extends his hand to help her up. She’s beet red with embarrassment, but she takes his hand.
And then Scott is slapping the cuffs on Drake. “You have the right to remain silent…”
We all just stand there as Scott pushes Drake out the door, leaving the little cop behind to wrap things up.
“Um,” she starts. “I’m… sorry.” And then she bolts out the door after her partner.
“What the f**k was that?” Ronin says from the doorway.
We all swing our heads in his direction. “Dude!” I laugh. “Insanity! Fucking Drake tried to say we robbed him or some shit. What’re you doing back, anyway?”
“You got me all riled up about Rook being pregnant.”
“Pregnant?” Ford asks. “Since when? She never said anything to me about being pregnant.”
“Why would she tell you before she tells me, ass**le?”
“Because we’re best friends. She tells me all kinds of shit about you, Ronin.”
Ronin is winding up to fight, so I stick my arm between them. “He’s f**king with you, Ronin. You’ve known him for ten years, and every time you fall for his shit.”
Director Larry bursts through the door now, and he’s the one who’s all riled up. “Holy cow! This is gonna be the best season ever!” He claps Ford on the back and Ford bats his hand away and steps aside. “We got all that on tape. Even”—he looks over at Ronin—“the pregnancy. Holy shit, if Rook is pregnant, our ratings will go through the roof!”
Luckily Ford pushes Larry out the door before Ronin knocks his teeth out.
I grab Ronin’s shirt sleeve and pull him outside. Scott and little cop are still busy arresting Drake in the parking lot, so we head across the street and start walking down Maple towards the shops so that the noise of lunchtime pedestrians and traffic drowns out our voices over any potential listening devices.
“We need to pull that bot out of that shop, like now, Ronin. This shit is getting crazy. I mean, who the f**k is in town stealing motorcycles? And why?”
“I dunno,” he says. “But we might have the whole thing on camera from the bot. We can’t risk going through footage parked in that neighborhood, so pulling it is the only option if we want to see who did it. I’ll go scout out the area tonight. Alone,” he adds. “You and Ford have already been made, so I’m the only option. Then we’ll come up with a plan tomorrow. Let’s just hope that little dick Drake doesn’t suddenly get smart and sweep his place for bugs.”
“Fuck.”
“We’ll figure it out. Just keep cool, man, OK?”
I look over at Ronin. “I’m always cool.”
“Yeah,” he agrees as we turn around and start walking back.
But I know what he’s thinking. I’m not always cool. Because I’m the one who lost his cool and shot that f**ker up in Boulder. I’m the one who had us all staring at a murder one charge and twenty years to life in prison.