walking toward him in nothing but that dress and those boots, and he could not believe he was hoping this was just some hippie cock-blocking joke and this would be done in five minutes so they could say goodbye to his couch and he could take them right to his bed.
“Who?” she asked.
“Essence,” he told her, handing her the phone when she stopped in front of him.
Her expression showed nothing but concern as she bent her head and started swiping at her phone.
“She fuck with you on dates?” he asked.
“No way,” she whispered, put the phone to her ear and her attention to his face. “Essence?” Pause. “Wait. Slow down. A what?”
Her gaze drifted away as all the color left her face.
Rush growled and put a hand to her hip, using it to guide her to his body.
Her eyes shot back to his. “Did you call the police?”
“Fuck,” he clipped.
“Okay. Good. Stay inside. Wait for them. You’re inside, yeah?”
“Fuck,” he hissed, letting her go and twisting to grab her purse.
“Right. Okay, honey. Right. Right. Essence, darling, slow down. Listen. Rush and I are coming.”
And they were.
He had her hand in one of his, her purse in his other, and he was dragging her to the back door.
“We’ll be there as fast as we can. Stay inside until the police get there. Promise me?”
They were out the back door and taking the steps down to the walk and they were doing it fast.
“Okay. Be there soon.”
He turned his head to look at her when he sensed her off the phone.
“What?” he asked.
“She heard a screech of tires.”
He stopped them at his back gate and stared at her face.
“A long honk,” she went on. “Another screech of tires. She looked outside, a car was taking off. But she saw something in the street. She went out.” She shook her head and then chanted, “Rush. Rush.”
She was losing it, spasmodically pumping his hand hard.
“Baby, get it out.”
“She said it was a dead body. A woman.”
“Fuck,” he bit, lifted the latch and yanked her through the gate.
He did not wait for her to climb up into his truck.
He lifted her ass into the seat and dropped her purse in her lap.
Then he jogged around the hood and hauled himself in the other side.
He had an arm on the back of her seat, looking over his shoulder, ready to back out before he put the truck in reverse.
They’d hit 13th when she asked, “How freaked should I be a dead body was dumped in front of Essence’s house?”
About as freaked as him.
Which was to say pretty fucking freaked.
Rush grabbed her hand and held tight. “Don’t freak until you know. It could be a coincidence.”
“I’m not thinking it’s a coincidence.”
He wasn’t either.
“Essence told me she knew some Hell’s Angels. She got a bad element she hangs around?” he asked.
“She told you she knows some Hell’s Angels?”
“Yeah, when she was threatening me.”
Her voice was rising. “How much did you two talk before you hit my house?”
He gave her hand a squeeze. “Answer the question, baby.”
“Essence probably totally knows some Hell’s Angels because, hear her tell it, she’d party with just about anyone, back in the day and now. But they’d be devoted to her. Or as devoted as a Hell’s Angel could get to a being with a vagina.”
Right.
“That fake name you’re workin’ for Valenzuela under, it come with a fake address?” he asked.
“Fake address. Fake social. Fake everything. Hank and Eddie set it up for me.”
“How do you get paid?”
“Direct deposit.”
“Fuck,” he muttered.
“In a bank account under Tallulah Monroe, Rush. I have a fake ID I used to open it. Got an ATM card. The whole thing. Outside me accessing that money personally, it isn’t linked to me at all.”
He let out a breath and turned right on Speer.
“Rush.”
His name came out shaky.
“It’s gonna be okay,” he told her.
“Rush.”
Now it was trembling.
He pulled her hand to his thigh and pressed deep. “It’s gonna be okay, honey.”
He drove as fast as he could without freaking her out with too many lane changes.
They hit the lights almost perfectly and were at her pad in fifteen minutes.
And there were three squads already there, one uniform rolling crime-scene tape.
The squads were blocking the body.
He parked close to the bumper of one of the cop cars, got out, and another uniform yelled, “You can’t park there!”
“She lives here!” he shouted back, jerking his head to Rebel.
The cop’s eyes went that way, and such was the power of the dress, he froze