She comes out a moment later with a broom and dustpan in her hands and a huge smile on her face. “Hey!” she says. “You okay?”
With a confused look, I survey my body and reflection in the espresso machine to make sure I don’t look totally fucked. Because I was, and even though it happened in the dirty ass clubhouse, it was incredible. “Yeah, why?”
“Because two-thirds of you is missing,” she snarks.
“Ha ha,” I say. “I’m sorry if I’ve been MIA lately.”
“If you’ve been? Girl, I went from seeing you every day to being lucky to get a weekly drop-in. I get it, the relationship is new and you’re living with him right now, so I’m chopped liver. But anyway, I just want you to know I’m only kidding and if you’ve gone all wackadoodle obsessed over him, it’s okay.” She’s rambling, but the smile on her face looks like it could split in two. I can’t help but smile back just as large and to take a moment to just be thankful that we’re here and that we survived crashing and burning those years ago.
“I’m gonna marry him,” I say. Mindy sets the broom down, grabs a rag and a spray bottle, and starts to wipe down the counter top.
“Yeah, Jeremy says this is getting serious,” she says. Since she’s been staying with Nic and Duke, she’s had the opportunity to spend some time with Jeremy as well. She looks around the shop with narrowed eyes.
“Oh yeah, Tall’s in the back,” I say hooking my thumb in that direction. She relaxes a bit and goes back to cleaning the counter top just as Tall walks out. He jerks his chin at her and gives her a smile, which she returns.
“Hey Aaron,” she says. My eyes widen and I look from him to her and back again. I’m not sure how much she knows about the club, but she should definitely know to call him by his club nickname. Then again, we seem to make an exception for Jeremy, so maybe Grady’s riot act was a little more dramatic than need be.
“What’cha need, Bean?” he asks her. Again, I’m left more than a little confused about this. Bean? Since when did the club give her a nickname? This entire trip has shed light on why I’ve been a crappy best friend lately. I have no idea what’s going on with Mindy or what her daily life is like now.
“I need to do a full mop-down. Can you stack the tables in the corner? They’re kind of heavy.”
“You got it,” he says and starts to systematically stack the tables in the corner in a manner that tells me he’s done it several times before.
I open my mouth to ask her how close she and Tall really are, but I’m silenced by a loud crash and the shattering of one of the front windows. Glass flies everywhere in a violent burst. Mindy ducks behind the counter and I drop to my knees, shield my head, and pray that I’ve covered myself in enough time to avoid getting glass in my face. I’m barely crouched down when Tall’s heavy body slams into mine. He wraps his arms around me and doesn’t loosen his grip for what feels like forever, but is probably just a moment.
“You okay, Sweets?”
“Yeah,” I say. Everything is silent and still until Tall stands, draws out his gun, unclicks the safety, and carefully approaches the shattered window. His boots crunch over the glass as he heads for a small object in the center of the mess. With his gun trained on the window, he slowly bends, picks up the object and walks back to me. With his body shielding mine from the window, he directs me to stand and both Mindy and me toward the office. I don’t waste a moment following his orders and round the counter and rush inside the tiny office. It can’t be more than seven feet wide on either side. Mindy is already disappearing into the office when I make it around the corner. Thankfully, there are no windows in here and no other doors. The lack of glass makes me feel more secure, though I won’t really feel safe until Grady’s here.
“Are you okay?” I ask Mindy and lunge into hugging her. She wraps her arms tight around me and squeezes.
“That was scary,” she says into my hair and lets go.
Tall enters the room and shuts the door behind him. He sets the object down on the desk and pulls his phone out. The conversation is short and a moment later he’s hung the phone up.
Eyeing the object, I realize it’s something hard wrapped in a piece of white, torn paper. Tall reaches out, but I’m faster. I grab it up and immediately recognize its size and weight as a brick. Separating the brick from the paper, I hand him the brick and unfold the paper. It looks like some kind of medical report, but I can’t make much of it out. Words like internal hemorrhage stick out, but the paper is worn and some of the text is unreadable. Tall shakes his head and grabs the paper from me.
“It looks like discharge papers,” Mindy says as she peers over his shoulder.
“Shit,” he says loudly. Folding up the paper and sticking it in his pocket, he pulls at his hair. “Fucking hell.”