Page 4 of Roulette

I walked to my bike without hurrying. The decision was already made. I’d known it the moment she admitted the place had been disturbed, but I’d let her talk anyway because people need to say things out loud sometimes. Need to hear how they sound. Need someone listening.

I’d known her address for three weeks by then. Hadn’t needed it for anything until now -- just habit, the same reflex that made me clock exit routes in a room I’d only be in for twenty minutes. Gunner had pulled it off a utility record the first week I started going during her shifts, back when I was still telling myself I only came into Patsy’s for the coffee. Standard practice for anyone who started mattering to the club, even before they knew they mattered. I’d filed it away and hadn’t thought about it since.

I swung my leg over the seat and started the engine. The vibration ran through the frame and into my hands, solid and familiar. I pulled away from the curb and pointed the front wheel toward her street.

I parked the bike half a block down from her house and killed the engine. The street lay empty. Mid-morning on a weekday, most people at work or inside with the air conditioning running. Her rental sat at the end of a row of similar houses -- single-story, vinyl siding that had faded to the color of old newspaper, a chain-link fence around a postage-stamp front yard. The concrete stoop had a crack running diagonally across the top step. A place that had stopped trying to impress anyone around the time Reagan was in office.

I didn’t go to the front door. I walked past it instead, hands in my jacket pockets, moving at the pace of someone who lived nearby and had nowhere particular to be. A man checking his mail, maybe. A neighbor out for a stroll. Nothing to see here.

I moved to the side gate. The latch was a simple hook-and-eye, easy enough for a child to open. A single dark hair was caught in the metal where the hook met the eye, stretched taut like a guitar string. Too coarse to be Lark’s. Too dark. I left it there.

The back of the house was where it got interesting. The doorframe had a scuff on the exterior -- faint, but intentional. A mark from someone bracing a boot against wood. A kick would have left a deeper indention. This was from a slower motion. More patient. I ran my thumb over it. The wood was smooth except for that one spot, where the finish had been compressed and slightly darkened by pressure.

I stepped back and checked the bedroom window. The blinds were drawn, but one slat near the center sat bent at an angle -- pushed aside just enough to leave a clean sightline into the room from the yard. Not broken. Adjusted, and adjusted from the inside -- someone had bent it just enough to leave themselves a window to look through later, without ever having to touch the glass again.

I stood in the backyard for a minute, hands on my hips, and let the pieces settle.

Someone had been here. Someone had entered the house without force, moved through it without disturbing anything valuable, and stood outside her bedroom window watching. Not a robbery. A message.

I pulled my phone from my jacket and called Fox. He picked up on the second ring.

“Talk to me.”

“Woman who works at Patsy’s Diner. Name’s Lark. Came home yesterday, found signs someone had been in her house. Didn’t look like theft. I just walked the property. Dark hair caught in the side gate. Boot scuff on the back doorframe. Bedroom blind adjusted for a sightline.”

Fox went silent for three seconds. I could hear the soft click of a lighter, the exhale of smoke.

“She have anyone nearby?”

“Not that I’ve seen.”

“Police?”

“No. She thinks she might be overreacting.”

Another pause. He was turning it over, considering angles I couldn’t see.

“Keep it in-house,” he said. “Don’t spook her, and don’t loop in anyone outside the club -- no cops, not yet. Watch her. If whoever it is comes back, we handle it. You need anything, call.”

“Copy that.” I paused. “But to have enough eyes on her, I think she’d notice.”

“Then don’t make it round the clock. Just enough to hopefully keep her safe.”

The line went dead. I pocketed the phone and walked back to my bike. The neighborhood stayed still. A dog barked two streets over. A lawn mower started up somewhere behind the houses. Ordinary sounds.

I started the engine and pulled away from the curb. The bike carried me back toward Main Street, past storefronts and parked cars and people going about their days with no idea the air had changed. When I reached Patsy’s, I slowed just enough to see through the front window.

Lark was there. Still moving between tables, coffeepot in hand, refilling mugs and taking orders. From this distance, through glass, she looked small. Not physically. Worn down, maybe. Carrying too much for too long. She turned toward the kitchen, and I caught the profile of her face -- the set of her jaw, her shoulders still caught in that defensive hitch. She glanced at the door. Then again, two seconds later.

I twisted the throttle and the bike surged forward, carrying me past the diner and onto the highway that would take me back to the compound. My mind was already running through what came next -- schedules, rotations, who would watch and when, how to keep it invisible so she wouldn’t feel watched. The club had done this before. We knew the drill.

But knowing the drill didn’t make the cold feeling in my stomach go away. Someone had walked through her house. Someone had stood outside her window. And the fact that nothing appeared to be missing only made it worse, because it meant whatever they wanted was still there.

I pushed the bike harder and let the wind take the thought.

Chapter Three

Lark