He didn’t make direct eye contact as they rolled to a stop, blocking his way just for the hell of it, but his adrenaline kicked up a notch. Always before they had kept their distance. His peripheral vision gave him the general outline of biker gear, complete with insignias of a gang he knew all too well from his bad old days.
“This shithole serve decent burgers?” The big overly muscled one of the two bikers had a voice as tender as boot leather.
Scott shrugged. “If you like grease and dill pickles.”
“What about the waitresses? Any got tits worth lookin’ at?”
Scott smiled slightly. “One.”
Alert to any sudden movement, Scott waited out the beat of silence as they dismounted. When they moved to walk around him, one on either side, he sidestepped, giving them enough room to walk past him together. They didn’t force the issue.
The bigger man was five feet past when he paused and looked back. “You’re a cop.”
Scott’s gaze corrected to direct confrontation. The challenger was a stranger but he knew the other one. Impossible not to remember a man so skinny his skin seemed shrink-wrapped to his skeletal frame. This man regarded him with a squint-eyed stare. Scott met and held it.
Three years ago he’d gone undercover to infiltrate a chapter of the Pagans, operating out of D.C. He had looked much different back then, a skinhead with a steroid-enhanced body. Nearly a year off the juice, his once-bulked-up physicality had been slimmed by thirty pounds to a taut, lean-muscled physique. His hair had grown in and his once bristling beard was shaved to a smooth cheek. No casual glance should have pegged him for his alter ego, who had been arrested in a bust that went sideways two years ago.
Yet, his gut told him he’d been made. Nothing to do but tough it out.
The skinny man stepped forward. “What the fuck you starin’ at?”
Scott braced himself, all cop in his expression and stance. “I was wondering the same thing. I don’t know who you think I am, but you’re mistaken. I have no beef with you.”
The bulkier partner shook his head. “What the fuck are you dicking around with him for? I’m hungry.”
His partner glared. “He reminds me of someone.”
“The pretty boy about to piss himself?” The bigger man snorted. “What? He a former bitch of yours from lockup?”
The skinny man swung around on his friend. “Shut the fuck up!”
The larger man didn’t answer but just swung a meaty fist that landed hard on his companion’s jaw.
Scott took the moment to put more distance between himself and them, though he remained facing them. He’d seen many a fight between friends in the biker world end in near death. Or, they could just as easily turn on him.
His gut tightened as he went through in his mind what his next three moves should be. He might get wet but he had an advantage they weren’t aware of.
At that moment several patrons exited the establishment, spilling light, music, and laughter onto the parking lot.
The two bikers scuffled a bit more and then laughed, slapped each other on the back, and turned toward the restaurant.
Scott waited until they had entered before sucking in a breath of relief. It was short-lived. Now that he could think past the next thirty seconds, his brain supplied the details he hadn’t had time to deal with.
The skinny guy called himself Dos Equis because of his fondness for using a knife to carve double Xs in his victims. From the West Coast, he’d said. Once he’d attached himself to the group Scott had infiltrated, the gang shortened it to X.
What the hell was he doing in Georgia? Last he heard, X was serving a five-year prison term.
Scott made his way with a deliberate stride toward his vehicle and in one continuous motion climbed in. He was immediately accosted.
A four-year-old chocolate Lab named Izzy had launched herself through the door of her cage in back and landed in his lap. His K-9 partner, and secret weapon. There was a button on his belt that would have freed her from her cage if she’d been needed.
She was shivering beneath her shiny coat and he understood immediately that she had not only been watching the scenario taking place in the parking lot, she had sensed his own anxiety and was responding in kind. She was trained as a drug dog, not an attack dog, but he knew she would have come to his aid.
He pulled her in close to his body though he was shedding pheromones, adding to the excitement even though the moment of danger seemed past. K-9 partners for the past year, he and Izzy worked drug enforcement for the DEA.
“Good girl, Izzy.” He stroked her firmly to calm her. “Gute Hund.”
During all this, his gaze never left the front door of the restaurant. When Izzy was sufficiently calm, he ordered her into the back. Then he reached under his console and pulled out a SIG Sauer and laid it in his lap.