"According to Crease the kid went wil ingly."

"Bad decision." I pictured the pale little waif and wondered what had led her to it.

"Yeah. A deadly decision."

I looked at Charbonneau, surprised at how closely his thought echoed mine. There had been so many fatal decisions. Gately and Martineau. Jocelyn Dion. George Dorsey. The Hel s Angels responsible for the cemetery attack. And near-fatal decisions. Kit and Crease, both of whom had managed to survive.

A Hel s Angels death squad had been sent from the States to blow away Crease because Jocelyn had fingered him as Cherokee Desjardins' kil er.

The Angels had intended to send a message that kil ing one of their own meant certain retribution, and had chosen a very public forum to deliver that message. The gunman assigned to Crease was to have escaped by cycle. The cycle did get away, but the shooter didn't. Ryan and Quickwater saw to that, though the public version would be different.

Unfamiliar with the local terrain, the shooters in the Jeep went off the mountain while speeding from police. The two in front were kil ed in the crash, the third hospitalized with multiple injuries. A routine check turned up a New York warrant for murder. The man was providing limited cooperation, preferring the non-death penalty attitude of our northern neighbors to the laws of his home state. His thinking was that a life sentence in Canada was preferable to a lethal injection in New York, even though the state hadn't executed anyone since 1963.

Six hours of surgery had pul ed Crease through, but the reporter was stil in intensive care. The story of his involvement was emerging piecemeal as his periods of lucidity lengthened.

Crease and Cherokee traveled with the Angels in the early eighties, the latter aspiring to brotherhood, the former a wanna-be academic charmed by the biker lifestyle. The two were drawn together by their shared Canadian roots.

According to Crease, he and Cherokee encountered Savannah Osprey on the Myrtle Beach run and invited her to ride along. Later, a party turned ugly and Savannah wanted to leave. Things got out of hand, the girl was strangled, and Cherokee hid the body in the woods.

"Has Crease admitted to a part in the murder?"

"He denies that, but admits to the return visit, when Cherokee decided to col ect bones to decorate the clubhouse."

"The bastards."

I glanced at Savannah's remains and experienced the same anger and repulsion I'd felt on seeing the photo Jocelyn had taken from Cherokee's apartment. I'd recognized the cranium instantly by the tiny burr hole in its side. The skul was mounted on a wal , the leg bones crossed below like the symbol on a pirate flag. Crease and Cherokee were posed below the macabre Jol y Roger, hands raised in a one-finger salute.

"Where was that snapshot taken?" Until then, I hadn't asked.