“Fuck,” Boone clipped.

Yup.

He agreed.

“They went after Hattie to drag me in, pull you in through that and Ryn’s history with him, and through you and me, get up in Hawk’s face, all to manipulate us into doing what we were going to do if we found him today. We rolled Eddie and Hank into it, something they could guess we’d do. So it’s a stretch, but not too much of one to tag them in. They knew we were investigating it. Even though Eddie and Hank now are also investigating it, they didn’t put a stop to us doing the same. You laid him out, statute of limitations is not expired on that first assault. Add another one, we’re vulnerable. If they’re pissed enough at us, and they’re pissed at us, if they got hooks in the DA, and they seem to have hooks in everybody, we’re fucked. Assault charges for you and me, and Hawk, Eddie, Hank, even other members of the crew who knew about this could get done for conspiracy or aiding and abetting.”

I wasn’t sure what he was talking about.

Though I knew none of it was good.

“Christ, makes sense,” Boone said.

“B lied to Aug and me, brother. She mentioned the women. She said it was just about us being off the market. It wasn’t. They’re on the offense. They intended to use the women to get to us, and this is how they’re doing it. They’re trying to force our play to take us out.”

I didn’t know who “they” were, but I knew I didn’t like them.

Axl kept going.

“If they did a direct assault, we’d keep our shit and plan accordingly. Hit one of our women, straight thinking goes out the window. Even Hawk was off his game today, he was so pissed.”

“Motherfucker,” Boone bit.

“Hunt is off for Kovack tonight, and maybe permanently,” Axl said. “I’ll call this in to Hawk in the morning and we’ll meet.”

“Yeah,” Boone agreed. “Good grab, Axe.”

“Yeah,” Axl said curtly. “Later.”

“Later, bud.”

The call disconnected and I handed Axl his phone.

“Was I supposed to hear any of that?” I asked.

“Some of it, no, but since it pertains to you and you’re not gonna say anything to anybody, it doesn’t matter.”

Point taken to keep my mouth shut.

Next up.

“Assault?” I asked quietly.

“With their gig, in BDSM, trust is paramount. This guy put Ryn in a position where he could do absolutely anything he wanted to do to her and she was helpless to stop him. In that world and any other, that amounts to rape. Ryn’s tough, but it understandably fucked with her. But even if she shrugged it off, that’s enough to send Boone over the edge. The fact this guy could be doing it to others, he had a statement to make. He made it.”

“Were you two going to find him in order to—?”

“Definitely.”