“They got eyes on us. They know about this guy. And I’m not sure it’s this guy doing it. They’re leading us to this guy. Makes no fucking sense he’s stalking Hattie, tagging me in on that, maybe trying to tweak me, thinkin’ I’d have an issue with the bent of his threats to me, instead of targeting Ryn ’cause he’s got a history with her, or you, because you got up in his shit. Hattie should have nothing to do with this. Me either.”

“Fuck,” Boone said.

In other words, whatever Axl was talking about, Boone agreed.

But Axl wasn’t done laying it out.

“This guy can see her at work, follow her home. But getting her cell number and email takes resources. Hacking a computer takes resources. Becoming a ghost takes resources. Resources this guy does not have.”

“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.”