Cam dropped the pack on the table. “Jokes aside, it was Nash who came to me about the bodyguard thing. River was there. He said it’s something Axel could do. How do you feel about that?”
“Axel... the mechanic?”
“That’s the one. You don’t know him?”
Nope. As a rule, I was closest to the brothers who did the dodgiest work. Axel wasn’t on that list, which had its pros and cons. “I don’t know shit about him.”
Cam grinned again. “That’s the point, isn’t it?”
I really wanted a cigarette. Karma for all the times I’d made fun of Nash for being in the same predicament rained down on me. I shifted in my seat, sore from... lots of things, glad Rubi had fucked off. “All right. Tell me what I need to know then.”
“He’s Irish,” Cam started, as if I gave a fuck. “On his dad’s side. McShane.”
“Excellent. Sign him up.”
“Don’t be a cunt.”
“I’m not being a cunt. I just don’t give a fuck if he bleeds Guinness. It doesn’t mean anything to me.”
O’Brian to the core, Cam stared as if I’d grown three heads, taking a full minute before he let it go. “He’s alegacy,” he amended. “Been with us since he was a kid, on and off. We lost him to the MMA circuit a few years ago, but he came back to work for River when his ma got sick.”
“She get better?”
“Died the night the Porth Luck garage burned down.”
“What’s he been doing since?”
“Raising his sisters, but the last one left home in September, so he came to help us rebuild Crow Land.”
“You like him?”
Cam ashed his cigarette, exhaling a last lungful of smoke. “Course I do. He’s quiet and keeps his fucking opinions to himself.”
“It’s a good thing to not know how someone thinks?”
“Actions speak louder than words.”
“Meaning?”
“Meaning he never left River alone with Bear. We didn’t realise it until recently, but Axel’s the reason that sneaky fed never got my brother in a room.”
River was no rat. He’d have offed himself long before he’d have rolled on the club—on his family, but I got the sentiment. “And he can fight?”
“He’s put me down before.”
That got my attention. Cam wasn’t unbreakable. He’d come unstuck in the ring, we all had—it was how we learned to win on the street. But it was fucking rare. If Axel was capable of that, he was more competent than I’d hoped for in a bodyguard for Juana. “What’s he like with kids?”
“I don’t know,” Cam admitted. “It’s never come up. I can’t see him being bad, but if he’s Juana’s protection when she’s a free woman, it shouldn’t matter too much.”
I drummed my fingers on the table, not disagreeing, letting my ravaged gut guide my thoughts as much as I could. “Hot fucker, though. He got a girl of his own?”
“Only ever seen him with fellas.”
“How old is he?”
“Twenty-four.”
“Really? Thought he was older.”