“We’re out of time.” Aaron grabs the pen and paper off the counter—a guest check pad he charmed out of one of the waitresses—and tosses it onto the floor next to Tom. “Details and quick.”
With another scowl, Tom scratches a number, a name, and an address on the pad and then chucks it at Aaron’s feet.
“Alright, up.” Victor grabs Tom by the back of the shirt and hauls him over to the side door, shoving him outside on the pavement where two boys in black hoodies and skeleton masks wait. They take Tom by either arm and manhandle him into the backseat of a ’75 Buick Riviera—according to Hael—and take off.
Two minutes later, our favorite police cruiser pulls into the parking lot to find us seated at the table together, sipping shakes and eating burgers. I’m sure they’re pretty pissed off by now that we keep giving them the slip, but that’s what happens when you chase a snake in its own burrow. We know exactly where we’re going and what we’re doing.
“Sara isn’t going to like this,” I say, stealing one of Cal’s fries and swiping it through a puddle of ketchup that looks like blood. “Us giving her the slip all the time.”
“Maybe that’s a good thing?” Aaron suggests, breathing just a bit harder than he normally would, wound-up on adrenaline and rage. “Next time we take off, it’ll be for Kay’s, and then maybe she’ll come looking for us herself? Just in case something happens, I’d rather have the VGTF than the SPD at my back.”
“Can we actually go back to discussing ass play?” Callum suggests mildly, and Vic darts his ebon—ebon, ebon, ebon—gaze over to him. Yeah, I’m a snarky bitch. Yeah, I bring up politics a lot. Yeah, I have personal vendettas and blah, blah, blah, but if you didn’t catch onto that from the beginning then there isn’t much hope left, is there?
“You didn’t tell me you played with each other’s asses at Pussy Point,” Victor says, almost accusingly, and Hael gives him a sharp look.
“Do we have to tell you everything?” he queries, and I sense the tension between the two of them right away. We need to hash out our shit now. There isn’t any time left to play games. “Are you and Bernadette the ‘primaries’ in this polyamorous relationship?”
“The fuck is a primary?” Victor shoots back, taking a flask out of his pocket and spiking his soda.
“A primary is like … the main person in your relationship, even if you’re with other people,” I explain, and Vic grins. I cut him off before he can stick his giant ass foot in his stupid ass mouth. “But no, you are not my primary. I don’t have a primary.” I look over at Aaron for a moment before switching my gaze to Oscar. “You’re all equal to me.”
“What you’re saying is,” Cal starts, lifting the empty basket of fries up as the waitress tentatively approaches our table. She takes the hint and scurries off to get another order—on the house, of course. “We don’t have to tell each other anything … but maybe we should try to be open?”
I give Hael a look and he curses, swiping his fingers through his bloodred hair.
“Alright, alright.” He turns in his seat to face Vic and exhales sharply. “Okay, I’m super pissed at you for having a threesome with Aaron when you kicked my ass out.”
Aaron snorts, but he doesn’t say anything, using the metal straw to stir his shake as I look between Hael and Victor.
“Whoa there, Harbin,” Vic starts, leaning back in his chair and crossing his hands over his belly. “I didn’t know you gave a shit.”
“You knew,” Hael corrects, giving his friend a sharp look. “You just didn’t care. I appreciate you saying you’d share Bernadette with the rest of us, but I need you to …” Hael gestures randomly and then sighs, glancing over at Callum for help. Oscar finally closes the cover on his iPad and sets it aside. Guess he doesn’t need to make any notes on ass play or the delicate dance of threesomes. “I need you to admit that you’re not sharing her at all, that she has just as much of a right to any of us as we have to her. That’s what I want to hear.”
Victor thinks on that for a moment, giving a long, slow blink as he processes the information.
Eventually, he just gets up and goes outside, letting the glass front door of the drive-in slam shut behind him.
Hael sighs, but he doesn’t seem particularly displeased.
“He’ll come around,” he says, nodding and leaning back in his chair. The waitress approaches like a timid mouse and practically chucks the fries on the table before fleeing yet again. Aaron watches her go with something akin to sympathy, like he knows his liberal use of the pistol is part of what has her so goddamn terrified. “He will. He just has to let it percolate for a bit.”
“You have more faith in him than I do, apparently,” Oscar drawls, staring down at the basket of fries like he’d very much enjoy having one or two or seven. It occurs to me then that maybe he has an eating disorder of some sort. Callum seems to agree with that sentiment, pushing the fries directly in front of his friend and then sitting back in his chair.
“Remember that ‘sleeping schedule’ that Vic wanted to make?” Cal begins, letting his blue eyes swing over to me. “And that you said you would make?”
“Yeah?” I ask, wondering where he’s going with this. He reaches out and runs a single, blue-nailed finger down the bridge of my nose. I swat him away, but I’m not entirely displeased. My mouth twitches and I reach out to steal Aaron’s shake. He lets me grab hold of it and then, at the last second, ends up yanking me into his lap.
“Well, I’d just as soon stay with you every night,” Cal continues, parking his chin in his hand and letting his gaze slide over to Oscar. “Pretty sure O feels the same way.”
“I’d like to have a bed of my own, in our future permanent dwelling,” Oscar says, and then finally, as if he just can’t fucking take it anymore, he reaches out and snags a French fry. The look on that motherfucker’s face when he puts it in his mouth reminds me a bit of his orgasm face. My lips twitch as I bring Aaron’s shake to my mouth and suck on the straw. “But I also wouldn’t mind having something of a master bedroom.”
“So you’ve thought about it?” Aaron asks, amusement clear in his voice. “What it would be like to have a house together?”
Oscar looks up at him, the light catching on the lenses on his glasses.
“Of course I have. Actually, Victor’s already asked me to purchase his grandmother’s old property in the name of a trust. Don’t act so surprised: where else could we live but together?” Oscar dips a second fry in the ketchup and slips it into that sharp mouth of his, closing his eyes for a moment while he chews. He opens them again and stares Aaron down. “We’re going to need a fortress, similar to the one Maxwell Barrasso lives in now. Fortunately, with Victor’s inheritance, we’ll have plenty of money to invest in a place.”
A shiver passes through me, one that Aaron feels as he wraps his strong arms around me and parks his chin on my shoulder.
“We could each have our own rooms, but yeah, a master bedroom of sorts for … orgies or whatever,” Aaron muses and I chuckle.
“Oh, I see how it is: we’re planning on orgies already?” I glance over at him, finding his beautiful eyes on mine. “We haven’t even … well, I wouldn’t call y’all running a train on me an orgy.”
“Running a train,” Hael repeats, snorting. “Is that what we did, Bernadette Blackbird?”
“If it walks like a duck …” I start, shrugging my shoulders and then pausing as Victor comes back into the restaurant.
“We should go,” he says, glancing over at Hael for a moment. In his eyes, I can see that Hael is right: something is percolating. Victor is all about family. All he’s ever wanted is this, the six of us together. All of the squabbling and the bickering and the arguing, none of that really matters. His grandmother’s property … all of us living together. For as deeply entrenched in hell as we are, that sounds an awful lot like heaven. “We could all use some sleep; we’ve got a big weekend ahead of us.”
“And an even bigger week,” I murmur as I rise
to my feet.
On Friday, we take down Mason Miller.
On Monday, we start at Oak Valley Prep.
Not sure which of those two things is going to be more difficult; my opinion is that it’ll be the latter that really gets us. Prescott trash at Oak Valley. Gods help us all.
We’ll infect it like a poison, but honestly, I bet the place is better off for it.
The type of poison that Havoc bestows is the kind that tastes oh so very sweet indeed.
We make the two-hour drive to Portland in the Eldorado and the Camaro, with Vic riding his Harley. As per usual, as soon as we take off down the street, the police cruiser follows.
“You sure you’re alright to drive?” Aaron asks as I depress the clutch and get us lurching down the street. But it only takes me a second to recall the warmth of Hael’s hand and the gently murmured instructions from our driving lesson. It isn’t so hard as everyone makes it out to be.
“I got this,” I tell him, following our carefully planned route, one that uses the shortcut at the racetrack to buy us a few extra minutes. After a half-dozen practice runs, we can pretty much count on seventeen minutes before the cop car catches up to us.
Seventeen minutes to kill the second-in-command of the Grand Murder Party.
We must be fucking insane.
“Are you sure you’re okay to not be wearing your medical boot?” I shoot back, and he grimaces slightly, like he knows he’s been caught doing something he shouldn’t. But that grimace, that cringing, that who me? look is what makes him so goddamn sexy. “We all take risks for the betterment of Havoc, I suppose.”
“Yeah, well,” Aaron starts with a small laugh, leaning back in the seat and running his palm over the leather, like he’s as impressed with Hael Harbin as I am. “Pretty sure that boot would give me away. I know we haven’t talked much about what, exactly, happened during the shooting but—”
“You beat a guy to death with a metal trash can?” I interrupt, and Aaron snorts at me.
“Okay, well, yeah, there is that.” He glances my way, studying the beautiful red wig I’m wearing with interest. Makes me wonder if we can’t incorporate something like this into our sex life. What is it that Megan Thee Stallion says in “WAP”? Switch my wig and make him feel like he’s cheating? Yep, something like that. Since I’d rather gouge my own eyes out with a spoon than share my men, I could spice things up with a wig every now and again. “One of the shooters that came into my bio class got away. He most definitely saw the boot. I figured I’d rather risk reinjuring it than getting caught.”
“Probably a smart choice,” I agree reluctantly, flexing my fingers around the steering wheel as I follow Hael in the Camaro, Victor trailing behind us. Cal and Oscar are with Hael, giving me and Aaron a moment to be alone. I can sense that he’s still watching me, taking in the lacey glove on my left hand—can’t exactly walk into a rival club with the word HAVOC inked onto my knuckles—and the way-too-short skirt with the garters underneath.
“If something goes wrong tonight, I just want you to know that even if I would’ve preferred it if you left Springfield altogether … I don’t regret the time we’ve spent together.”
“Don’t be so fatalistic,” I snort, but Aaron’s got a point. If this works, it’ll be quick, painless, easy. If it doesn’t … well, I’ve gotten used to living on the edge of a knife. Lately, that’s all we’ve been doing. If this works out though, we’re likely to get a few months of downtime. Maxwell will see that Havoc is truly a threat, that he isn’t so invincible as he thinks. With Trinity working the faux fiancée angle, Ophelia tamed, Maxwell mollified by the promise of a big cash influx, we might actually get to finish out our senior year with little disturbance.
“Well, I’m trying not to be,” Aaron says with one of those sexy boy next door grins, the ones that are floppy and sweet and completely irresistible. I like it even better because it’s paired with ink and a ruthless need to protect, to save, to shelter. He broke his fucking hand to get back to me. He killed a man in the woods with no weapon of his own. He took care of Kali when I failed to do it myself. “I like being with you too much to die yet. Besides, after hearing all this ass play crap, I feel like I’m missing out.”
“Oh my god, shut up.” I smack him with my right hand, keeping my gloved left one firmly attached to the wheel. Hael speeds up and takes a corner so tight that he cuts across the edge of someone’s lawn; I make sure to follow along exactly. There’s no room for error here. We have to stay together, and we have to outrun our little copper friends. “Remember the first time we tried anal?”
“I try not to,” Aaron says, but there’s a warmth in his voice that tells me he doesn’t care that we were fumbling, inexperienced idiots. It was still fun, I’ll admit it. But it was also way more intimate than I’d expected. I remember looking up at him and seeing this expression of bliss and wonder on his face. “Remember when Kali tried to tell you that anal sex didn’t count as sex?”
I laugh my ass off at that one; I’d forgotten she’d ever said that. How goddamn stupid. Anyone that says anal sex isn’t sex needs to have their fucking head examined.
“Do you …” I start as we near the racetrack and I see Aaron’s eyes flick to the windshield. He takes in the quiet night and the muddy stretch of track with a slight grimace. Poor Aaron. He’s had it rough lately. Crashing the Camaro, having the shit beat out of him, getting hit with Kali’s car. Tom stabbing him in the dick with the shotgun, breaking his hand, having to kill a girl we’ve been going to school with for a decade. He deserves a break. “Do you still think about her?”
Aaron’s quiet for a moment, almost like he’s holding his breath as we fly onto the track and then up the hidden side road. Glancing in my rearview, the only person I see behind me is Vic on his bike. No cops. Good. Eventually, this trick isn’t going to work anymore. But that’s okay. It just needs to last one more time, one final night.
“More often than I’d like,” he finally says, after we’ve emerged onto the suburban street and turned right at the next stop sign. The exit for the highway isn’t far off. From there, it’s about a two-hour drive without traffic. In traffic … fuck, it takes forever. This area was never meant to have so many people living in it. I just wish all the out-of-state transplants would fuck off and find somewhere else to live. Yeah, I’m that salty about it.
“Maybe we should use the handcuffs again?” I hazard, hoping that I’m not about to set off a PTSD trigger or anything. Aaron takes off his seat belt and scoots closer to me, making me wonder why every car doesn’t have a bench seat in the front. It’s sort of, like, optimal for cuddling or whatever. Totally new concept for me, but I’m embracing it.
“If you want to use handcuffs, Bernadette Blackbird, then we’ll use handcuffs, but not for my benefit. I’m okay, really.” I flick a quick glance in Aaron’s direction, but he puts a single inked finger up and pushes my face away, turning my eyes back to the road. “If you’ve been worried about me, don’t be. Obviously, what happened with Kali wasn’t ideal, but it had to happen. She was on your list. She was dealt with. I don’t take pleasure in it, but she isn’t appearing to me in ghost form.” He smiles to soften the blow of that, but it doesn’t bother me. I’m over that now.
“Hey, I promised to be a Havoc Girl, but I never promised that I was sane.” I turn my blinker on, rocketing onto the highway behind the Camaro.
Aaron’s nice-boy smile turns a bit naughtier and he leans in, pressing his lips against the side of my throat. When he puts his hand on my thigh, I decide that we’re not going to make it to Portland alive if he keeps touching me. Fortunately—or unfortunately, depending on how you look at it—he draws his hand away and sits back.
“Nobody in our family is sane, Bernie. That’s why we work so well together.” Aaron turns up the music—“Determined” by Mudvayne—and then threads his fingers together behind his neck, closing his eyes against the rush of farmland on either side of the highway.
We make record
time, pulling into a disturbingly dark parking lot outside of some industrial shitbox with the word Kay’s written in neon pink lighting across the front. Looks exactly like the type of place I’ve gone out of my way to avoid in life. This is the sort of establishment that girls go into and they don’t come out of. Or, if they do, they don’t come out the same person that they were when they went in.
I turn the engine off and, with one last look at Aaron, I open the door and climb out.
We have seventeen minutes. That’s it. There’s no time to dawdle.
“Set the timers on your phone,” Vic commands, hopping off the Harley and hooking his helmet over the handlebars. He’s dressed in a black hoodie and jeans, just like the rest of the boys. But Hael and Aaron are the only two wearing black fingerless skeleton gloves on their left hands. Even fingerless, the gloves cover up to the first knuckle, hiding that deliciously dark acronym from view. “Bernadette, call my phone and leave the line open; I want to hear everything that you’re doing in there.”
“Got it,” I say, pausing beside Oscar near the back entrance to the club. There are a few dumpsters out here, a wash of graffiti which includes that horrid silhouette of a clown face, but little else. It’s so fucking creepy. Apparently, this place used to be a bank once upon a time. According to Vera, there are old vaults in here that make up some of the rooms. The doors have all been turned inward, making them nearly impenetrable.
I text Vera as Hael and Callum do a quick check of the parking lot. Here, girl. That’s all I send, just in case the feds get another warrant to take our new phones. Not that it really matters. Even if Sara and Constantine figure out we were here, they’ll never know why. It’s not like the GMP is going to report Mason’s murder.
The underground operates within its own set of fucked-up rules.
Leaning my shoulder against the wall of the club, I can feel the pulse of the music from inside, a dirty heartbeat that speaks to the underbelly of the city, beckoning forth its darkest denizens. I make sure to keep my eyes on my phone, pretending to scroll as I wait for Vera to unlock the door from the other side.
Victory at Prescott High (The Havoc Boys Book 5) Page 23