Page 119 of Anarchy at Prescott High (The Havoc Boys 4)
Cal takes the box and I hop down, my hands curling and uncurling with violent thoughts.
“Her things are gone,” I tell him, wondering when the attic was cleared out. Last time I checked on her stuff, about six months ago, it was all there. Did this happen after I moved out? Before? When the Thing was still alive?
There’s a sound from outside, but not from the front yard. It’s coming from the back, like footsteps on the rotten old porch that takes up what little crumb of a backyard this place has. Cal and I exchange a look and he slips over to the window in Penelope’s old room, looking out.
The frown that takes over his mouth scares me a little.
“Cops,” he tells me, glancing back in my direction. “Sara Young, to be specific.”
“Shit,” I breathe, feeling my heartrate pick up. This is unexpected. “How do we get out?” I ask, looking at Pen’s box and the two bags of crap we’ve packed. It’s going to be hard to sneak this shit out without anyone seeing. I was planning on walking out the front door …
Callum watches me with an infinite well of dark, placid patience. It’s like, he could sit there forever, just to hear what I have to say.
“Let’s go out the front,” I say when I hear a loud knock at the door. It’s harsh, unforgiving; it demands to be let in. “I have every reason to be here, and it isn’t like Pamela can report her stolen things as, well, stolen.” I shrug and Cal smiles.
“That was going to be my suggestion as well,” he says, moving away from the wall and coming to stand beside me. The air between us feels charged, like the molecules are dripping with desperation. I lift my hand up and Cal does the same, pressing his palm to mine, letting our fingertips touch. “We should hide this bag”—he points at the one full of jewelry and other stolen items—“in the attic for now.”
He moves away suddenly, before I can fully appreciate the moment, and scales the ladder with the heavy bag like it’s nothing. Then he drops down, closes it all up, and thumps down the stairs loud enough to alert every officer to our presence. An intentional move, and a good one. Don’t want to spook the cops and end up shot.
I follow after him, so that by the time he opens the door to the third pounding knock, I’m standing beside him and looking out at Sara Young.
She’s standing there with Detective Constantine and a bunch of uniformed officers.
“Bernadette,” she says, the faintest hint of bewilderment in her voice. “I’m surprised to see you here. I thought you’d moved out?” She exchanges a look with Constantine, or at least, she tries to. He won’t look at her. He’s too busy frowning down at me.
“She has moved out,” Cal says, leaning forward and obscuring me a bit by putting his forearm up against the left side of the doorjamb, his body propped against the right. “We’re here to get her stuff.”
“So, which one of the boyfriends are you?” Constantine asks, glancing down at his phone like he’s got a list on it that he needs to consult. “Because you’re certainly not Victor Channing, the husband.” He looks back up with an expression that says he’s more than happy to bait Cal into doing something stupid.
But come on, this is Havoc.
This is Havoc, and all along, I still haven’t quite figured out how well-oiled they are, how deep their plots run, like a vein buried deep inside the heart.
“You’re Callum Park, correct?” Sara says, attempting to smooth over her partner’s bad cop persona. How stupid do they think we are?
“He’s Callum Park,” I answer, pushing Cal’s arm down. He bands it around my waist, and I have to really focus to remember to breathe. In that moment, his energy is my energy, a dark swirling storm that only I can control. “And yeah, I’m dating him, fucking him, fucking four other guys. What’s your point?”
“Fucking five guys?” Detective Constantine says with an ugly male laugh. Some of the officers behind him titter like schoolgirls. I blink back some of my own rage. “That must be … I mean, wow. You’re, what, seventeen? Those boys must fight over you like animals.”
I just stare at the man, for so long that he actually starts to look uncomfortable.
“Is your partner done with his sexist bullshit or can we leave? We were on our way out.” I look back at Sara, telling her with my eyes that I have something I need to say. No idea what, exactly, that is now, but I have to come up with something so that she feels like we’re still on the same side.
Now that I know she’s with the VGTF, and that she was looking into Neil Pence, I have several clues I can put to good use. One, she’s more interested in finding out all the awful things my stepfather has done, rather than the things I’m doing. Her questions all come rushing back to me in a flood, and they all seem to make a hell of a lot more sense than they did before.
