Page 52 of Anarchy at Prescott High (The Havoc Boys 4)
Pretty sure all Pam ever wanted was to be free.
“Where is Neil?” she whispers one last time. Her 1994 Oldsmobile sits behind her, rusted out and looking like shit. It suits her, that car. Her clothes look ridiculous, like a doll dressed in the wrong outfit. I wonder if that’s how I’ll look next weekend, when I wear a designer dress to a fucking art gallery filled with millionaire and billionaire pedophiles.
“If I knew that, I certainly wouldn’t be telling you,” I inform her, thankful that Hael and Aaron are distracting the girls. If Heather saw our mom here, things would get a lot harder. I’m certain that if Pam sees the way I look at my little sister, she’ll know how important she is to me and try to take her.
I can’t let that happen.
“You know what,” Pam says, getting in my face in just such a way that Callum appears beside her, almost by magic. He stops just shy of touching her, but she can sense what almost just happened and moves back. “You brought this on yourself,” she hisses, backing up. “Remember that.”
Pamela climbs into her car and drives away in a cloud of exhaust.
I watch her go as Cal passes the coffee back to me; he’s already finished the cigarette.
“Do you think Ophelia would contact her?” I ask, because I’ve got a bad feeling about all of this. Havoc has a lot of balls up in the air. I remember once reading a quote from Nora Roberts, some reply to a reader who asked how she keeps it all together, her writing and her family. She said that some balls are made of glass and some of plastic; you have to decide which ones to drop and when.
I need to make sure I remember that.
“Maybe,” Cal agrees, looking from the street to my face. His blond hair, the bit that shows from beneath his hood, is gold in the morning sunlight. “But that’s okay. It won’t change anything.”
He steps toward me, pulling me into his arms. I love the way his smell—like talc and aftershave—sweeps over me and makes me dizzy. I’m drowning in his hoodie. When I nuzzle into it and accidentally spill coffee all down the front of him, he doesn’t seem to mind.
We’re twisted fate, me and Cal.
He recognizes that long before I ever do.
“Shall we?” he asks, holding out his hand. There’s a scar between his thumb and forefinger that reminds me of a heart. And I like that. I like that his ruined flesh can show me something pretty. I smile and offer my hand out, letting him lead me back inside.
“Oh, we’re holding hands now?” Victor asks, cigarette dangling out of his mouth as he sits at the dining room table and polishes a pair of men’s shoes. Barker Blacks, the same ones he wore to the wedding; they have metal skulls on top that suit Havoc’s aesthetic. Also, they’re expensive as fuck. They should go over well at the shitty gala. “How very sweet.”
“Sickeningly,” Oscar agrees, his long finger scrolling on his iPad. He doesn’t bother to look up at me, as if he didn’t don a mask and nut inside of me like everyone else here.
“What’s wrong with holding hands?” Cal asks innocently enough, but with a bit of an edge that finally drags Oscar’s attention up from his iPad and over to his friend’s face. They stare at each other for so long that I’m damn near certain they must be telepathically communicating. “It grounds me, Oscar. It makes me feel human. You should try it sometime.”
Oscar adjusts his silver gaze from Callum’s face to mine. The way he looks at me, it’s either a promise to kill me or fuck me. Since I’m pretty sure I’m in his good graces, I’m guessing it’s the latter.
“What did Pamela want?” he asks, and I sigh. I guess that’s it. We’re not going to talk about the orgy. We’ll just leave it in the dark and the shadows and the smoke like everything else.
“She thinks I stole her man,” I deadpan as Cal lifts my knuckles to his pink lips and brushes a kiss against them that has me shivering. The dark chuckle he lets out in response reminds me of last night, and heat rushes to my core, making me shift in discomfort.
“That makes perfect sense,” Vic agrees sarcastically, cursing as the cigarette drops hot ash onto his crotch. He flicks at it with his fingers as he pulls the smoke from his lips with the other hand. Aaron and Hael choose that moment to make their appearance, coming down the stairs together. The girls’ laughter can be heard echoing from the upstairs bedroom.
“Can you please not smoke in my house?” Aaron says, and I see that we’re already back to normal. Yesterday, he told me fuck it, and let us both chain-smoke right here at this table. But maybe it’s different when Victor does it?
