Total pages in book: 168
Estimated words: 160578 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 803(@200wpm)___ 642(@250wpm)___ 535(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 160578 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 803(@200wpm)___ 642(@250wpm)___ 535(@300wpm)
I follow her until my eyes land on the Gentlemen. Suits, ties, and big fucking lies…that’s all they exude.
“Why the fuck are they even here?” The words leave my mouth before I can stop them. Vaden wouldn’t want them here. I sure as fuck don’t want them here.
Brantley wouldn’t either.
Why my father and Danny Dale are hell-bent on keeping peace for the sake of their kids is pointless, because Moses Dale and Vaden have hated each other with a fire that would burn through any treaty.
“Because your father needs them alive for a bit longer.” Her eyes settle on me. “Find another way. Don’t use the Gentlemen. They will not bend. Their hatred for us, Priest.” She leans in farther as if I can’t hear her loud enough. “Is not superficial. Who they are, what they do—” She pauses. “They’re not who you think they are, and every ugly thing you know, every disgusting image you can think of happening to that girl? You can bet that entire one million that they will do to her.”
With a light pat, she retreats back through the swarm of tables and to the curtains that hide the backstage.
“They’re hiding shit about the Gentlemen.” War taps me with his leg. “Listen to her. You know your mom. She doesn’t say anything unless it’s the truth.”
We’ve tried everything else. Now I’m back at square one. I need an enemy, but it needs to be one I can trust enough to not hurt her for any reason. One with a moral code. One I thought the Gentlemen had.
I need air.
Vaden’s footsteps catch up to me as I head through the main doors. They die out when I stop, and in the blanket of the night, everything pieces together like a puzzle.
“I know what we’re going to do.”
Vaden trails down the steps, watching me with careful eyes. “I know that look…”
Restlessness clings to me, the world shifting to a colorless shade of gray. “We’re going to sell her.”
Vaden pauses. “Mommy Mads already said no, and no offense, but she’s terrifying and I don’t much want to get on her bad side.”
Vaden and I both know that he’s her favorite, so it’s impossible for him to be on her bad side, and second, she doesn’t much have one since having us, unless, well, you fucked with one of us.
I step closer into my best friend, the constant whispers around me finally muted. “She will think she’s been sold.”
“To who?”
“Me.” His voice is the exact trigger for Vaden’s rage, and when his smile falls and his head whips around to find the owner of it, my hand flies out to stop him.
“Wait.” I pause, shoving Vaden out of the way. He’s like an emotional bulldog when it comes to the Gentlemen, and I don’t have any of the patience for it tonight. “How much of that did you hear?” I planned to do this anyway, but I don’t appreciate him listening in to shit he shouldn’t.
Fucker.
“All of it.” Moses plucks the cigarette out of his mouth, shoving his hand in his pocket and taking the steps down until he’s directly beside both Vaden and I.
Vaden vibrates beside me, his anger radiating off him in heat waves.
Moses chuckles. “Oh, you can trust me with her all right.”
“The fuck you can!” Vaden’s in front of me now, his face blocking my view from anything else. “Priest, be for so fucking real right now. If you do this, you’re handing him a token. Something of ours! We trust that these backward motherfuckers aren’t going to do all the things they want to do?”
“Ahhh…last I checked, we’re not the EKC. We don’t get off on dubious consent, preying, stalking, murder, or—what was the other one? Oh yeah…necrophilia.”
I flip him off.
“Fuck me…” Vaden pulls at his hair. “How you gonna make a deal with the Devil?”
From his long hair tied at his nape to his Armani suit that seems to be tailored a little too tight. His eyes are burned toffee, and his cologne is way too fucking strong. The Gentlemen are a lot of things, but Mom is right. I can’t trust them.
Vaden’s comment triggers a laugh from Moses.
My head tilts. “Why do you find that funny?”
He shrugs. “The Devil part. That you’re the one doing a deal with the Devil.”
“Am I not?” My tone remains flat. Moses isn’t a threat. I’d stomp him out in less time it’d take to tie the laces of my Jordans.
He seems to think for a moment. “One would say you were the Devil in this equation.”
I don’t answer. I barely move.
Vaden scoffs from somewhere behind me. “He ain’t the Devil, Moses.”
Moses pauses. Vaden has his attention, probably because he’s never said his name out loud.
“He isn’t? Last I checked, the pied piper of Riverside was absolutely the Devil. What’s the saying? Luring young girls to their death?”