Havoc at Prescott High (The Havoc Boys #1) - C.M. Stunich Page 0,46
saw when I picked up Don’s phone. I'll leave the door unlocked.
A shiver takes over me, and my throat gets tight. Vic frowns heavily and turns to Hael, nodding his chin.
“Get the stuff and meet us at the school at dusk.”
Hael nods and Vic rises to his feet, watching as I finish off the last of my burger and lick my fingers clean.
“Come with me,” he says.
It's not a request.
With a sigh, I swipe my hands down the front of my jeans and follow Vic over to his ride.
I have no idea where he's taking me, but if it isn't to collect on his end of the bargain, I'll be shocked.
I'm starting to feel like my payment is past due.
We take all these crazy back roads over to the abandoned jailhouse on Campground Road. It's like way, way out there, and a part of me feels a jolt of fear when we pull into the empty parking lot, dotted with crows and bits of broken cement.
If Vic wanted to kill me out here, he could. Nobody gives a shit about me, so he'd probably get away with it, too. What does it say about me that I'm not sure I care?
He climbs off the bike and stalks across the lot and up the front steps, not bothering to see if I'll follow. He knows I will. With a sigh, I move along after him, my leather jacket just barely enough to ward off the winter chill. Fall is on the way out, winter is incoming, each day one step closer to my eighteenth birthday, to graduation, to a freedom that seems falsified. When I turn eighteen, I'm not suddenly going to have job prospects, and an apartment, and a future to look forward to. I have to make those things happen.
And if I don’t neutralize the Thing before my birthday, he could kick me out of the house. He could separate me from Heather. He could hurt her like he did Penelope. And there’s not a damn thing I could do about it.
There's a padlock and a heavy chain on the front door, but it's been snipped, probably by the Havoc Boys. Vic simply waltzes past it and inside.
“Come on,” he says, pausing with one boot on the bottom step of the interior staircase before he turns away and starts up it. The steps are covered in leaf litter, but there's at least a skylight above them that gives a little light. The rest of the place is bathed in shadow.
“Gotta be ghosts in here,” I murmur, following after him and taking the steps two at a time. Five stories later, I'm panting and sweating while Vic leans casually against an open door and watches me with that dark gaze of his.
He steps outside, and I follow, finding myself on the roof. The sun is setting in the distance, bathing the hills in gold light. Vic moves to the edge and stares out at the tree line, and the sinking ball of sunshine.
“What are we doing here?” I ask, but I think I already know.
He wants to fuck me here, I bet.
“Don't look so resigned,” Victor tells me, lighting up a cigarette. “I just like to come here to think. You look like you need a moment.” He passes the smoke to me without taking a drag, and I accept it, holding it between two red-nailed fingers. “What ever possessed you to date Donald Asher?” he asks me, and I cringe at the directness of the question. “He doesn’t exactly seem like your type.”
“He’s rich, a ticket out of South Prescott. What is there to figure out?” I ask, and Vic gives me this look that says that even though we're just getting started here, he's done with my bullshit.
“Don't play me like that. You play everyone else in your life. And what do you have to lose with me?” Victor laughs, the sound bitter and broken. “Fucking nothing,” he murmurs, watching the sunset.
I turn to follow his gaze as he lights up another cigarette, and we sit there smoking together for a while. All the anti-smoking ads in the world can't change my life or take away the pain. So what if I want to have one, little pleasure in my life? I don't stop anyone else from eating hamburgers that clog their arteries or driving gas-guzzling SUVs that poison the air as much or more than my smokes, so they can all get fucked. Cancer doesn’t seem like