Victory at Prescott High (The Havoc Boys #5) - C.M. Stunich Page 0,221

in all the places that I'm improper. Almost indecent, really.

Cat would so kill me for this …

Some people—ignorant people—think that having a dad named Cat is a little weird, especially considering his … chosen profession. But the guys call their president that for a reason. Cats are some of the most efficient hunters on the planet, taking down a wide variety of prey … and also, everyone knows that well-fed housecats kill for fun. Toy with their prey, play with it, torture it before they kill it.

That's my dad. That's Cat, president of Death by Daybreak MC.

And sometimes I think he's just as hard on his daughter as he is his enemies.

“A really fucking good time,” I say, leaning into her.

The acrid smell of smoke curls around the pair of us, me with my Jameson and Reba with her plain old Coca-Cola. We sit there for the longest time, until Johnny K. asks Reba to dance and she accepts, joining the crowd to the right of the pool and hitting the makeshift dance floor with moves that were probably outdated by the time this old house was built.

A few minutes later, Johnny R. gives up on trying to convert us all to records and old-school rock and sets up a playlist on his iPhone, leaving the DJ station to invite me to dance next. I abandon the now empty bottle of whiskey, run my tongue over my teeth to make sure there aren't any lipstick stains, and take his hand.

It's warm and sweaty and unsure. Joining Johnny R. in the empty dirt patch where my classmates grind and bump and grin and grope, I know I'm dancing with a boy instead of a man.

Flickers of a different party, a different moment, a different dance partner skitter around the edges of my mind, but I ignore them, letting the booze and the weed keep control of my brain and all the horrible things crawling around inside of it.

After a few songs, I push Johnny R. away and stumble over to the edge of the yard, where the black silhouettes of trees stand guard like silent ghosts. Putting my hand on the faded white paint of an apple tree trunk, I lean over and try to fight the sudden, overwhelming nausea spiraling through me. It doesn't help that on the ground near my boots, the plump corpses of rotten fruit litter the dirt like splotchy scabs.

The scuff of a rubber sole on the ground nearby draws my attention up and over to the black-on-black shimmer of a shadow hiding in the trees. As sick as I feel right now, my head still spinning with THC and alcohol, my hand drops to my boot and the hunting knife buried in a sheath behind the leather.

“Shouldn't mix pot and booze, Gidge,” a rough voice says, just beyond the orange-yellow pool of light cast by the bonfire. It dances through the dark, vertical bars of the forest, highlighting the dry brown sea of undergrowth.

Lifting my head up, I try my very best not to puke.

“Crown?” I ask, but I already know it's him because there's nobody else in this town that's as big as a house but that moves like a cat, padding on soft paws through the night. I swear, I can see his smile before I see his face, just the Cheshire's grin floating in the darkness. “What are you doing here?” I whisper, heart pounding, beads of sweat sliding down the sides of my face.

Crown is my father's right hand, the vice president of Death by Daybreak.

“Looking for you,” he says, stepping into the light, all six foot five of him cloaked in black leather and bullshit. Oh, don't get me wrong—Crown is as brutal as Cat on a good day. On a bad one, he's twice as dangerous and packed with enough emotional issues that he may as well be walking dynamite. But he's charming and he's handsome and the man all the club-whores fight over.

My stomach turns and I lean over, planting a hand across lips painted ruby red. Crown knows I'm not allowed to wear makeup—ever. It's just another one of Cat's archaic, sexist, fucked-up rules.

“As soon as I heard there was a senior class bonfire happening tonight,” he says, leaning his forearm against the apple tree, “I knew you'd make the great escape.”

I fall to my knees and throw up, the sickly sweet smell of overripe apples making the situation ten times worse. I just hope Reba doesn't