Delinquents Turned Fugitives - Ann Denton Page 0,93
like Snow White. I mean, I was on the run from the law, in hiding like her, and I had a crew full of guys protecting me. Why the hell wasn’t she considered more of a badass? I wondered randomly.
I was happy that my guys weren’t of the dwarf variety though. As my eyes traveled up Evan’s chiseled torso and Gray’s lean swimmer body and then over the huge planes of Andros’s pecs, I thought about how I’d definitely gotten lucky with my crew. It was like I had my own personal Chippendales.
Gray kissed me goodbye as his phone rang. He ignored it for a second, pulling me in closer and taking his time to make my heartstrings pull tight. But the caller wouldn’t let up. The phone didn’t stop ringing, so after the eighth ring or so, he backed away and answered. “Yup?” His face tightened and he stepped to the side, toward the parking lot and the crappy old car we’d stolen.
Andros and Evan each kissed me. Evan kissed me first gently. But then Andros grabbed my ass and lifted me into the air and kissed me hard, his tongue plundering my mouth.
I was panting by the time he set me down and not quite ready to say goodbye.
“It’s not a damn competition,” Evan growled, but then he grabbed me and dipped me, giving me his own aggressive kiss.
“I’m gonna send you all out on grocery runs more often.” I grinned.
But Gray’s face ruined the lighthearted moment. “That fucker! Find him. Take care of it,” he commanded, his tone brooking no argument. He ended the call and turned back to the group to see every eye on him. “One of my guys at the school got the tournament sphere out of Metamorphose. But then the asshole skipped out on his drop point.” His eyes met mine and I’d never seen him look more menacing. For a moment, I saw what others in Crush saw, a powerful man with the kind of quiet rage that characterized leaders. Rage didn’t overtake and own him, he owned it.
A little shiver crept up my spine, but not in fear of him; it was because Gray had never looked so damn hot.
He stepped up to me, the fury rippling off him in little waves as he put a hand to my cheek. “Don’t worry. It’ll get fixed.”
“I don’t worry, nemesis. If I know anything about you, it’s that you’ll get revenge.” I winked, and it finally broke Gray’s sizzling fury enough to make him chuckle.
He kissed my cheek once more and then the three of them left.
Z declared he was going to scout around the park for a good location for us all to sleep for the night.
Malcolm and I walked back into the park, past the picnic area, and sat down on the bank of a tiny little stream. It was really more of a rock bed than anything, there was hardly a trickle of water running through it. But it was peaceful.
We faced the steep bank on the other side and there were lush trees with broad green leaves that waved at us like enthusiastic little children as a breeze danced through and cooled our faces.
Malcolm pulled out a pen and a notebook from his messenger bag. In less than half an hour, his hands and the notebook were both full of scribbles, his hands stained from writing so quickly he smudged the ink before it dried. We were brainstorming ways to get rid of ghosts.
Because while Muller was a fucker, and I didn’t doubt he was greasing every palm, blackmailing everyone he could—it was still ten times harder for him to find us.
With Claude, we just had to accidentally say his name.
That was the very first thing that Malcolm and I figured out, because Dad had always shown up whenever I called. I hadn’t realized at the time that his name was what summoned him. But the two times Claude appeared to us (on the bike and at the tents) someone had said his name out loud.
So, rule 1 in Malcolm’s notebook: Don’t say the bastard’s name.
After that, I lay in the grass and pulled up all my memories of Dad, and when he turned into a ghost. “At first, he was really with it. Sometimes, he even forgot he was a ghost. He’d try to grab things or eat. But over time, he started to lose things. Memories, focus … I don’t think any of that helps us, though.