pointed to the front door.
Fuck. I was not good at charades.
“She’s coming back with Marco,” King barked.
For the umptieth time, my jaw dropped. I tapped my nose and smiled. He understood me.
Frost held his head in his hand and silently laughed.
Hey, I got my question answered, and I didn’t have to say a word.
“You can go now. Eat and stay out of my hair.”
I plastered a smile on my face and stood. I bowed with my hands in front of me and then skedaddled my ass over to the kitchen.
“Did you just bow to King?” Cyn barked with laughter. “You’re gonna give that man a complex, and then he’s gonna expect all of us to bow to him.”
“Not happening,” Meg called. “That man gets me on my knees enough. Not bowing to his cranky ass, too.”
“Oh, God,” Luna moaned. “Please don’t refer to your knees and King in the same sentence ever again. I have virgin ears.”
“Is there a different definition of virgin than the one I know?” Greta asked. “Dead serious.”
Luna flipped her off. “Sit and spin.”
Greta wiggled her eyebrows. “Don’t tempt me with a good time, Luna.”
Meg handed me a plate. “Everything okay?”
I grabbed the plate and nodded.
She raised her eyebrows. “Did you go mute?”
“Oh, I can talk now,” I chirped.
“He took away talking privileges again?” Meg asked.
I nodded. This obviously wasn’t the first time King had been so pissed he didn’t let anyone talk.
She shook her head and laughed. “He must have been pretty pissed if you’re still hesitant to talk. Was it Zig and Zag?”
I ducked my head. “I’m pretty sure it was me. It was like once I opened my mouth, I couldn’t shut up.”
Meg patted me on the shoulder. “I’ve been there, honey. I’ve been there more times than I can count. Fill your plate.” She leaned close and whispered, “Stay away from the potato salad and possibly the Jell-O salad. It’s a box mix, but I swear I saw her adding vinegar to it.”
I wrinkled my nose. “Vinegar?” I whispered.
Meg nodded. “We keep her around because she’s a good person, and she married my best friend. Those things forgive the fact that she can’t cook to save her life.”
“Thank you for the warning,” I whispered.
I filled my plate and made sure to avoid the potato salad and Jell-O. Both things, under normal circumstances, I more than likely would have taken huge spoonfuls of.
I grabbed a seat next to Greta and Luna then dug in.
Things were still a mess, but I had hope that at least Royal would be safe soon. I had to hold on to any hope given to me because if I didn’t, I was sure to break down crying right there on my plate.
Life was hard, but Royal was safe.
I would take that victory.
*
Chapter Fourteen
Frost
“Vinegar, Frost.” Indiana wrinkled her nose. “Meg said she put vinegar in the Jell-O.”
I laughed and laid back. “That seems pretty tame compared to some of the crazy shit she has added to food. Troy says he blames the show Chopped for her adventurism with food.”
“Shut up.” She laughed, curled into my side, and laid her head on my shoulder. “It’s not like Meg gave her a basket with mystery ingredients, and vinegar was one of them. There was no written rule somewhere that said she needed to grab the vinegar.”
“Well, you were lucky and learned early on to stay away from Marley’s food.” God knows there were many times we weren’t given warning about the food she brought to family dinners.
I was fully convinced that the reason why Luna was such a bitch most of the time was because she was malnourished when she was young.
King had talked at us for about ten minutes before he ended church and stormed out of the clubhouse. Even Rigid was clueless about why King was in such a shitty mood.
We all figured it was because of the girls dying. That shit was affecting all of us, but King was going off the deep end about it. This was a problem that he couldn’t solve, and it seemed like even the police were coming up short with answers.
As of right now, there was no physical evidence from the person who had taken Pam, killed her, and then dumped her in the park on the other side of town. They had sent the blood from the window sill out to be tested, but we didn’t have our hopes up it was going to be the killers. It looked like when