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“Thanks, Brayden” I say primly as I hand it back.
“Jayden,” he corrects. “Brayden is over there.”
Jayden is a skinny white guy with a bright orange afro and Brayden has a complexion the color and texture of terra cotta tile. “No relation?”
He lets out a laugh that abruptly cuts off when he catches an elbow in the stomach from the pledge next to him.
I know Drake has warned them not to say anything that might offend me. He has gotten into the habit of reacting violently to perceived insults, so most of the pledges go out of their way not to acknowledge me at all. He doesn’t understand that being ignored is almost as bad as being insulted.
The bottle passes around again in a circle. The pledge on my other side has the choice between handing it over or walking around me to give it to someone else. He hands it over with a sigh.
I take another swig, letting the liquor settle on my tongue a second before swallowing it. Trying to identify it is impossible. Too rough to be vodka, but I don’t recognize the familiar taste of tequila or rum. Some kind of whiskey, maybe. “What is this?”
“Eighty proof,” Jayden says with a rough laugh. “That’s all I need to know at this point.”
I jerk my chin at the two other pledges. “If one of you is named Okayden, I’m out.”
The two glance at each other, but only one of them is brave enough to answer me. “I’m Ian and this is Alex.”
“Alex. Ian. Brayden and Jayden. I’ll try to remember that.”
Jayden takes the bottle when I pass it to him. “No worries.”
Ian casts a nervous look over my shoulder as he takes the bottle. “Where’s Drake?”
I shrug. “Some guy tried to touch my ass in the pool, so Drake lit his bed on fire while he was sleeping in it. Probably should have put him out before the alarm went off.”
At first, Jayden is the only one who laughs. It takes the other’s way too long to realize that I’m joking. Tough crowd.
“Drake didn’t really start the fire, did he?” Alex asks.
“Not as far as I know. We were on the pool deck when the alarm went off.”
Jayden’s eyebrows shoot up as his smile widens. “The pool deck, huh?”
I belatedly realize that I basically just admitted that Drake and I snuck into the pool after hours. Only an idiot wouldn’t be able to figure out what we were doing. Even though the burn has settled into a ball at the pit of my stomach, I take another swig from the bottle to cover my sudden embarrassment.
“You and Drake.” Ian lets out a loud burp. The slur in his words is so slight that I almost miss it. “I’m still wondering how the hell that happened.”
Alex elbows him hard in the side. “Shut the fuck up, man.”
“What? I can’t ask questions?”
“Maybe don’t say anything to her that you don’t want getting back to Drake.”
“I’m just saying what everyone is thinking. Nothing wrong with that.”
“It’ll be a problem when he kills you. Or worse, kicks you out of Havoc House.”
I decide to interrupt them before things get out of hand. Maybe it’s the hard liquor loosening my tongue, but I suddenly can’t fight a burst of curiosity. “What are people saying?”
Even though my gaze settles on him, Ian looks around like he thinks I might be talking to someone else. “What?”
“You said that you’re just repeating stuff everybody says,” I reply patiently. The bottle has somehow made it back into my hand. The world wavers around me as I try to figure out if everything else is swaying back and forth, or just me. I take another sip anyway, though smaller than the last one. “What have been people been saying?”
Some of the bravado leaks out of him. “People are always talking.”
“You started this,” Jayden points out. “Go ahead and tell her.”
