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“Stop, Kayli,” Marc said, tugging again, gentler this time. “He’s just egging you on.”
“What check?” I asked Jack again.
“You think I need you?” Jack shoved a finger back at my face. “It doesn’t matter if Wil is here as long as he’s going to school and the cops don’t catch him living somewhere. And if you’re both off on your own, then the state may reduce it, but I can still live on...”
It was like ice water striking at my very heart. “You...” I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. “You get checks from the state?”
“You think I do nothing around here?” he bellowed. “You think I can’t support myself? You think your little contribution makes you tough shit?”
I smashed my fists against my thighs to stop myself from hurling them at his face. My mouth clamped shut and I was biting my tongue so hard, I tasted the blood boiling inside me. “How long?” I managed to utter.
“None of your business what I do with my money,” he said. “You dropped out of school and have been running around. When I stopped providing for you and your brother, you straightened up and worked and finally started contributing.”
Raven held up a hand between us. “This isn’t the time for this. Wil is still gone.”
But the revelation struck me hard. My father had lied to me. Lied about having money. He lost his job, and didn’t even try to look for another one. It’s why I’d dropped out of school. I’d started working part time jobs where I could get them. And when it wasn’t enough, I started stealing what I needed by picking pockets at the mall. Even then, we got kicked out of our old apartment and Jack convinced us we should stay at the hotel until we found another. But this whole time, I had been the only one paying the bills and contributing. Jack left nearly every afternoon when the bars opened to drink and pay for hookers out of the money I’d brought home for rent.
And now he tells me he’s been getting government assistance all along. Possibly using me and Wil the entire time as the state helped pay for what we needed. Only the money went to Jack. He must have drank it all. Gave it away to those hookers.
My rage bubbled over. I lunged at him. I wailed. I screamed. Marc tried to pull me back, but I wrenched myself free. Raven dropped my bags and wrapped an arm around my waist and pulled me back, but not before I clawed at Jack’s face with a good swipe. Even then, it wasn’t enough.
“How could you?” I screamed at him as Raven started carrying me to the door. “We needed you and you kept it all to yourself? We were starving!”
“Get out!” Jack bellowed after me. “Ungrateful little shithead!”
A slew of curses fell from my lips as Raven towed me out. I fought him, but not as hard as I could have because he wasn’t the one I wanted to kill.
I was a mess, upside down, seeing red and choking on sobs as Raven brought me to the parking lot. Marc followed, carrying the book bags that Raven had dropped. His head was down and he stared at his feet as we left. He opened the truck and threw my bags into the back seat. Raven put me down in the passenger side and then shoved me over until I was in the middle.
Raven got inside, slamming the door. “Skatert'yu doroga.”
“Good riddance is right,” Marc said. He jammed the key into the slot and started the truck.
I sat back against the seat. My eyes were open and I was staring at the windshield, but I wasn’t really looking at anything. I was trying to contain the anger that now threatened to consume everything inside of me.
I’d been gripping Raven’s thigh after he got in. As he settled, he snatched up my hand and squeezed. Then he opened up his arm and pulled me into him until I was leaning against his chest. He gripped at my shoulder, clutching me.
I let him. And in a way, his strength allowed some of my anger to flow away. Marc drove and then glanced at us. His hand drifted out, and he gripped my knee.
None of us said anything. We didn’t need to. We all knew.
I’d never see Jack again.
But what about Wil?
CALCULATED MOVES
The bubbling anger in my throat wouldn’t settle. Staring through the windshield didn’t help. My fists kept balling up against my thighs.
I handled things pretty well for someone whose life was in upheaval. As of this moment, I had no home, no brother, and no family. I didn’t have a dollar to my name, no job, and probably had a billionaire playboy mad at me for wrecking his yacht. And shooting him in the leg.
Marc was focused on the road.
I’d known him for only a few days. During that time, I managed to put a nail through his thigh, run out on him twice, kiss him a handful of times, wanted to do it again, and if that wasn’t enough of a start, he knew every last bit about my life and I still knew hardly anything about him. He was an ex-thug who now belonged to a new gang...undercover division...I didn’t know what, really. Their group was called only Academy. What kind of name was that?
Raven had his elbow propped up on the door and he was staring out the window. He called himself a professional Russian. I wasn’t sure what Russians were professionals of, but so far I knew he could handle any sized weapon you gave him, and he knew how to blow things up. Sexy ran through his blood just like his heritage. He had a lip ring, and occasionally he fiddled with it with his tongue, causing it to protrude out. The tattoos on his body, his broad stature, and the harsh stare he gave made him one of the few people I actually thought could take down a person with a single punch. So far I was on his good side. I never wanted to know the bad one.
They were both a mega problem because I hadn’t wanted to return, and they were the only ones I thought I could call, outside of the police--and I didn’t want to go there. Most of me wanted to search for Wil on my own. I’d swallowed back a lot of pride to call them for help, thinking their Academy skill set could help me find him faster than I could on my own. Making sure Wil was safe was the only thing that drove me to call them in the first place.
Maybe.
I was a thief...an ex-thief, new to standing on the better side of the law. I knew how to pick pockets, and occasionally I could lie my ass off to get out of a sticky situation. I had brown hair, light green eyes and decent cleavage. With enough mascara and gloss, and a low-cut top, I could turn a head or two, or wear boy clothes and go unnoticed.
We’d only been driving for a few minutes, but every mile was agony. I was ripping myself out from a world I’d always been in, and now completely lost and dependent on the guys and I hated it. The worst was, I didn’t have a choice. I could walk out into the street and leave, but I was going to start with absolutely nothing, not even a place to stay. My original plan to get on my feet before I saw any of the guys again had failed before it even started.
Wil was still missing.
“Corey said Wil was going to school,” I said, breaking the silence. This bit of information felt oddly important, but in my stressed out state, I wanted a clearer head to spell it out for me.
“He is?” Marc asked. He turned his head, his mismatched eyes taking on an eerie glow from the lights in the dashboard since it was already dark outside. When I nodded, he shifted and pulled his phone out and started typing into it.
“What are you doing?” I asked, glancing nervously at the road and his texting and driving.
“Checking in with Axel.”
“Here,” I said, snatching the phone from his hand. There wasn’t much traffic along the interstate, but he was laying on the accelerator and I didn’t trust other drivers.
“Hey,” Marc said, though he reclaimed the wheel with both hands. “It’s not nice to snatch stuff.”
“It’s illegal to text and drive. And I don’t particularly want to die today because you’re not paying attention.”
“You’re going to talk to me about illegal—”
Raven reached over, thunking Marc on the head. “She’s right.”
Marc made a noise but didn’t argue.
I focused on the phone, where Marc had started to s
end a text to Axel. I tapped at the screen to finish up. Raven hovered over my shoulder, watching what I was doing.
Marc: Wil’s been going to school? Any update from classmates?
Raven continued to hover over me as we waited for a response. He pointed to the screen on the phone. “What’s that one?” he asked.
“What?”
“That word,” he said, and he pointed to the phone’s screen.
I wondered if he was playing some joke on me and I wasn’t getting it. “Update?”
“Oh,” he said. “Update. Never mind. I know that one.”
“He’s still learning to read,” Marc said. “English isn’t exactly the easiest language to learn.”
“It’s fucking hard,” Raven said.
It was odd to think of Raven not being able to read so well. He wasn’t stupid. He was learning a new language. I didn’t know any bit of another language, so I couldn’t imagine what he had to go through to learn English.
I wanted to comment on this but the phone shook in my hands.
Axel: Confirmed. Administrative records say he’s been to class. No word on where he’s staying.
