“How well do you know my sister?” he asks.
I’m hot under the collar, but I refuse to stretch my neck from side to side to catch some cool air. It’s imperative that I remain steady and unshakeable in the eyes of Paisley’s brother. “Not well.”
He grunts thoughtfully. “Then how in the hell did you end up saving her?”
“I was watching him,” I say instead of admitting that I was looking for her. “I know these guys. They did it to a friend of mine and got away with it.”
His eyes narrow. “How did you let them get away with it?”
I’m looking at him, trying to figure out if he’s trying to insult me on purpose. “What do you mean how did I let them get away with it?”
“Just that. You called Phil and Mick tonight. Why didn’t you call them when your friend needed them?”
That’s a good question. And here’s another instance where I can’t tell the truth. Orion and Achilles wouldn’t do shit for my friends. They wouldn’t want me or themselves involved. With them, everything is transactional. With me, it isn’t. If Orion wasn't still in love with Paisley's cousin, then I wouldn't have gotten any help from him. I can’t tell Max that.
“My brother called Phil and Mick. I don’t know them.”
He’s observing me with narrowed eyes again. The elevator stops, and as the doors slide open, he says, “I don’t want my sister dealing with shit. Got it?”
I’m speechless as a long explanation about why we need Paisley involved sounds off in my head. “We need her. We have witnesses that…”
He puts a finger over his lips, and I go quiet. “Hear that?” he whispers.
I incline my ear toward the hallway, but before I can pick up any sound, Max is on the move. I follow him, still trying to hear something. He stops and points toward my feet. I get it. He wants my steps to be quieter. I nod, figuring I’ll go with the flow. I don’t hear anything, though. I’m still not happy about him wanting to leave Paisley out of it. She’s my slam dunk.
We move slower. I listen hard until…shit, I hear it.The sound is like the foot of a bed knocking against the floor. I don’t think it’s anything, though, until we get closer and I see that the noise is coming from the room where O’Brien was trying to violate Paisley.
Max raises his eyebrows, and I nod, letting him know I understand. I’m on his heels as we rush into the room.
“Shit,” I whisper. It’s one of them.
A flash goes off. Beatty Stern swiftly turns to face us. Another flash goes off. He hops off the girl, whose dress is pulled up to her neck. Her name escapes me, maybe because I’m on sensory overload. But just looking at her that way feels like a violation.
“Go get one of the cops. They should be where the main party’s taking place,” Max says, staring daggers at Beatty, who’s scrambling to put on his pants. “This one’s not going anywhere.”
* * *
The older cop,Phil, came back to the room with me. When I got upstairs, more cops were in the party, the music was off, and everybody had been hauled up to the rooftop patio. The guard I ran into earlier was replaced by another, who apparently let another one of those fuckers take a girl downstairs. He was being questioned by an officer.
After I found Phil, he rode down in the elevator with me, and on our way to the room, a girl walked right into us. She said she didn’t know how she’d gotten to that floor, and after seeing the cop, she broke down and cried, knowing something had happened to her.
I’m still thinking about it all as I ride home. Max said he’d handle it after Beatty was arrested. He said my testimony wouldn’t be needed.
“Paisley’s name stays out of it. We have enough evidence without her,” Max said.
He told me to go upstairs and give officer Mick Byrne my statement about my friend Blossom. Again, he warned me not to mention Paisley. “If you put her name in your statement, then I know you don’t care about these girls at all and you’re playing some Valentine bullshit games with me. I’m looking you in the eye, and I’m seeing you’re more honorable than that, Hercules.”
I didn’t have to wonder what he meant by “Valentine bullshit games.” Max and Achilles have bumped heads more than a handful of times. I wanted him to know that tonight wasn’t about the tension between our families. I went upstairs and gave my statement about Blossom along with her name and address.
Now, I’m in my car. I almost don’t want to drive home tonight. I want to see Paisley again and tell her thank you, but I have to drive to Long Island. On weekdays, I stay in the city for school. On weekends, my parents want me home. I tried to talk my mother into letting me stay the night at my place since I graduate tomorrow, but she insisted I come home.
“What kind of mother do you think I am?” she said. “Get home, Hercules. It’s already bad enough you’re away all week.”
What can I say about Marigold Grace Valentine? Ever since I was cognizant of what was going on in the world around me, I knew it was my mom’s job to craft our family image with the precision of a surgeon with a scalpel. Only recently have I learned that her efforts were made on account of the morality clauses in the Valentine family trust agreement. My great-great-great-great grandfather, tycoon and oil baron Thomas Ralph Valentine, was a vicious man but a religious one. I heard he was king of the hypocrites, and the only reason he included all those morality clauses was to make himself look like a saint.
It’s funny that I’m thinking about my mother, because a call registers on my dashboard screen, and it’s her. I’m tired as hell, and after the day I’ve had, I really would rather wait until tomorrow to talk to her. I thought she’d be in bed by now. It’s after midnight.
“Shit,” I mumble and then answer the call. “What’s going on, Mother?”
