Page 84 of Mr. Match

I put my hands up to stop the uproar. Then place two fingers on my tongue and whistle shrilly to shut them up. “Stop,” I say. Nolan is tugging West off Pax and Mac is pushing Pax into a corner to keep them from fighting.

“Knock it off, you dicks. It’s a fucking figure of speech, Weston. For fuck’s sake. Don’t you know him well enough by now? He’s just trying to piss you off.”

West pushes Nolan off him and straightens his shirt. “Well, excuse the fuck out of me,” he says, breathing hard and pointing a finger at Pax, “for not thinking any of this shit is funny. I’ve got way too much on my mind to deal with his childish bullshit.”

“I have to side with Weston on this,” Mac says. “Knock it off, Pax. And just explain the goddamned plan.”

“OK, let me fill you in on a few things Oliver just updated me on,” Pax says, looking at me for permission.

I nod. What’s the point in hiding it now? This shit is happening. There is no way what’s going on with my site on the dark web will be secret once this is all over. I know it. I’m being set up. We’re all being set up.

Pax explains the plan to fake-kill West and hire a reporter in the dark market to air it. Make it go viral. Everyone is pretty quiet while he lays out the plan, but once he’s done, they are nothing but questions.

“Where will we take this picture?” West asks.

“How will we make it believable?” Nolan adds.

“What if Liam doesn’t believe it? What if he wants a finger? Or a baby toe?”

“A baby toe?” Pax says, making a face at Mac. “Were you watching The Big Lebowski before you got here?” Pax shakes his head as Nolan huffs out a laugh. “Fucking toe. No one wants a stupid baby toe for proof.”

“Whatever,” Mac says. “You get what I’m saying. I don’t think he’ll believe it unless he sees a dead body.”

“And we’re not gonna have a dead body,” West says.

“But we will have the next best thing,” Pax says, beaming a huge smile at me. “Oliver’s cousin-friend, Sparrow Flynn, owns the Fort Collins Theater, right?”

“So?” I say. “We’re not getting her involved. Believe me, she is so strait-laced, it will never stay secret. She will tell every one of my relatives before the sun goes down. My dad will come over.” I shake my head, just picturing it. “And my mother will overreact and start pulling out guns. No. We can’t use Sparrow.”

“What if she doesn’t know?” Pax says. “There’s a huge ZombieFest this weekend for Halloween, right? And she runs the new haunted house in town?”

“Yeah? So?” I say again.

“Cindy said it’s pretty hardcore. Like they have professional makeup artists for the blood and gore.”

“Oh, fuck, yeah,” Nolan says. “That’s genius, Mysterious.”

Pax looks proud of himself. “Why, thank you, Romantic. I do my best. So all you gotta do, my little matchmaker friend,” Pax says, clapping me on the back, “is tell her West is going to a costume party tonight down in Denver and needs help. Make the rest of that lie up for me, will you? You’re good at that.”

I ignore his insult and think it over as I scratch the hair on my chin. “Sparrow,” I finally say, “has West painted up like he took a bullet to the head. Then we take the picture, buy a reporter from the dark market, and have him leak it.”

“Exactly,” Pax says.

“Tell me again why we think people are gonna care enough about this one murder to show it on TV?” Mac asks.

“Because it’s Weston Conrad,” Pax says. “The Misters are back, gentlemen. And as much as people would like to say they’re not interested in our debauchery, they are. So let’s give them the headline they’ve been waiting a decade for.”

Chapter Thirty-Six - KATYA

I get to the building behind Shrike Bikes ten minutes late because of my unplanned stop at home. But as soon as I approach the door, it opens, and Ariel is standing there looking pretty pissed off.

“Nice of you to join us,” she snaps as she lets me pass and then locks the doors behind us.

I wait as she does that, then follow her through a sheet of construction plastic and down a hall. “What is this place?” I ask, looking ahead at the large room. It’s got lanes, or aisles, marked out with some kind of track on the ceiling. “A bowling alley?”

Ariel snorts. “A shooting range.”

“Really?” I look around as we come to another piece of construction plastic. Ariel pushes her way through, then me. And on the other side is a small office with a dingy round table. All the other girls are either sitting or standing, drinking coffee.