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Liquor has her staggering as she turns around to face the white Audi, her face creased against the shine of the sun bouncing off the hood. It takes her sluggish mind a beat before she recognizes the car.
With a sigh, she waves him over—
The car rolls up to her side. Window down already, she leans her arm on the door and pokes her head in.
“Goin’ Southside by any chance?” she asks.
Trevor gives a small fleeting smile, then jerks his head—a gesture for her to get in. “I can go out of my way.”
She’s not gonna argue with a free ride. It’s a damn long walk.
Sticks are pushed all the way out. All the way to the edge of town. Just walk across the rusted tracks, where the air gets darker and tastes bitter with all the secrets that poison the bowery.
In a blink, she’s in the white leather passenger seat and buckling herself in. “Thought Kate was with you,” she says.
“She was. I drove her to her car at Grace’s this morning.” He shoots her a look as he starts the drive down the rest of the hill. “She’s alright. A bit shaken, naturally. But you know her. Nerves of steel.”
Billie’s smile is soft. “Yeah, she’s tough. Was Grace there, at home? How is she?”
He shakes his head. “Picked up from the hospital by her parents, as I heard it. They took her to Charlotte. Her house is taped off.”
Crime scene, then.
Means she’s got no chance of getting her bag back anytime soon.
“Kate tried calling you a couple of times,” he tells her, pulling onto the flat road that leads into town. The difference a car makes. It would’ve taken her blisters-on-her-feet long to make it down here. “Is your cell off?”
“It’s at Grace’s. In my bag. Keys to my truck, too.”
Oh. And the tip money she hustled at the Joint. Half of it belongs to Tonya, now that she thinks about it.
“It’ll be at the station now,” he decides.
In answer, she takes another swig.
He side-eyes her, not with judgement, but noticing all the same.
She ignores it. Used to it now. Some looks aren’t so nice, that’s why she likes to hide it in her water bottle. But tough times, and she finds that with all the murderings of her friends and hooded killer on the loose, she couldn’t give a shit.
“Will you be alright?” Trevor asks, crawling the car through town. “At the trailer, alone?”
She turns her cheek to shoot him a bitter smile. “I don’t know what else I can do, you know? Can’t stay with Preston. Mom’s locked up in another county. We stayed at Grace’s and look how safethatturned out.”
“Night.” Trevor presses the heel of his palm to the steering wheel and turns and turns and turns, pulling the car onto Mist Boulevard. “Blood Hood strikes at night.”
Billie gives him a puzzled look.
He adds, “Cletus, Gigi… Carmine. It was all at night. That’s why Kate’s been trying to get ahold of you. It’s best you both stay together. I tried to get her to stay with me, but—”
I come first.
She loves me more.
And it’susthat Blood Hood is hunting.
Billie can’t say that, of course. He knows nothing about Blood Hood’s motives, why the girls are being hunted. Best to keep him out of it.
She smiles and looks ahead, through the windshield. “Safety in numbers, I guess.”
