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I’d done my best to put that story from theExaminerout of my mind, but it had felt like a real cherry on top of a shit sundae at the time. As if it wasn’t bad enough that our sons had been taken, our privacy had been breached as well.
My disguise might not have fooled Lexi, but it was comforting to know that she was so serious about not ratting me out.
“I’ll be grateful when there’s no story at all anymore,” I admitted as Lexi rang up the last of the items from my cart. It was more of an afterthought, really, not even something I was saying in response to anything she’d said.
“I’ll keep you in my thoughts,” Lexi promised, then tapped the register screen. “Can I help you with anything else today?”
“No, this is everything.” I glanced to all the bags and hoped it was everything.
“Okay. Um…” She tapped the register’s screen again. “Oh. Your total is…wow.”
I glanced at the number and laughed. Five hundred bucks’ worth of food. It was harrowing to think that in a day or two, all of it would probably be gone.
“Full house,” I explained, then tapped my card against the reader. It would all go on the pack’s account, which was accustomed to big purchases like this one, and thank God for that. If I was using my own bank account, I’d be sweating through my shirt.
“It was good to see you, Lexi,” I said after we’d loaded all the bags back into my cart.
She gave me another smile, this one much brighter than the one she’d given at the start of the conversation.
“Thanks, Lissy,” she said. “Good to see you, too.”
Chapter21
Xander
Across the table from me, Denny hunched over his burger, eyes fixed on his fries.
“Go ahead,” he said abruptly, shoving several fries into his mouth. “Ask.”
We were at an In-N-Out just off the Strip, taking a quick lunch break before we ventured back out to resume our search.
For three days now, we’d been waiting for Mama Striga to deliver my message to Melony. While we bided our time, we continued searching for Melony’s scent to little avail. The crowds had started to thin out again, but we had yet to uncover any sign of her. If she was still in Vegas, she was laying low.
Without a trail to follow, all we could do was hope she’d visit Striga again, and that Striga would tell her I was in time. We had to hope she’d find us instead.
Denny and I had barely spoken all day. He’d gone quieter after our visit with Striga, which was just as well. I didn’t know if I could trust him anymore. Now that I knew his secret, there was no telling what he thought of me, either.
But if he was offering…
“You have a blood curse, don’t you?”
He snorted. “Real observant, Miller.”
“How’d you get it? Do you know?”
“Oh, I know. You really wanna hear it?”
Of course I did. The nature of his curse would make or break the stability of our agreement.
If he was the victim of a family curse, like Ma, he’d have my sympathy. We might even be able to piece our trust back together—especially if, unlike Ma, the symptoms of his curse didn’t screw with his head.
But if he was an oath-breaker, I’d seriously need to rethink how much faith I could put in him, and whether or not that faith was well-placed.
Letting him catch on to how important his answer was wouldn’t be a clever play on my part, though. The last thing a liar needed was more incentive to lie.
I kept my voice light, casual, as I scraped up a glob of cheese sauce with my own fries. “Might help pass the time.”
“Fine.” He nodded to his meal, then grabbed a wad of napkins and wiped his mouth. “Well, you know already that Mikey and I were both born sigmas. We make all right leaders, especially short-term with a small pack, especially if we’ve got an active goal in mind. But long-term, for a whole pack…”
