Anarchy (Hades Book 2)

by Tate James

  I snorted a laugh. "That's cute," I told Zed with a wide grin. "You think you're the boss around here." Reaching up, I gave him a condescending pat on the head, then headed through to the kitchen.

  "What?" Zed asked, following. "I am his boss. Or... was. You're probably not a hot commodity on the stage right now, kid."

  Lucas scowled back at Zed as I slid onto one of the barstools at the island. "Yeah, keep lying to yourself like that, Zed. Chicks dig scars; I'll be ten times as popular whenever the actual boss lets me get back to work." He gave me a pointed look, and I shook my head firmly.

  "Not a chance, Lucas. Your bruises haven't even healed, let alone that burn." I frowned at his chest like I could see the brand through his T-shirt. It was healing well, and his doctor speculated that the branding iron may not have been as hot as it could have been. Chase had rushed it, and for that I was glad.

  "Actually, I had an idea about this," Lucas told me, tapping the spot with his index finger. "So don't stress. I got it handled. Just say the word and I'll happily get back to work in any of your other clubs."

  Zed arched a brow at me behind Lucas's back, and I flicked a look at him before shaking my head. "We can discuss it when you've had another checkup."

  Lucas gave a long sigh and braced his hands on the counter beside me. He leaned in close, his lips brushing over my ear. "I guess I'll have to keep my skills sharp with private dances in the meantime." His whispered words were full of sex and promise, and his teeth nipped playfully at my neck.

  I sucked in a sharp breath as my body responded, but my eyes locked with Zed's. He wasn't angry, though. Just... sad. Resigned.

  Fucking hell. That was the last thing I wanted. Had we already broken our once ironclad friendship with that one kiss? Or had this already been a long time coming?

  The gate buzzer sounded, saving me from doing something really dumb—like asking Zed if he was cool entering into a polyamorous relationship with me, Lucas, and Cass.

  Zed went to answer it, and Lucas seized the opportunity to kiss me properly while we were alone. His hands clasped my waist, and his full lips were soft and unhurried against mine as I kissed him back.

  I could seriously kiss Lucas forever; he had some crazy natural talent with that mouth of his.

  "Are you okay this morning?" he murmured softly when he released me a moment later. "I couldn't help overhearing a bit of that argument last night..."

  I cringed, hating that he'd possibly witnessed such a raw wound on my soul. "Yeah. Zed and I have... history."

  Lucas snorted a laugh. "No shit. But that wasn't quite how I thought it was going to play out."

  My brows rose. I wanted to ask what he meant by that comment, whether he had known Zed was going to spontaneously declare his love and kiss me. But footsteps on the tile floor cut our quiet conversation short, and Zed walked back into the kitchen with Dallas following behind him.

  "Dallas," I said with surprise. "I didn't know we were expecting you this morning."

  He gave me a tight smile and a nod of respect. "Sir. No, you weren't. I thought this was important enough to warrant discussing in person, though."

  His laptop was tucked under his arm, and he placed it down on the countertop to open the screen up.

  I shot Zed a curious look, but he gave me a small headshake in response, telling me he also had no clue what Dallas had come to tell us.

  "Okay, I'm just going to cut to the chase and pray you two aren't in the mood to shoot the messenger," Dallas muttered, flicking Zed and I nervous glances as his fingers flew over the keyboard.

  "We took the edge off at the paintball park this morning," Zed replied with a wry smile. "What have you found?"

  "The purchaser of your insurance underwriter," Dallas replied with a grimace. "That shell corporation took a bit of hammering to crack, but sure enough..." He heaved a sigh, then spun his laptop around to show us the document on the screen. "Locked Heart Enterprises."

  My whole body stilled, and my heartrate seemed to pause for a second.

  "You're kidding me," I responded in a hoarse whisper, my gaze locking with Zed's. "That's not even remotely subtle."

  Zed nodded his agreement. "He wanted that shell cracked."

  "Uh, okay, maybe," Dallas murmured. "Anyway, this is your CEO of Locked Heart. I did some digging into his background, of course, and—"

  "And you found affiliations to the old Timberwolves," Zed finished for him, scrubbing a hand over his face with a groan. "As well as a familial tie to the Lockhart family. Wenton Dibbs was, what? Chase's cousin?" He looked to me for confirmation, but I was shaking my head in disbelief.

  "Yeah, he was," I replied, licking my suddenly dry lips as I stared at the data sheet on the laptop screen. "But he's also dead."

  Dallas frowned. "Um, not to contradict you or anything, sir, because that seems like a supremely stupid idea... but Wenton Dibbs is very much alive. He's been filing tax returns every year, paying rent, getting parking tickets..." He trailed off with a shrug.

  I arched a brow at him. "Do you have a picture of him?"

  Dallas's expression tightened. "No. Or nothing clear enough for facial recognition software. Just these, lifted from a security camera outside the Locked Heart office in Cloudcroft." He clicked a couple of times, bringing up some grainy images that simply showed a tall man with light hair and broad shoulders. His face was averted in all the shots, like he knew where the cameras were and deliberately avoided them.

  They had been cousins, so without seeing his face there was no way to conclusively tell whether it was Chase or Wenton. Except for one thing.

  "Wenton Dibbs is dead," I said again, rubbing my forehead. "Chase shot him on the back of his dad's yacht and tossed the body overboard."

  Zed gave me a startled look. "How come I never knew about this? Didn't the family blame their feud with the Montaguire's on them killing him?"

  I shrugged. "I forgot all about it until just now. I wasn't..." My voice broke, and I needed to swallow. "I wasn't fully lucid when it happened."

  I met Zed's eyes, and he gave a knowing nod.

  "If that's everything, Dallas, I think we need to discuss this in private." He arched a brow at our resident hacker, who smoothly collected his laptop and jerked a nod.

  "Understood, boss. I'll send a copy of all of this over to you and keep hunting for better images of Dibbs. Or whoever." He gave me another nod, then hurried out of the house once more.

  After the front door closed, echoing through to us in the kitchen, Zed folded his arms and gave me a worried look.

  "Want to tell us the story?" His voice was calm and unemotional, but his eyes were swimming with concern. He'd seen my meltdown last night, and this would be wandering awfully close to those same memories. But one word in his question grounded me back in the present. One word choice threw me a lifeline to cling to and remind myself that things were different now.

  Us.

  He’d asked if I wanted to tell “us” the story... him and Lucas.

  Lucas heard it too and slid his arm around my waist in a silent reminder that he was there for me. I wasn't that scared, drugged-up teen anymore. I had a support network, and dammit, I needed to start using it.

  I only wished Cass were here too. Where was he?

  28

  Clenching my teeth, I tried to force my hand to stop shaking as I raised my coffee to my lips. Zed had just poured it for me, then pulled out the bag of assorted pastries we'd picked up on our way home from paintballing.

  "Zed already knows my horrible history," I told Lucas in a dry voice, wrinkling my nose, "so just... interrupt if I confuse you. Otherwise, I'm just going to gloss over the details if that's cool?"

  He nodded, his brow creased in concern, but his hand on my knee was nothing but reassuring.

  I drew a breath. "Okay, so in a nutshell, Chase Lockhart was an unrestrained, sociopathic psychopath. I mean... if a clinical psychologist got their hands on him, they'd either write a thesis or wet themselves." Ze
d snorted a laugh but didn't interrupt. "He used to..." I trailed off, then gave myself a mental slap to pull it together. "He thought it was entertaining to drug me. PCP was his family's cash cow, and he found the hallucinations that a strong dose could induce to be... I don't know. Amusing. He got off on fear, so trust me when I say that my experiences with angel dust were quite firmly the stuff of nightmares."

  "That's fucked up," Lucas muttered, and I gave him a lopsided smile.

  "You have no idea. Anyway. Wenton Dibbs." I cleared my throat and tugged nervously on a lock of my hair. "It was during some event or other that the elder Lockharts were hosting. We'd gone out on his father’s yacht, and Chase was in the mood to celebrate some promotion his father had given him. He was drinking and doing lines of coke and pressuring me to do it with him."

  Zed grunted an annoyed sound. "He was good at that. Manipulative fuck."

  "Yep. Eventually he decided I wasn't being fun enough and dosed me up on angel dust." I detached myself from the story, focusing on the warmth of Lucas's hand on my knee, of the rich scent of coffee under my nose, and the intense, blazing blue of Zed's eyes locked on mine. "The altercation with Wenton happened when Chase decided to share me around. Wenton refused, then stood up to Chase and told him..." I trailed off, the details fuzzy. "I don't know what. But it ended up with Wenton punching Chase and Chase shooting him in the head."

  I paused, taking a sip of my coffee and letting the distorted memories play out in my mind like a TV channel with bad reception. It was all fuzzy and broken flashes of my drug-induced delirium intermingled with reality. My stomach churned and twisted like I was stuck on a rollercoaster after drinking milk.

  Nope. No way. That was a ride I was more than capable of getting off. So I did. I shut it down and shook my head to clear the scene before refocusing on Zed's eyes once more.

  "Chase panicked that he'd be in trouble for killing a member of the family, so he shoved Wenton's body into the ocean, then paid off the other witnesses, Ivan and Dennis, before we got back to shore." I gave a small sigh. "I was so messed up that it all just... disappeared in my mind."

  Zed's shoulders were tight with fury, his hands clenched into fists at his sides as he stared back at me. The guilt and pain in his gaze was almost too much to bear, so I looked away, turning to Lucas, as I cleared my throat.

  "Do you have any questions?" I asked it gently, meaning did he want more details or would that suffice to explain what an unbalanced mess I’d been.

  Lucas’s forehead was deeply lined with disgust, but his grip on my knee was strong and comforting. "Yeah, actually, I do," he replied, his voice rough with emotion. "I in no way want to doubt your version of events, but my first thought here is... are you sure that's what happened? On all those drugs, already hallucinating... You said Chase got off on your fear, so I'm going to assume he did shit to deliberately scare you, probably orchestrated situations to mess with your head and terrify you."

  I jerked a nod. He'd nailed it.

  Lucas winced, probably hoping I'd say it wasn't like that. "Well, yeah." He ran his free hand over his floppy, model-eque hair. "How do you know that wasn't a setup to scare you or keep you in line? Like a warning to you not to fuck with him?"

  The cold chill traveling down my spine turned to ice.

  "It's possible," Zed said softly, leaning across the counter and tugging my thumbnail from between my teeth. I hadn't even noticed I was chewing it. "I remember that event. I wasn't there that night because I was out with some random college chick, desperately trying to convince myself I wasn't in love with my friend's girl." He gave me a long look. "If I'd been there, he wouldn't have tried that shit."

  I gave a small shrug, refusing to let myself wallow in that victimized feeling any longer. "He'd have just done it later, when we got home."

  "But it's possible Wenton wasn't shot," Lucas reiterated. "A whole lot more possible than Chase surviving a bullet to the face. Right?"

  My skin prickled, and I glanced over at Zed. Was it?

  My friend gave a one-shouldered shrug. "Only you have any hope of answering that, Dare. How positive are you that your memory was reality and not a dust-induced fakery?" He ran a hand over the back of his neck, wincing. "Because I witnessed you shoot Chase. But both Ivan and Dennis are dead now, so we can't check with them about your memory of Wenton."

  I ran that information over and over in my mind, inspecting it from an outsider's perspective. From Lucas's point of view. Eventually, I swiped a hand over my face and exhaled long and hard.

  "Fuck," I whispered. "I don't know."

  Lucas gave my knee a squeeze. "That's okay, babe. You don't have to know. Whether it's Chase himself or Wenton Dibbs, we're still gonna kill him for real this time. He's declared war on Hades herself; there's only one way to end this."

  Zed gave a grim laugh. "With total anarchy."

  I groaned and rolled my eyes at his dumb play on words. But it shifted my mind onto a more worrying subject.

  "Have either of you heard from Cass today?" His absence was increasingly irritating me. Not that I expected him to be hanging around like a lovesick fool simply because we'd fucked once, but something seemed off about him not being here. Maybe that said more about how deeply I'd already let him under my skin than it said about anything else. Prior to hooking up, I'd been lucky to see Cass once a week. He had his own life, his own gang to run. But I was uncomfortably aware how much of his life had previously involved random, beautiful women, and we hadn't exactly drawn up an agreement about what we were.

  Lucas shook his head, taking a bite of a chocolate croissant. "Nope."

  Zed refilled my coffee mug and pressed an oh-so-casual kiss on my cheek as he leaned in. "It sounded like some teething pains with the Wraith takeover." He spun away before I could give him a hard look for that slightly more-than-platonic gesture. "But I'm supposed to see him at Anarchy for training in a few hours, if you want to come spectate."

  I grinned, nodding to the bruise on the side of his face. "You that eager for me to see you get KO'd again, Zayden?" I clicked my tongue, teasing. "I think you might have let your skills slip a bit in recent years. I might need to throw you into a fight night too."

  He narrowed his eyes, setting the coffee pot back down and folding his arms over his chest. "Pick a date; I'll do it. I was just going easy on the old man yesterday so he wouldn't break a hip."

  Lucas started laughing and choked on his mouthful of pastry. He coughed hard, his face red as he tried to get himself under control, but Zed just glared ice-cold death at him throughout.

  "If you say so," I told him with a wide grin, thumping Lucas on the back to help him out, even though it was a proven fact that did nothing to help.

  Zed glowered, picking up his own coffee mug to drink from it. "Fucking shit stirrer," he muttered at Lucas. The dark look he cast at my Gumdrop said he would be getting revenge during training later, poor darling.

  "Alright, I need to go wash some of this paint off," I announced, sliding off my stool and taking my empty mug to the sink. "You two play nice and don't kill each other in some kind of misguided dick-measuring competition."

  Lucas smirked. "I'm secure enough not to need measuring."

  I rolled my eyes, but he was probably right. That snake he was smuggling in his trousers was a one in a million.

  Leaving them in the kitchen, I made my way back upstairs while texting Dallas. I wanted the details of the Locked Heart offices so I could pay the CEO a visit in person. After all, it seemed like the easiest way to answer the Wenton-or-Chase question once and for all. Positive, first-hand identification.

  But I had to admit to myself as I washed fluorescent paint from my hair under the shower stream that it was seeming a hell of a lot more likely this was Wenton, and that gave me some measure of relief. I could handle Wenton Dibbs back from the dead. He wouldn't break me like Chase could.

  29

  Zed seriously taught Lucas a lesson about laughing at him. When they finished thei
r training session in the downstairs gym, Lucas was half-dead and groaning curses at my second.

  I gave Zed a half-hearted reprimand on account of Lucas's still-healing wounds, but ultimately, Lucas was just as much to blame.

  Dallas had gotten back to me earlier to let me know that Wenton Dibbs, CEO of Locked Heart Enterprises, was currently out of the country, so I'd had to put my confrontation plans on ice for the time being.

  After Zed left to check on the clubs and meet Cass at Anarchy, I settled down beside Lucas on the sofa in the living room. He was freshly showered and changed and flicking through the streaming channels in search of a movie.

  I snuggled under his arm. "What are you looking for?"

  He gave me a sly smile. "Research," he replied, then clicked on the movie he'd been hunting for. "Gotta work on some new routines so I'm ready when my boss puts me back on the schedule."

  I snickered as Magic Mike started playing on the big screen. Call me curious, though, I wanted to see what inspiration he was going to draw from Channing and his guys.

  We'd just settled in to watch, when my phone vibrated in my pocket, and I gave a frustrated sigh. I was starting to think I'd be better off without a phone... but that probably wouldn't work amazingly well for running my empire.

  I pulled it out and sat up with a jerk when I saw the caller ID.

  "Everything okay?" Lucas asked, arching a brow at me.

  My eyes flew from the phone to him then back to the phone screen in an instant. "Yeah. Yes. I have to take this." I rushed out of the room, sliding my thumb over the "accept call" button, and brought the phone to my ear. "Seph? What's wrong?"

  There was a heavy pause, and I desperately wished I could climb through the phone. Then my sister sighed. "Hey, Dare," she finally said.

  She didn't sound like she was panicked or in pain or being held against her will. What the fuck?

  "I'm still so mad at you," she informed me, her tone hard and edged with hurt. "But you're still my big sister."