by Amo Jones
She enters. “Hey, Bran—” Then stops. “What did I just interrupt?”
Her hair has been straightened, her face full of makeup. I know she loves that shit, but she doesn’t need it.
“Nothing.” Then I fish my keys out of my pocket and fling them toward her. She catches them in mid-air. “And you’re taking my car…” When I said she wasn’t riding on anything to do with Brantley, I wasn’t just meaning his cock.
Her eyes widen. “Thanks. Mine should be here tomorrow.”
“You bought a car?” Brantley asks and she drops to the floor, slipping her Chuck Taylors onto her feet.
“Yeah, when Madison and I went shopping, I bought a car.”
“What kind?” Brantley and his questions.
“Let me guess,” I mutter. “A Range Rover.”
“Nope,” she declares, standing back up with my keys in her hand. “A Porsche.”
“Did you get it in black?” I ask, my eyes coming to hers. It’s tradition for all of The Kings to ride in black cars. It started when we became Kings of course. It’s not actually part of The Commandments.
She keeps them on mine, but they lack the typical fire that she normally has. Because she’s hiding something, something she thinks I don’t know. Her lack of faith in The Kings is tugging on my patience.
“Nope.” She smirks, looking down at Brantley. “Blood red.”
Brantley laughs and then looks toward me. “I told you—red is her color.”
I roll my eyes. “Be back by three.”
She waves us all off and makes her way out the front door. We all sit in silence until we hear my loud engine start up and take off down the driveway.
“Three, two, one—” We all stand and make our way out to the two Range Rovers parked at the front. I jump in the driver’s seat of one, with Bishop in the other.
“Get Dough” by Dead Obies starts pulsing through the sound system and Brantley cranks it up. It’s good. I need a distraction from my thoughts.
We pull out onto the main road. Brantley pushes a few buttons, lighting up the GPS on my car. We all had them installed when we got them. It’s just something we do as a precaution. Every single King and close associate, like wives and such, have the same systems installed. A little green light flickers, signaling where she is. Heading into the city.
My phone rings. I switch it to speaker. “What?”
“I’m about to meet her now,” my dad says into the phone. “Nate?”
I don’t answer, running my hand over my jaw. “What?”
“She’s in danger. You must know this.”
“Yeah,” I mutter. “Yeah, I do.”
“And what are you all doing about the situation that holds the last living Stuprum in danger?”
I shuffle in my seat. “We’ve got a plan.”
“Care to share?”
“Fuck no!” I scoff. “You’re nomad, therefore you’re even less trustworthy than a fucking Rebel and The fucking Circle.”
He sighs. “I’m also your father, and the peace—”
I hang up, tossing my phone onto Brantley’s lap.
“How is this cunt trying to act like daddy Malum now?” Brantley mutters. “Motherfucker.”
I brush him off.
“You calling red on Tillie now?” Brantley asks, watching me out of the corner of his eye. When you call red on a girl, that’s when all Kings have to back the fuck off her. You only get one girl ever that you can call red on. Meaning she can’t be shared. Bishop never did until after Daemon died.
I think over Brantley’s words. If I call red on her, that’s fucking it. No one is going to touch her. Flirt? Yeah, but no more little fuck arounds between the three of us—and she’s off limits to Brantley. Now, a reasonable man wouldn’t call red on a chick until they’ve been together as in official—for a while. You know, like Bishop and Madison. However, I’m not fucking reasonable at all.
“Yeah, fucking aye I am.”
Everyone bursts out laughing, Brantley included.
“Finally. How’d you get her to forgive you?” Brantley grins.
“Huh?” I look over at him innocently. “Oh, she hasn’t forgiven me and we’re not together. Might not ever be, might be next week—who fucking knows.”
“You just called red on her!” Brantley yells around his laughter.
“Yeah.” I nod my head. “Because none of you fucks are to go near her with your cocks.”
“Damn,” Brantley chuckles. “Never in the history of The Elite Kings Club has anyone ever splashed red over a girl without being in a relationship with her.”
“Well, there is only one me.” I can’t help the cocky smile on my face.
Brantley shakes his head. “You like them fucking crazy.”
“And you don’t?” I ask, my eyes going to his. I really need to learn more about this secret he’s hiding.
“No,” Brantley glares. “Not anymore.”
“So how do you like them?” I ask, smirking. Is he opening up a little?
“As a saint.”
Tillie
I shut the driver’s door after zipping up into a construction parking unit. I meet him at the top, ignoring the fact that these concrete ramps could come undone any minute.
Gabriel smiles when he sees me, but his eyes also fly around the area. He has one guard standing behind him wearing dark glasses and a suit.
“Tillie.” He nods.
I smile. “Gabriel.”
He hands me a suitcase. “It’s in there. I hope you find closure and happiness when you finish.”
I laugh. “Oh, I doubt it.” Then I feel bad when I find his eyes on me. If he’s pretending to be nice to me, then he’s doing a good job, because every time I’m around him, I almost believe him.
“Nate let you go?” I ask, tilting my head.
“He did. He knows he can’t keep me long and even he knows that I’m a better ally than an enemy.”
“And could you do that?”
“Do what?” He brings his hands to his front. I watch as his thumbs twist and twirl around each other.
“Be an enemy to your son?”
“No,” he answers instantly. “No, I couldn’t.”
I squeeze the suitcase handle. “Thanks for this.” Then I turn to go back to Nate’s car.
“Tillie?” Gabriel calls out. “I know you love my son, and I know that he loves you.”
I clench my jaw. No one gets to say those words on behalf of him but him. Maybe I’m being irrational, but I don’t like when everyone else says those words to me. He doesn’t even know that these people have said that to me. Do they know what goes on inside of Nate’s mind? Because let me tell you, I’m almost certain not even Nate knows what goes on in his mind.
He continues. “But this world is different. Loyalties lay differently.”
I swing my door open, my eyes on his. “I’m well aware of how this world works, Gabriel, and who’s to say that I’m the one who is loyal to him?”
I push my Ray-Bans over my eyes and start the car up, putting it into first gear and driving out. I flick open the suitcase when he’s gone and see the book. I flick through the pages, finding the one I was up to. I know that most of the drawings were done on Perdita, but I also know that the ending wasn’t.
I go to the next page.
It’s another drawing of the trailer park I grew up in. The light turns green and I swing around, doing a U-turn while dropping down to second. I know where I need to go, and I make it my mission to work through this damn book by the end of the day.
When I was a child, I had a crush. When I was a teenager, I had a crush. When I had… My mind aches as I pull down the long, empty road. It’s worse than it was when I left. Opposite the park there’s an abandoned building with graffiti splashed all over the concrete, smashed windows, and littered rubbish floating in the wind.
I roll to a stop, the familiar gate closed securely.
My eyes slam closed. “What is with this gate, Daemon. Wh
y have you drawn me so many damn times?
Nate’s car continues to idle beneath me.
I flip open Puer Natus again, drifting through every sketch. The baby rattle. The cell in Perdita. Was that the cell he was in? Yes? My head hurts and I can’t remember.
I flip to the next page and I stop breathing as a bracelet drops out from between the pages. It’s a knitted bracelet, plaited in a French plait. I wore this bracelet when I was little. When I had a crush. The drawing is two hands clasped together, pebbles and dirt scattered near their shoes. The view he drew is of that looking down. In the image, she’s wearing my bracelet.
I throw the book. “Oh my god!”
I swing open the car door and start prowling back and forth, the gravel crunching beneath my shoes. “Why…” I think over my memories. Why did I not know that that was Daemon? He was my crush at thirteen. He held my hand and made my heart beat faster. My heart. I tore at my chest, heat melting over my skin. I need to find him. I need to ask him what the fuck this means.
I climb back into the car, slamming the door closed and reach for the book.
“Finish the book, Puella.”
I scream out in frustration, flipping to the next page.
A broken heart, weeping through the pages.
I flick to the next, turning the cover around. A baby crib, dark and old, one that looks like it was the same one the biblical baby was put into. Was it Jesus? Yeah, Jesus. There’s no baby inside, instead, is a sign SOLD! Drawn over the small mattress.
A baby was sold. Who was sold?
My heart squeezes. The baby subject is too much for me right now. Too sensitive. It touches too close to her.
There are only a few pages left so I flick through again, and it’s Hector’s house.
Hector, her? If I didn’t see the body with my own eyes, I would think that Hector had her instead of having her—I choke.
I flick to the second to last page and it’s the back of a small girl. Her hair is long—so very long, hanging down to her lower back.
I flip to the final one, and it’s a drawing of Brantley’s house.
There are no more pages.
Why are there no more pages? He said that I would have my answers when I reach the final page!
I throw the car into first and skid out onto the road, heading back to Brantley’s.
I need to talk with Daemon, and I need to talk with him now.
Tillie
You don’t judge an ocean by what you see on the surface the same way that you never, and I mean never, judge a King by his demeanor. They know more than they show and are worse than you could ever know. This can be a good thing or a bad thing. I know this, but the information that they hold from everyone, me included, is something I can only handle for so long.
I push open Brantley’s front door, tossing Nate’s keys onto the small table that accommodates loose items.
I press the door closed and quickly head for the door that leads to the floor level, to my room. I need to ask Daemon what this book has to do with me and why he didn’t tell me that that boy was him. Is this why I have always had feelings for him? Because they’ve always been there, under all of the damage from my past?
I don’t know, but as I move down the long hallway, I know I’m about to find out.
Lifting my fist to his door, I knock a few times, but no one answers.
“Daemon?”
I squeeze the handle and push at it, finding his bedroom exactly how it has always been. I haven’t seen him for a couple of nights now, and I’m starting to get worried. He’s not been the same since we found him.
I sigh, flopping onto his bed with the book in my hand. Slipping my wrist through the bracelet, I loosen it enough so it fits comfortably, and lay back, flicking through the pages again.
Maybe I’ve missed something between the pages. Maybe there’s something in-between that I’m not catching…
Nate
Betrayal is the feeling of your stomach being yanked from your body. It’s watching as someone you thought you could trust, throws it into an ocean of hungry sharks. It’s feeling your trust meter completely empty. But there are a few seconds after feeling this when you go numb. You stop and think to yourself, well fuck. Now what?
I didn’t feel this when we became aware of Hector possibly being involved in Micaela’s death. I went straight to the numb feeling.
“We have to be careful with how we execute our plan,” Brantley mutters, putting a smoke into his mouth.
I stay still, my eyes glued to a spot on the wall, not wanting to show any emotion.
Bishop sits with his head hanging between his shoulders. “We can’t kill him.”
A hiss escapes my lips. “What the fuck do you mean? If he killed my daughter, Bishop, he is fucking dead, whether I take myself down with him or not.”
Bishop rubs his face viciously with the palms of his hands, the frustration evident. “He’s still my fucking dad, Nate.”
“And since when the fuck did that matter to you?” I shoot back, my eyes narrowing.
“Since we were plotting his fucking death!” Bishop stands from the table we’ve all become accustomed to at Brantley’s. He leaves, the door slamming shut behind him.
Brantley’s eyes come to mine. “He’s a dead man if this is true.”
Eli shifts uncomfortably. “Taking down Hector Hayes? The daddy of the EK? I don’t know… I get that you’re angry, man, but—”
“—but nothing,” Jase interrupts. Jase is the older brother of Hunter and Madison, but he’s always been around because of Hunter being in our generation.
Jase brings his dark eyes to mine. “If it is revealed that he was behind her death, Nate, you have my word—I got your back.”
We have a divide, but I know that has to do with Bishop. If he was all in, there would be no buts about it.
Brantley stands from the table, his phone vibrating. His eyes shoot to mine. “She’s got the book back. Now what?”
I think over his words, running my finger above my lip. “Now we wait.”
After leaving Brantley’s house, I need something to take the edge off, so I hit dial on Billie’s number as I stroll back to my car. The keys are in the ignition, but everything smells of her. Her smell attaches itself to everything I fucking own, including my cock.
I groan, adjusting myself in my pants as I think of her perfect little cunt clench arouover me.
“Fuck,” I groan, sending a text to Billie.
Meet me outside your hotel in 10.
The sun sets against my windshield as I drop it into second gear after picking up Billie.
“I got to say,” Billie whispers from the passenger seat of my car. “I’m impressed by her royal highness,” she purrs, glaring down at her phone. I look over my shoulder and see she’s looking through Tillie’s Instagram. “Cute kid…sorry about that…”
My jaw tenses, my fists tightening around the steering wheel.
“Where are we going?” She places her phone onto her lap.
“To a meet.”
“…and why? Why am I coming to a meet?”
I run my hand over my forehead. “I need your help with something.”
“With what?” Billie says, further forcing my hand.
“I need to break someone,” I murmur.
Billie pauses. “I can’t come to a meet, Nate. It’s not allowed.”
I slam on my brakes, my tires tearing up the asphalt. I breathe in and out. “You’re right. Get out.”
Billie reaches for me and I flinch, pulling away from her.
“Get. Out.”
She spills out of the passenger seat of my car, and I slam it into first gear. She’s right. Billie can’t attend a meet. She’s not a fucking King and she’s definitely not a Stuprum.
Tillie
Sweat drips off my body as I kick the speed up to level 14 on the treadmill. My legs run at a pace that I didn’t even know they were capable of, my eyes going out the front glass windows. “L
ove Lies” is pulsing through the speakers that are set up in the gym. I left my headphones somewhere and it took me about twenty minutes to figure out how to work his flashy speakers. My thighs burn and my legs ache as I power through, the timer reading 1:34:09. An hour and a half of solid running? Yeah, I had issues coming in here, but I won’t have them going out. The moon is starting to set behind the thick trees and I take in the natural beauty of it. I understand why Brantley built the gym like this now. Not only is it therapy to train, but to train with this view is a whole new level of tranquility.
Movement catches my eyes to the right, near a bush of flowers. I narrow my eyes, but only make out a bright contrast of white between bushes.
What the fuck was that?
It almost looked like…
“A ghost?” I yell, hitting the treadmill off. My feet stop running as I squint my eyes to get a better look. The figure moves again and I freeze.
Not a ghost.
A girl.
I climb off the treadmill quickly, making my way to the glass window. Can she see me? She has the whitest hair I have ever seen in my life. It can’t be natural. She has a round, baby face, and a very, very, petite body. She’s wearing a white sundress that clings to her, while hanging off her all at the same time, and her hair looks to be in an intricate French braid, dangling delicately all the way down to her tail bone.
I tilt my head, but in an instant, her eyes snap up to me.
I still. Either entranced in her pure, innocent beauty, or in the shock of being spotted. She drags her eyes away from mine, I’m unsure whether she can see me or not, but she continues to water the flowers.
“See a ghost?” Brantley asks from the doorway.
I jerk, turning my head over my shoulder slightly. “Maybe.” I shrug. “Who is that?”
He comes up beside me and I physically feel the air shift between us. When he doesn’t answer, I bring my eyes to him.
“Bran?”
