Home > Chaos at Prescott High (The Havoc Boys #2)(2)

Chaos at Prescott High (The Havoc Boys #2)(2)
Author: C.M. Stunich

I’m vaguely aware of them arguing around me for a while longer, but I’m not listening.

Instead, I’m trapped in a nightmare I’ve entertained for years, one where Bernadette is looking at me like she hates me.

Like she did when she passed me in the hall today.

Like she did on the first day of school.

Like she did when I held her prisoner in my closet.

Some men dream when they sleep. Some of us live in nightmares, whether we’re asleep or not.

And if I can’t get Bernadette to see who I really am, then I’m afraid I’ll never wake up.

It strikes me suddenly, what I’ve just said, and a laugh spills from my throat.

“Boss?” Hael asks, watching me skeptically. I shake my head at him and rub my chin in thought.

“The discussion is over,” I say, letting my voice drop to a dangerous low, caught somewhere between a purr and a growl. Like I said, I haven’t felt fear—true fear—since I was five. I’m sure as shit feeling it now. “Bernadette is mine, or no deal.”

I hop off the stage and slap my palm on Oscar’s iPad.

“Write it down—now. I’m off to find our new girl.” I lift my hand up and keep going, shoving open the doors to the theater and storming down the hall. Students scatter in my wake, as they should.

When I first started this gang, others tried to copy me. Hell, they still do—just look at Mitch Charter. They can pretend to be inspired by me all they want, but they’re nothing. Poor imitations at best, plagiarists at worst. I’m content to watch them scrabble like rats for my crumbs.

Because I’m Victor Channing. This is Havoc. We’re OG, and everyone else can get fucked.

And Bernadette Blackbird … she’s going to be my goddamn wife if it kills me.

Which, thinking about it now, it just might.

Halloween night, Now …

Bernadette Blackbird

There are two sides to every story, but usually, only one of them is true.

According to my stepfather, my sister Penelope was a sad, lonely, little girl who was desperate for attention. It’s why she made up those lies; it’s why she killed herself.

Looking into his dark gaze, I can tell we both know better.

“Take a seat,” Neil Pence repeats, dressed in his uniform and smiling like only he can, like a gator who’s just scented his next meal at the edge of the swamp. His brown hair is disheveled, his stubble thick around those fat, worm-like lips of his. I’ve never wanted to see someone dead the way I do him. “That blood real?”

He knows it is. The question mark at the end of that sentence is just for fun. See, my stepfather doesn’t have hobbies like a normal person. He thrives on pain, discomfort, and repartee edged in violence. Asshole.

“Costume blood,” I say, worrying about Callum, about all the boys really. Wondering if Danny Ensbrook really would’ve shot me in the face if given the chance. Aaron is stone-still behind me, so I reach back and grab his hand. It kills me a little bit, to touch him like that, but there are bigger things at play here than our bullshit feelings for each other. “What are you doing in Aaron’s house?”

I don’t acknowledge my ex-bestie Kali Rose-Kennedy or our disgraced Principal Vaughn; they’re not worth my time.

Mostly, I'm concerned with making sure Aaron doesn't start anything violent just yet.

Or … maybe I'm the one most likely to start something violent? If I find out that the Thing laid a single finger on my sister, God help him. I'm more than happy to go down and take Neil Pence with me, engulfed in flames and enjoying the burn.

Anything to see him suffer.

Principal Vaughn watches us warily, and I can tell Havoc has done it: he's really and truly afraid of them … of us?

Us.

Havoc Girl.

Kali smirks at me, and I come to the understanding that if she weren't pregnant, I might just leap across this table and hit her as hard as I could in the tit. Maybe I still will? Her flat-ass boobs aren’t currently enveloping a fetus, now are they?

The worst part about the whole situation though, is the way Neil looks at me. He stares at me like he always does, like I’m a horse that needs breaking. He undresses me with his eyes, too. He does that to every girl—even his flesh and blood daughter. My mouth fills with bile, and the step-thing grins like a crocodile. He’s loving every minute of this interaction.

“Where the fuck are our girls?” Aaron asks, still bleeding, still with a goddamn bullet in his arm. He resists when I pull him down toward the sofa, but he hasn't got a lot of strength left and finally gives in. This couch is gonna end up drenched in blood … Aaron and I, we're covered in it. The smell is actually starting to make me dizzy.

“Your girls?” the Thing asks, lifting one scarred eyebrow. Want to know how that happened? Our neighbor's super sweet golden retriever broke out of the fence one day, charged Neil, and attacked his face. Clearly, he knew something about Neil that nobody else but me seems to notice.

He's a bigger monster than all five Havoc Boys combined.

“You heard me, you pedophile piece of shit,” Aaron grinds out, his hands shaking but his gold-green gaze steady and fierce. I have no doubt that he'd bleed himself out going after Neil if he had to. He'd do anything for his girls, even bully me. But would I want a man that wouldn't do those things for the children he loves like his own?

No. No, I would not.

I squeeze Aaron's hand a little harder. Sometimes, it feels almost impossible to see past one's own hurt, like looking directly into the sun. The brilliance of it is blinding. But if we close our eyes, we can feel the warmth of those rays on our skin.

“Our. Girls.” Aaron lifts his chin up and flashes the nastiest smirk I've ever seen on his face. It's a mask, I see that now, but we're both players in a much bigger game. What choice does he have? His father is dead; his mother is gone. This is all he's got left, the grinning maw of a master thespian. “Because you lost that right when you raped Penelope Blackbird. Matter of fact, you lost the right to life.”

“I told you this was a bad idea,” Vaughn simpers, and I flick my green gaze his direction, making him flinch. “They probably killed somebody tonight. That blood … that's not costume blood at all, is it?”

“Keep talking and maybe you'll get to see the difference for yourself?” I say, my voice a cold deadpan that doesn't quite match the frantic beating of my heart.

“Oh, Penelope,” Neil says as Kali bristles and glances his way with narrowed eyes. “She certainly was a pathetic little fuck-up, wasn't she?” The step-thing turns toward Kali, like he's about to explain a sad truth. “Brought her into the station drunk on more than one occasion. She was a fucking delinquent, but nothing like this bitch.” Neil gestures my way. “This bitch has gotten herself tangled up in a gang.”

“I'm going to kill you one day,” I tell him, shaking with rage, the words from Penelope's journal echoing inside my head. He said he'd kill my sisters if I told, that he'd kill my mom. He says he's killed before and gotten away with it. That look in his eyes when he said it … there's no doubt in my mind that he was telling the truth. “And I'm going to cry tears of joy.”

“Are you threatening a cop?” Neil asks, cocking his head to the side. His eyes shimmer with loathing and licentious greed, a want so strong it makes my head spin. Underneath that average Joe persona he has going on, his need to break and consume innocence shines brightest. If you know to look, it’s impossible to miss it. “You know how serious of an offense that is?”

“You better have a fucking warrant, considering you're sitting in my house,” Aaron says, his hand clenching hard to mine. “Now, where the fuck are our girls?”

“Sound asleep in their beds,” Neil says in that infuriatingly calm voice of his. The way he says the word beds, however, frightens me to my very core. I don’t think he would commit his dark deeds with Vaughn and Kali as witnesses, but you never know. Fear flutters in my chest like a bird with broken wings. “Such sweet, beautiful little babies. Angels, really. I sent that babysitter home a few minutes ago, gorgeous young thing.”

I'm surprised Havoc's safety net didn't alert the boys to what was going on, but then … maybe they did, and we were just too busy to see the messages?

“If you touched them,” I begin, because at this point, all gloves are off. I'm sitting here covered in both my ex's blood, and the blood of a boy who tried to kill me tonight. A boy who's now dead. All Neil has to do is call us in, that's it. The question is: why hasn't he?

“Listen, Bernadette,” Neil interrupts, smirking as he leans forward, a shimmer in his eyes that says he has me right where he wants me. “If you don't want your little gang to go to jail, you'll shut the fuck up and say yes, sir to every word that comes out of my mouth.”

My entire body goes ice-cold, to the point that I just don't smell blood, I'm choking on it.

“Talk to my girl like that again, and I'll break your face,” Aaron says, and my gaze snaps his direction. My girl? He's like an echo of Vic right now. I don't … hate that though.

“Listen, you little prick, you've got no fucking choice.”

“Watch me,” Aaron says, standing up so fast that he ends up stumbling and slamming into the coffee table. He's dizzy from blood loss; I'm seriously worried about him. I stand up, too, grabbing onto his shoulder as he braces both palms on the table, panting for breath. I need to get some fluids in him, and fast.

“Forgive me if I'm not running in fear,” Neil says as that little rat Kali giggles next to him.

“Tough guy,” she says, playing off her perceived seat of power next to Neil. But she has no idea what Havoc has in store for her. Hell, neither do I. All I know is that if the boys were willing to castrate Donald, Kali is going to suffer just as much.

What was it that Callum said? Her face isn’t pregnant.

   
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