“I’m trying to help you, Bernadette,” she says, pink mouth flat and grim, eyes shadowed in a way they weren’t before she walked into that building today and saw carnage spread out across the decrepit school like it was the fucking end-times. “I brought you here because I have a deal for you.”

Sara turns away and gathers a packet of papers, bringing it over and laying it out in front of me. I look at it for a moment and then adjust my gaze to hers.

“Pardon me, but I don’t speak legal bullshit. What is this?”

“Full immunity for you,” Sara says, tapping her fingers on the pages. “In exchange for information … and your testimony.”

“Testimony for what?” I ask, feeling my skin prickle with goose bumps. I want to go home. I want to see my boys. Shit, that’s the only thing I can think about right now, going home and curling up in bed with them. If I ask real nice, you think they’d all snuggle up with me together? Stranger things have happened.

“Against Pamela,” Sara says, crossing her arms again. Looks like a defense mechanism to me, all that arm crossing. Like Vic’s chin rubbing, Cal’s hood, Oscar’s iPad … and the way Stacey Langford stared at her phone with a hollow, distant look in her eyes. Shit, motherfucker. We should’ve protected her.

That’s on us.

That day in the cafeteria, when she called off her deal with Havoc, that’ll haunt me forever.

“My mother?” I ask, crinkling my brow. I’m not stupid: I heard what the boys said. Their plan was to pin Neil’s murder on Pamela. If Sara is asking me to testify, then she must have found evidence to support the idea.

“Yes,” Sara says with a long sigh. After a moment, she leaves the room and I’m left to stare at the paperwork in front of me. No way would I ever be an informant or a witness for the cops. Talk about social suicide. Besides, how would that look, for Havoc’s wife to do such a thing? I push the paperwork back and thread my fingers in my hair.

When Sara comes back in, she’s holding a familiar box. She sets it on the counter beside me. I don’t touch it, not right away. I don’t want her to know how important that box is to me. Old Homework and Assignments stares back at me in looping, feminine letters.

“We kept what we needed of Penelope’s things,” Sara tells me, laying a hand on my shoulder. It’s meant to be comforting, but my skin itches with the need to throw her off. I don’t want to be comforted right now; I want my phone back. I want to see Havoc. “You’re welcome to keep the rest.”

“Am I free to leave?” I ask, knowing that what happened at the school won’t be enough for a charge of any kind to stick to me. That was self-defense. Of course, the very fact that the GMP came to Prescott in the first place is enough to get Sara to look more closely at Havoc. But I can’t be charged for defending myself against white supremacists wearing ski masks and carrying weapons with silencers.

“You can leave,” Sara says carefully, but I can tell there’s more to this. She isn’t done with me, not by a long shot. “But I would like you to consider this offer. It’s a onetime thing, Bernadette. The DA isn’t going to give you this opportunity again.”

“Please take me home,” I insist. Sara stares at me for a moment and then nods, taking the paperwork for the deal and stacking it neatly before slipping it back into a manila folder. I grab the box of Pen’s things and head for the front door.

There’s an uneasiness in the air that tells me our city is on the brink of change.

What that change might be, depends on us.

Sara wants an informant to help clean up the streets?

Fuck her.

We take care of our own in Prescott.

And the GMP … they’re Havoc’s problem now.

Victor Channing

My palms slam into the glass of the French doors leading into the Bordeaux—an upscale wine bar in Oak River Heights that serves escargot and pâté as bar food. It’s the most pretentious place I’ve ever fucking seen. The doors swing open with a bang, causing the hostess to jump as I scowl in her direction and she cowers against the decorative rock wall like a shrinking violet.

“Excuse me, sir, you need a jacket,” a man simpers as I storm past him, dried blood crusted under my fingernails. I swear to god, I can still taste it in my mouth. I ignore the maître d' as I sweep past, dressed in a clean white t-shirt and jeans. The only shower I’ve had was a quick one down at the precinct; I could really use another. But, business first.

I pause next to the table where Ophelia and Trinity are seated, crossing my arms over my chest as they both turn their gazes up to mine. I don’t often see my mother surprised, but something akin to fear flickers in her dark eyes before she remembers to school her features against my presence.

“Victor, have a seat,” Ophelia tells me, sipping her wine. Trinity is a bit white in the face. Does she know yet, that her half-brother is dead? Or should I say her lover? Shit, they’re one in the same, aren’t they? Incestuous motherfuckers.

“I agreed to this little deal for a reason,” I say, lifting a hand and gesturing absently at Trinity Jade. She blinks up at me with eyes like sawdust. That’s the color they are to me, something dull and dusty, something useless. Scrap. Throwaway. I would never actually entertain the thought of marrying or sleeping with someone like her.

Everybody knows Prescott girls are the best in bed anyway.

A smirk catches the edge of my lips, but it doesn’t take. Today was a complete goddamn surprise to me, and I thought I’d prepared for everything. Agreeing to marry Trinity was supposed to get the Grand Murder Party off my ass. Instead, my school got shot up. Unacceptable.

“What on earth are you talking about?” Trinity asks, smoothing her hands over her lap and looking at me like she’d happily ride my dick into oblivion. I stare back at her, and I don’t bother to mask my feelings. I wait until she shivers before turning my attention back to the egg donor.

“Oh, I don’t know,” I start, a sarcastic laugh snapping out of me like the crack of a whip. Sliding a borrowed phone out of my pocket, I pull up a news site and toss it onto the table. Low-Income School Devastated by Shooting. Don’t ya just love that? How they had to mention how poor we are in Prescott? As if that fucking matters. “Maybe the fact that the GMP sent more than a dozen men to my fucking high school this morning.”

“We didn’t know about this,” Trinity says, glancing over at Ophelia. Based on her expression, I don’t think she knows that James Barrasso is dead yet. That, or she’s as much of a psychopath as my mother and doesn’t care. “This wasn’t part of our plan either; James was responsible. His father is going to have a talk—”

“James is dead,” I say, because I want the news to sting. I want to see this girl’s reaction. She just stares at me like I’ve spoken in another language. If Hael were here, I’d ask him to translate it into French for me. Maybe this highbrow bitch would understand that?

“Sir, I need to insist you put on a jacket …” the maître d' says, approaching me the way you might a vicious dog, one that’s foaming at the mouth and straining against a chain. But, you know, I’m not an animal—even if Bernadette makes me feel like one. Fuck, I need to be inside of her. That’s what I need to do, go home and bury myself in her heat. That’ll calm me down. She’s the only person that can.