“She left the school with Mack again,” Oscar explains, still looking right at me. “I thought she might be here, but she’s not. Perhaps she’s missing her lover?” He just keeps staring at me, so I turn away to look out the front window instead.

“Do you think Mitch knows about her and Neil?” I wonder aloud, but Hael just snorts.

“No idea. I mean, you’d think he’d be a little worried about his girl banging some old cop, but I guess these guys operate under a different set of morals than we do.” Hael muses on the idea for a moment, settling back into his seat as Aaron slows down to a less conspicuous speed. “So, we’re sure that Neil and Kali were fucking?”

“She was all over him at the school,” I reply, looking back on the moment in my mind’s eye. “There’s no doubt about that. But even if Mitch doesn’t know about Kali and Neil, he does, in fact, know Neil. Remember when he called us the night after we moved Danny’s body? He said the Thing had a message for us, but then Vic hung up.” I gesture loosely in his direction, but he’s too busy looking over his weapon to pay attention. That, or he’s just pretending like he’s too busy with the gun. “They clearly know each other.”

“I’ll have to do some more digging,” Oscar admits, which is as close to an admission of I don’t know as I’m sure he’ll ever get. He knows it isn’t realistic to memorize the world, right? Maye he’s just aware that his personality is so prickly that he has to give something of value to the group.

I’m going to crack the safe that is that motherfucker’s ass, and see what cash he’s hiding inside. I need to know about his past, about the Peters, about his feelings that night we made love.

I exhale sharply as Victor adjusts the song to another one from A Day to Remember. It’s called “Mindreader”, and it makes the perfect backdrop for our ride back to Havoc’s garage.

There are a couple of boys in skeleton masks waiting for us on the driveway. When we pull up, Aaron parks the Escalade, but doesn’t bother turning off the engine. Instead, he just climbs out and one of the other guys climbs in.

“Leave the guns,” Vic tells me, tossing his onto the seat as the other boy climbs in. The guy pulls out a container of wipes and starts to clean the weapon, like he’s trying to scrub away any possible evidence. We might’ve been wearing gloves, but that doesn’t mean there isn’t something there that forensics couldn’t sniff out.

We all step back as the SUV takes off and disappears into the night, the red of the brake lights the last I ever see of it.

“Where are they taking it?” I ask, glancing over at Aaron. He’s watching me even more intensely than usual, and I find myself shifting with discomfort under the heat of his stare.

“They don’t tell us that, and we don’t ask,” Aaron says, shrugging his shoulders loosely and then turning his head to look up at the moon. “Anyone want to hit the drive-in? I’m starving.”

“I’ve got to get home and check on my grandma,” Callum says with a longing sigh. “Although I could really use a shake and fries.”

“There’s always tomorrow,” Hael says, clapping Cal on the shoulder and nodding once. “Good work tonight, recruit.” He winks at me, and I flip him off as he laughs. “I’ll take Cal back on my way home. My asshole dad has been hanging around a lot lately, and I don’t trust him not to kill my fucking mom.” Hael tries to smile to lighten the blow of his words, but it doesn’t work.

I decide to change the subject.

“I’m sure Oscar needs to get back to the Peters, right?” I quip, giving him a look that he returns with one that’s colored in grave-sorrows and epitaphs. His gray eyes are like fog in a cemetery, but the color shifts when he moves toward me. When the moon hits them just right, Oscar’s eyes appear silver in the night.

“You’re quite right,” he says, pausing so close that I could touch him, if I were so inclined. Without his glasses on, he looks like a different person. To be honest, the glasses humanize him a little; he looks entirely feral tonight. “I need to get home to my faux mommy and her home-cooking, my faux daddy and his boring work stories, and my new little sister, a one Miss Alyssa Hart. The Peters already have two biological children that they spoil rotten. Anything else you’d like to know, Miss Blackbird?”

“Actually, there’s a lot I’d like to know, Mr. Montauk. No secrets in Havoc, right? All I have to do is ask?” I keep my gaze on Oscar’s silver eyes as I snap back at him, hands curling into fists. “Tell me why you ran out on me after we slept together. I want to know.”

This time, he laughs at me.

I can count on one hand the number of times I have heard that motherfucker laugh.

“You piece of shit!” I call out as he backs up suddenly and turns, heading for the Camaro without bothering to answer me. “You can’t run forever, you fucking pussy!”

“Ball sack,” Hael corrects, and I punch him right in the pec. The effect is less silly and more … arousing than I expected. His muscles are like fucking rocks. “See you degenerates tomorrow then?”

Vic nods once, and then he, Aaron, and I watch as the other three members of Havoc take off in the Camaro.

“Why don’t we do the drive-in for dinner?” Vic asks, exhaling and then looking over at me. “Since it’s just us three tonight.”

A shiver races through me.

We’re not picking the girls up from Jennifer Lowell’s house until the morning.

That means … I’m going to be alone with Vic and Aaron, the two boys in Havoc that are the furthest apart, the most at odds. I’m also going to be operating under a whole new set of rules. Havoc Girl. I get to define what that means between me and each boy the same way they define their relationships with each other. Essentially, we’re a family where each pair of people decides how they want to behave together.

“Let’s do it,” Aaron says, turning to head toward the Bronco and then pausing like he’s just thought of something. He glances back at us, and Victor raises his eyebrows.

“Yeah? You want something?” he queries, his voice mild but laced with an edge of irritation underneath. He might’ve given his okay to the rest of us, but he’s not happy about it.

“Bernadette can ride with me tonight.” Aaron doesn’t waver in his statement nor does he ask; his words are not a request.

“Mm, okay, so,” Victor starts, lighting up a cigarette. Either he’s nervous, or he just likes a good smoke after a drive-by. No big deal. I don’t even consider the fact that Callum likely killed the guy he shot. My boys in black, I feel like they’re untouchable. “When I said you fuckers could work on your own shit, I didn’t mean you could boss me around. I’m still in charge, Fadler.” Vic nods at me with his chin. “Bernie can choose what she wants to do: ride on my bike or carpool with you.”

I stand there for a minute, feeling like my body is being pulled apart by two powerful magnets, one on each side, desperate for a piece.

My initial reaction is to flip a coin and let fate decide.

But I’ve got to be more than some limp-ass, dangling ball sack that crumples to pieces at a simple flick of a finger.