I would never forgive myself if I killed Aaron Fadler.

“Dude, what are you doing here?” he asks me, sounding tired. We’ve stopped chasing Bernadette around, sure, but it’s impossible to miss her when she steps foot on campus every morning.

Her sister is dead; she looks broken.

I drop the knife to my side as Aaron studies me, waiting for an explanation of some sort.

“You know what I’m doing here,” I retort, glancing over my shoulder to make sure that Neil hasn’t left the motel yet. All seems quiet on the Western front. I look back at Aaron, and in his eyes, I see a reflection of my wants and needs.

“We followed you,” Aaron adds, stepping back to lean against a tree. He looks like a strong wind might blow him over. I slip the knife—the very same one my dad used to cut me once upon a time—back in its leather holder and then tuck the whole thing in my pocket, so I can cross my arms. “They’re all here, around the corner.” He pauses and looks away. “Waiting for me to bring you back.”

“Is this an order from Vic?” I ask, not even sure why I’m bothering. I know the answer to that.

“You know it is.” Aaron looks up, meeting my eyes just as I hear the door swing open and look back to see Neil swagger down the upstairs walk toward the stairs. Fuck. I look back at my friend. “Bernadette is a part of us, but so you are. Havoc has to look out for every member, not just Bernie. You going to prison for life for stabbing a cop doesn’t do anyone any good. Pamela will still have Bernadette, she’ll still be trapped by Heather, by Heather’s grandfather and uncle …”

I touch the knife at my side, knowing that my time for jumping Neil is running short. It’s now or never, but looking at Aaron, I don’t feel quite as sure as I did. Giving up Bernie for life, I don’t want to do that, but I will. Because I’ll never be selfish when it comes to her again.

“Besides, who’s to say killing him now won’t find its way back to her? Everyone knows she hates him. He’s sent her to juvie for attacking him before. We can’t take the risk, Hael.”

I frown, and my hands squeeze into fists at my sides. But I already know that he’s right, just like I knew about Vic. I might act like an idiot sometimes, but I’m not as stupid as I look.

“Every night he’s in that house, there’s a risk that he might touch her, that he might put his hands on her. Aaron, I couldn’t live with myself if that happened.”

“It won’t,” he tells me, reaching out a hand, palm up. It takes me a minute to realize that he’s asking for the knife. With gritted teeth, I give it to him because I’m not sure what I might do with it if I don’t.

Well, okay, I do know. I’d destroy Neil and I’d probably howl with laughter while I did it.

I reach up to scratch at the back of my head.

“Well, you gonna explain or what?” I snap, listening to the sound of a car door being shut. After a few seconds, the engine starts up and Neil disappears into the night. I didn’t do it. I wanted to, but I didn’t. Am I still that same selfish asshole I’ve always been? The thought infuriates me.

“Look, he knows we have the video now. He knows we’ll come for him if he touches her. Right now, we have to work on building Havoc, so we can help her later.” Aaron plays with the knife for a minute. “Someday, she’s going to come to us, and she’s going to call Havoc. We have to give her a weapon she can actually use, something that’ll help her escape.”

He stops talking. I get it. We all want that for Bernadette, a normal life. A life that is, specifically, not the one we live. Well, except for Vic. I love the guy, he’s my best friend, but he can be … intense.

“I love her, too, you know,” I say, and Aaron nods. He’s lucky. He’s the only one of us who got to pretend, at least for a little while, that she could be his. “So we use the video to keep Bernie safe?” I scoff and rub my hand over my face. “I don’t like this. We shouldn’t be using a video like that as a weapon.”

“We can, if it means keeping both Havoc and Bernie safe.”

Aaron meets my eyes again. We’re similar in a lot of ways, me and him. We both want to be the good guy yet we both do evil things. We’re both inextricably lost somewhere in the middle.

“Okay,” I say, exhaling and putting my hands on my hips. “Okay. But someday, he has to die. You know that, right?”

This time, Aaron actually smiles. It’s a sad smile, but it’s a smile, nonetheless.

“I know,” he replies, and together we walk down the block and climb into the welcoming arms of my Camaro. She isn’t done yet, but she’s getting there, and when she is, I’m going to paint her a violent cherry-red.

And one day, I’m going to take Bernadette for a spin.

Mark my words.

November nineteenth, Now …

Bernadette Blackbird

“She didn’t take it well,” Hael says, sitting at a stool in front of the kitchen peninsula, his chin in his hand, a frown on his face. “She threw her coffee in my face and tried to knee me in the balls. I’m a little worried, to be honest with you.”

He watches as Oscar goes down a checklist of things that need to be done before the wedding. It isn’t a huge affair—after all, besides the Havoc Boys, we’ve only invited six guests. With Victor’s choice of venue, it wasn’t difficult to put together a ceremony in the twenty-thousand-dollar budget.

Actually, I’ve only spent about half of it—most of it on the dress.

“Worried about Brittany?” Aaron asks, making a scoff of disbelief in his throat. “You really think she’d break the deal she made with us?”

“I have no idea,” Hael says, narrowing his eyes slightly. He’s clearly thinking about Brittany’s father, the chief of the Springfield police and the leader of a newly developed anti-gang squad in the area. The fact that he ever got involved with her shows me that even if Havoc seems to have its shit together, we’re all still in high school.

There’s a lot to learn.

“Hey kiddo,” I say when Heather comes tromping down the stairs to search in the fridge for some juice. She gives me a look that very clearly says, I’m busy, so what the fuck do you want? I raise an eyebrow and she whines at me.

“I’m in the middle of a game, Bernie,” she complains as Victor slips past her and into the kitchen, wrapping his arms around me from behind. My eyes narrow, but Heather gives a dramatic groan.

“Why are you always kissing on each other?” she demands, slamming the fridge door and turning to glare at us.

“Whoa,” Hael whistles with a laugh. Victor’s big body shakes behind me as he chuckles.

“Because we’re in love,” he murmurs, resting his chin on my shoulder. I can see Aaron rolling his eyes at the comment.

“Well, I don’t want you to be in love,” Heather declares, lifting her chin and crossing her arms over her Spiderman t-shirt. “I ship you and Aaron.”

“You ship us?” Aaron echoes, and it’s like he can’t control his face anymore. His lips twist up into a shit-eating smirk. “Seriously?”