Page 56 of Lock Up the Darkness

It wasn’t like me to struggle with my schoolwork. Especially when it came to a course like this that was all math and logic.

It was because my mind was elsewhere.

It had been three days since that revelatory night of the Blowout and I’d been trying to absorb and reconcile everything that had happened, and all the truths that had been revealed. It had been a major step forward—on many accounts. But in the most important way where the mission was concerned, in the fact that there was now a path toward achieving what I’d come here for. Hell, what I’d been striving for over the last three years.

Finding my dad.

Bringing him back to me.

The locating him part was only a piece of it with the confirmation that Carson Monroe and his mammoth operation was standing in the way.

Until that obstacle was removed, it wouldn’t be safe, and it would be pointless, my dad would just have to disappear again. And this time, he’d have to take me with him.

This alliance with Asher would shift that, it would give me the leg up I needed, the insight I needed. Nobody knew Carson better than his own son.

Fortunately, me and the guys had the same goal that united us—destroying that bastard’s influence and power, his hold he had over all of our lives.

I’d wanted more time to absorb it all, but because Liza had—not unsurprisingly—suddenly up and quit Fusion, I’d had to work both weekend days. I guess it had at least served to give me a reprieve away from all the heaviness.

But once Monday had rolled around, it had all come slamming back into me.

And now it was distracting me from my studies.

So was the fact that I hadn’t heard from the guys since Asher had dropped me off home and told me he was going to reveal the whole thing to Killian and Jonah and get them on board. He’d told me just to play things cool, go about my business, just without the attitude toward any of them this time. I hadn’t seen any of them since. It had been odd when it came to Killian, because we shared the same classes. Then again, he had been incredibly messed up that night, so maybe he’d needed more time to recover.

I had seen Liza in my Ethics class, but she’d moved seats and returned to hanging with Killian’s fan club, as she obviously had been before the guys had used her as a plant to manipulate me. A couple of dirty looks from her had been the extent of it and I’d just left it at that. Confrontation was pointless. Now I knew why Asher had engineered it, it was insignificant in the bigger picture. Besides, I didn’t have the wherewithal or time to entertain friendships. And with what needed to be done, it would only endanger anybody I allowed close to me.

I was going to have enough trouble managing the guys anyway.

Neither of them were exactly a breeze to deal with.

I closed down my coursework and pulled up the intel I’d siphoned from Asher’s network.

A whole lot of intel, some of it several levels beyond disturbing.

Profiles on people, some key figures in and beyond Hexwood. Very detailed profiles.

Compromising photos.

Surveillance tracking the movements of certain targets of theirs.

And the videos. One that was particularly noteworthy depicted Jonah fucking and degrading the backup quarterback of Hexwood U’s football team, Evan Tessier, and his girlfriend. The notes on file from Asher indicated they’d been trying to form some sort of rebellion against the Infidels, using a slipup from Killian to do it.

It was certainly a brutal way to handle the situation.

Fortunately, I’d found another way that didn’t implicate anyone and returned things to being even between both sides without any fallout. I was always in favor of the less messy route.

Although, with my alliance with Asher, Killian, and Jonah, I suspected that approach was going to burn to ashes. They didn’t do things that way from what I’d seen from the intel I’d started to comb through. They reacted with massive, brutal shows of force that completely obliterated their enemies, anybody who crossed them.

It really brought it home to me how lenient they’d been with me.

Because of Asher.

As twisted as it was, he’d actually protected me—in his own fucked-up way.

Because I had value to him.

Well, that was what I’d been telling myself.

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