Page 43 of Heartless

“Me,” the guy on my left said. “Dixon’s the one with the nasty body odor.”

They both smelled like weed, hormones, and bad decisions to me, but I didn’t bother correcting him as I carefully touched my sore face. Callum had got me worse with the elbow than the punch, even though the second hit had knocked me out. “Is my cheek all puffy?”

Dixon grinned at me, all feral amber eyes and dimples deep enough to fall in. “You look like that home-made pinata Mrs. Grady made of Mr. Grady. Right after she split him open with a spud bar.”

“Pretty sure it was a voodoo doll. And Mr. Grady made it of Mrs. Grady after he caught you two coming out of their trailer at three am,” I muttered, ducking my head as they laughed and shared a fist bump. It was no secret on the Horn that the twins were into older women. They even wore matching cougar costumes every Halloween, although now I knew their heritage, maybe that wasn’t just about the mature ladies they like to share.

I’d had a few classes with them at school. Pranksters, whose games often brought out their mean streak, but I’d always thought they were the harmless ones in the Barakat brood. But now I had to wonder if they were more like their brother than I realized.

I checked the front seat again, just to make sure it was Trey behind the wheel. “Are you two just along for the ride, or are you joining your brother on the kidnapping charges I’m going to file?”

“Ooh-hoo!” Donny kicked the driver’s seat and slapped his thigh. “Oh, man. Little V’s found herself some attitude. You’ve really got your work cut out for you, big bro.”

“He really doesn’t,” I said flatly, propping my lone Van on the center console and tying my bedraggled laces. “Take me back, Trey. Or just let me out here, and I’ll find my own way.”

Dixon batted my hands aside and, tugging off my shoe, tossed it into the empty passenger seat. “Aw, don’t you want to go to the party, Cinderella?”

Dixon was definitely the more annoying of the two and I glared at him. “The last time a Barakat invited me to a party, he handed me over to a pair of Denners, who then chased me through the woods on a wolf hunt. So, no thanks.”

“Shit. That must have been before the old man bit the dust.” I narrowed my eyes at him, but he shrugged. “He had us all on lockdown while he was in charge. Still, you’re better off with big bro than your wolfy side-piece.”

My wolfy side-piece? “Are you talking about the Alpha of the Hunter Moon Clan?” I demanded.

“Ooh-la-la,” Dixon chortled. “We’re just simple mountain cats, V. We don’t go in for all the fancy titles and shit. But out boy T is the top of the tree in these parts.”

Not what I wanted to hear, but I wasn’t really surprised. The Barakat boys weren’t the type to take orders from anybody, their dead dad included. So, if being in charge meant there was a tree that needed to be climbed, hacked down, or fed through a wood chipper, Trey would be first in line. Still, I preferred to try reasoning with him than Callum Sawyer, so I wiggled forward in my seat. Which wasn’t easy when wedged between a pair of overgrown man-children. “Trey, I told you to give me time. And I was pretty clear I wasn’t going anywhere while Jasper needed me. So if you take me back right now, I won’t say anything to anybody.” When he just continued driving, I felt the last thread of my sanity snap and I hissed. “I knew you were a shady sonofabitch, but doing Callum Sawyer’s dirty work is low, even for you.”

Trey’s gaze cut angrily towards me in the rearview mirror, but Dixon hauled me back hard against the seat. “You got it backwards, V. That dog is our bitch. And how else was T going to get you out of the wolf’s den if he didn’t twist that asshole’s arm?”

“So you threated Callum to drag me out of there? Maybe that’s why he decided to scare the shit out of me, and punch me in the face.” I was pretty sure he didn’t need any encouragement to do that, but I wasn’t past shaming them into letting me go. Which was kind of pointless – they were the Barakats, after all - and I thumped the back of Trey’s chair. “Stop the goddamn truck, Trey!”

“I think you need to take a chill pill,” Donny muttered.

“I think you should shut your yap, Donny!” I growled back, deciding the twins were both as annoying as each other, and fixed back on Trey. “You had no right to come after me. I’ve got enough shit to deal with, without you sticking your nose in and making things worse.”

Trey’s mouth crimped, but he finally asked, “What shit?”

“What do you expect? Jasper’s hurt. The vultures are circling. Callum wants me dead.” I slumped back in my seat, still holding his gaze. “Please, Trey. Just give me some time to make things right, and then we can talk about whatever you want.”

“It’s too late for that,” he replied, leaning forward and looking up at the sky. “We need to do this now.”

“Do what?”

But no one answered me, and that heavy feeling was back in my belly, only this time it wasn’t my cat getting ready to fight her way free. It was dread, plain and simple. Because I knew all the stories about the Barakats, and Trey hadn’t been kidding when he threatened to dump Jasper’s body on the mountain. The twins might seem cute with their gags and dimples, but underneath the prankster façade, they were as ruthless as Trey. The only law any of the Barakats respected was their own, and Darkness had long ago warned me that trying to change their minds was like trying to push shit uphill.

Which seemed appropriate, since the truck was suddenly struggling up a steep rise, before finally leveling out in a frozen clearing. I had no idea where we were, although the dash clock said it was just after two. The girls and I had gone to sleep around ten, but I didn’t know what time Callum had lured me out of the cave, or how long I was passed out between the twins. Even in the mountains, you could cover a lot of ground in a couple of hours.

I didn’t realize how tightly I was still clenched until Donny patted my knee and popped his door. The wind howled through the gap and the grin he gave me was just as fierce. “Show time, V.”

When he slid out, and Trey did the same, I looked at Dixon in desperation. “Just please take me back. I don’t want to die out here, Dixon.”

Instead of trying to reassure me, he gave my other knee a pat and shrugged. “It’s not the worst way to go, V. Better the devil you know, right?”

No. Any guy who wore the Devil of the Horn badge with pride was the very worst. But when Dixon gave me a little shove in the back, I didn’t have much choice but to slide off the seat and face my own personal demon.

Trey was standing in the glow of the headlights, but he moved quickly in my direction as I climbed out. The wind hit me like a packball tackle, and I rocked back against the truck door. Trey grabbed my arms, but it felt like the ground was moving, too, and I looked at him in alarm. Did he bring me up here to bury me under an avalanche?

When the truck slid away behind me, I spun around, gaping as the twins grinned and waved like lunatics as they drove away. “Wait! Where are you going?” I lurched after them, but Trey dragged me back, pulling me hard against his chest. It was a sign of how brutal that wind was that I didn’t immediately push him off. Although I cringed as he said in my ear, “You feel that, don’t you? The ground moving under your feet?”

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