Page 36 of You Belong With Me

Christian slaps me on the shoulder. “Yeah, I get it. Listen, maybe you should, uh, go upstairs and chill for the rest of the night. We’ll handle the clean up.”

I push out a breath, my mind wandering to Wyn waiting in my bedroom. I ich to get back to her, but fuck, I can’t help but wonder if her being in my orbit is good for either of us. This obsession I have for her has forced me to do some pretty horrific things. Things she’d never forgive me for if she ever found out.

Fuck.

Would it be better for me to walk away now before any real lasting damage has been done?

I nod at my brother. “Thanks, man. I owe you one.”

As I turn to walk away, he says, “Oh, wait, hold up. I’ve been meaning to tell you...”

I tilt my head back. He hasn’t said anything yet, but I already know it isn’t good. I can just tell. Call it twin intuition. “Fuck, what now?”

He leans in, so the people passing us in the wide hallway can’t hear what he’s saying. “We, uh, got a message from Sin.”

I blink at him. He says that name like I should know who the fuck that is. “Who the fuck is Sin?”

Christian pulls back and makes a face. “Do you have dementia or something?” He pats down his pockets and pretends to glance around. “We need to find a pen, so your ass can draw a clock. And I’m warning you now, if it looks like Picasso drew it, we’re getting your head examined.”

I roll my eyes. “Shut the fuck up, and tell me why I should give a fuck about that name…”

Christian rolls his eyes back at me. “Sin Savano? Shadow and Ash, ring a bell?”

“Oh, right. What does he want?”

“Well, uh, he’s pretty pissed about what we did to August, and he demands reparation.”

“Reparation,” I repeat with a laugh. “His bitch, August, spoke against me in a fucking police report. He got what was coming to him. He’s lucky I didn’t throw him off a fucking cliff…”

“Yeah, I know,” Christian says in a low tone—again, so people don’t overhear. He angles his body, so his back is to anyone passing by. “But, uh, he says his guy wasn’t lying when he made that report, so we had no right to act.”

Fucking-A.This is literally the last thing I need right now.

“So, what do they want?” I ask, eager to get them off my back. If they want money, then whatever. I’m willing to buy them off just to shut them the fuck up. I’ll destroy their society later when I have the fucking bandwidth to deal with it.

“He wants your consort,” he says bluntly.

With everyone leaving and saying goodbye and shit, I couldn’t really hear him. I misheard, clearly. “He wants what?”

Christian shifts on his feet. “Your consort.”

Nah, I didnotjust hear that. “He wants Wyn?”

My hands ball into fists, stretching my raw, bloody knuckles. There aretwoproblems with Sin saying Wyn’s name. One, it means he knows about her, and that fucking bothers me. Two, they have the audacity to assume I’m going to just, what, hand her over to them?

I flex my hands, flaring my fingers. I’m not going to let these assholes get a rise out of me. That’s their plan, I’m sure. Otherwise, why demand my consort as payment? They know it’d humiliate me, and that’s what they want—to chip away at my power.

I push a finger into my brother’s chest. “Tell him I want a meeting.”

Christian’s eyes go wide. “Come one, Lucas. You’re not going to hand over Wyn?—”

“Of course not,” I say. “But I want him to think I’m considering it…”

“Okay, so if I get the meeting, then what?”

I take a step back, moving toward the front door. “You let me worry about that…”

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

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