Page 5 of Of Heathens & Havoc

Before I can deck his privileged ass, Saint reaches over, flattening a hand against my chest to hold me back. “We just want to know if there’s going to be any shit,” he rumbles back at the guy. “The Crossbones play football. Disciples play hockey. We coexist here, but not on the same team. Got it?”

“I don’t fuck with small town gangs,” the asshole says, his lids lowered halfway, his eyes black as the pits of hell.

“You don’t fuck with gangs at all if you think the Bones are small-town,” Heath says, smacking his fist into his palm, his teeth just about chattering in his excitement at the prospect of a brawl.

“Everything in Arkansas is small compared to Manhattan.”

“Not everything,” Heath says, cackling.

“You’re not on Sincero’s payroll, we got no beef with you,” Saint says.

The QB smirks at him. “My family makes our own payroll.”

“Keep it that way,” Saint says. “Or expect… Problems on the field.”

“Noted,” the freshman says. “Now back the fuck up off my dick. It’s taken.”

“We can see that,” Heath says, grinning like his heathen side’s about to take over entirely. He nods to the guy’s massive pecs. “Which one’s your bitch, and which is the side chick?”

“It’s my dead sister,” Royal answers coolly, hooded gaze holding Heath’s. “I guess you’d know something about that.”

“You wanna start shit with me right now?” Heath asks, lunging for him.

Saint collars Heath and draws him back, clapping his other hand to my uncle’s chest. “He doesn’t,” he assures Heath, measuring our opposition with an equally unflinching stare. “Do you?”

“No,” Royal says. “I want to take a fucking shower after practice like every other asshole. Now, are we done here?”

“We’re done,” I grumble, glaring at him. “Bring up that shit again, though, and we’ll have a different problem. ¿Comprende, asshole?”

He tips his chin back and stares us down like he wouldn’t hesitate to singlehandedly take on three gangsters. “Got it.”

When no one moves, he pushes past us and stalks off to his locker.

Saint pats Heath’s chest where his arm’s still hanging around his neck. “You good?”

“Yeah, dog,”I agree, turning to Heath as well. “That shit was uncalled for.”

He nods, his smile going just a little more unhinged. “Yeah, good. All good.”

“That asshole better not be fucking with us,” I say. “If I find out he’s working for Sincero…”

“They’re both Italian Yankees,” Heath says, narrowing his eyes, his dark fringe of lashes swallowing the teal blue of his eyes. “That’s where Diablo’s Disciples started.”

“We’ll know about him soon enough,” Saint says, turning to head out, knowing we’ll fall into step with our leader. “Until then… We’ve still got the other seven Sinners to deal with.”

three

The Merciful

I slip on my trusty, thick-soled clogs to complete my outfit and step back from the mirror. The shoes are the closest things to high heels I own, but it’s not for any sinful reason like vanity that I wear them. I paired them with knee-high white socks to cover my pasty legs, the required tartan skirt, which I pulled down as low as possible to make sure no skin shows except my unfortunately knobby knees. I got my white button-up shirt a few sizes too big to hide my chest, and with a grey blazer with the Thorncrown crest over it, I doubt I could extract a sinful thought from a man if my life depended on it.

“For you, E,” I whisper to the mirror.

I touch the cross hanging around my neck, aware of the sin in its meaning. I don’t take it off, though. I never take it off, though it chokes me with contradictions and messy feelings more than calming me. Checking to make sure not a single, strawberry blonde strand is out of place in my tight bun, I step away from the mirror. Vanity is another sin, after all.

I straighten the fall afghan I crocheted for my first semester in a dorm room, soft yarn in caramel and rust and chocolate, then prop Raphael against my pillows. He stares up at me with his one remaining eye, his fur long ago worn flat by being cuddled under my chin too many nights. I give his misshapen head an affectionate squeeze and then pick up my backpack and leave my dorm, heading for breakfast at the dining hall. No one pays me a bit of attention, which puts me at ease. Some irrational part of me was afraid that after being shelteredfor so long, the moment I set foot outside the protective bubble my aunt built for me, a roving gang would fall upon me, sensing vulnerability.

I shake the thought away, knowing how silly it is. No one here knows me, even if I am back in Faulkner. The campus is small enough that everyone probably knows each other by sight, but there’s a whole new class of freshmen, around three hundred people, and I’ve made sure I won’t stand out.

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