Page 33 of The Wild Charge

He turned away from Fox’s shit-eating grin with a dismissive huff – and nearly collided with Reese’s back. They’d reached the car.

Fox spun the keyring of the nondescript Toyota around his finger and pressed the fob. “Now remember, kids, don’t accept drinks from strangers, and don’t set a drink down–”

“Let’sgo,” Tenny snapped, and Fox cackled.

~*~

So far, everything about Nine was typical.

Typical blacked-out industrial space that looked like so much nothing on the outside; parking lot full of low-slung coupes and jacked-up trucks. A line stood on the sidewalk out front, and a bored, bulky guy in a black t-shirt with an earpiece was checking IDs at the door.

He barely glanced at their fake credentials, looked a little longer at them, their outfits, their faces, then shrugged. “Girls’ll like you, I guess.” He waved them in.

“Hear that?” Fox twisted around to smirk over his shoulder as they passed through a stale-smelled vestibule. “Thegirlswill like you.”

Tenny said, “I loathe you.”

Fox chuckled, and faced forward, as they pushed through a curtain of thick plastic strips and entered the club proper.

Fox lifted a hand over his shoulder, a two-fingered salute that meantexecute the plan as discussed.

The plan was this: Tenny and Reese would hang out on the main floor, chat up the locals, see what they could learn, and, if Fox texted them, provide a distraction when necessary. Fox, meanwhile, was going to do some snooping. See if he could get into the offices and find anything that indicated this was something besides a shitty place for newly-legal idiots to get hammered.

And shittywasthe word.

Fox slipped effortlessly between two people and disappeared.

Tenny glared at the space where he’d been, then gripped Reese’s jacket sleeve and towed him forward. Reese followed along without complaint – he’d become practically docile where Tenny was concerned, and that wasn’t something he could bear to think about for too long without becoming disgustingly soft inside.

Ugh. Fuck love, honestly.

Nine was nothing special. Beneath the neon and the flashing glimmers from several disco balls, it was a grungy, black-painted warehouse space with cords taped down along the edges of the heaving dance floor. The bar off to the right was lit from beneath, its pyramid of liquor bottles painting rainbow refractions up the wall. The air was humid, and stank of sweat, cheap cologne, and spilled beer.

A girl staggered across their path, slopping liquid out of a plastic cup, laughing hysterically and tripping over her own too-high heels.

“Watch it,” he snapped, and realized two things.

One, he hadn’t bothered with his fake American accent.

And two: he was angry. He wasfurious– and not entirely sure why.

He knocked his shoulder hard into a passing frat boy in a snapback, and earned a justified, “Hey, man!” in response.

He still gripped Reese’s sleeve, and he felt the strong forearm beneath his knuckles flex before Reese twisted loose, and grabbed his wrist instead. Tugged.

Tenny whirled around. “What–”

And his question, and all its accompanying anger, evaporated. He was left empty-headed and stupid. While Reese…

Reese stood there in his ridiculous crop top, and jacket, his ripped jeans, and his combats, his choker, and his half-up hair, and he studied him with a frown laced with open concern. Blue neon carved his abs in stark relief, pooled in the tempting hollow of his throat.

And his expression was realer, morehuman, than any he’d ever shown.

“What’s wrong?” he asked, and Tenny couldn’t answer that, because everything was wrong, and he had no idea how he was going to make it through this useless op without blurting out something totally damning.

Nine

The first thing Fox noted was that security wasmuchhigher inside than it was outside. The lone bouncer out front hadn’t exactly been theory with their IDs. But inside, Fox spotted two large, tough-looking guys stationed at each exit – most of which weren’t marked, and wouldn’t have stood out if not for the bouncers flanking them. They were dressed all in black, wearing forbidding expressions, far more serious than the first bouncer.

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