Page 59 of Unleashing Mayhem
He heard frantic whispering and looked to the left to find Chaos’s yellow eyes peeking out from a crack in the guest bedroom’s doorway.
Then Matty felt the warmth of Nightmare at his back, and that open door shut quickly, though the sound of Chaos’s gleeful cackle was perfectly loud and clear.
Maybe Chaos had gotten his novel entertainment after all.
Sascha kickedMatty out of the house in the morning.
Well, not permanently, but still.
It had been the plan for Matty to be seen around town anyway, but also Matty had been looking forward to cuddling Nightmare in his own bed until he got his fill. Maybe he would have ventured out three or four days from now?
It was Kai who’d banged on Matty’s bedroom door with all his might, yelling that they needed to come down for waffles immediately. And then Sascha had politely but firmly told Matty he needed to be seen out of the house as much as possible. “I want to get the guys after you, but I don’t want it to go down here. This is my home. My safe space. Is that—is that okay?”
And of course it was okay. Matty didn’t want Dominico stepping into his safe haven either. But it had meant he’d kept his mouth shut about the intruder Nightmare had caught. The shadows had cleaned up all the evidence, anyway. No need to worry his friends.
And now he and Nightmare were outside in the bright sunlight, surrounded by tourists. Matty was staring at a flyer pinned on a billboard outside the town’s most popular diner. Itwas for the next dance night at the Lighthouse, Seacliff’s one and only gay bar.
“You think we could lure Dominico out with something like this?” Matty asked Nightmare.
Matty didn’t exactly want any innocent bystanders involved, but Dominico was wily—he wouldn’t do anything in public that could get him caught by authorities. He would try to get Matty out. Get him alone. And a confined bar at night would be easier to manage than out in the town during the day, with kids and families running around.
“Yes, sweet. We can manage.”
Matty swallowed. The flyer was for Friday. Five nights away.
He shivered, suddenly cold despite the summer sun, but then something warm pressed against his chest. He pulled the collar of his sweatshirt out and peered down. It was one of Nightmare’s shadows, about the size and shape of a handkerchief, plastered to Matty’s T-shirt.
Matty grinned down at it. “Oh, hello. What are you doing out and about?”
The shadow didn’t answer, of course, but it didn’t seem like it was going anywhere either.
“Are you ready to return?” Nightmare asked.
“No.” Matty shifted his sweatshirt back into place, patting at the shadow hidden there. Now that they were already out, it didn’t make sense to retreat so soon. “We should walk around a little more.”
He grabbed Nightmare’s hand, and they wandered further along the main street. It wasn’t long before they found Chaos standing on top of one of the benches, a group of older children huddled, rapt, in front of him.
Chaos held out his hand, his fingers bent into an imaginary claw. “And then I sliced him with my talons!” he cried. “All the way through!”
Cooper was on the sidelines, looking on with amused fondness, and Matty approached him. “Um, what’s he doing?”
Cooper’s grin grew wider. “He’s reenacting a deadly Mafia meeting for these innocent children.”
“And is he…allowed to do that?”
“They think it’s a made-up story.”
Matty watched Chaos slice through the air with vengeful glee. “Isn’t it a little violent?”
Cooper shrugged. “Have you seen the movies these kids watch these days?”
It was true that the children were all smiles as they stared up at the cackling chaos demon. One of them was holding an ice cream cone, and Matty gazed at it longingly. He hadn’t had ice cream in ages.
Nightmare gave Matty’s hand a squeeze, then let it fall. “I will fetch you some, sweet.”
“Um.” Matty tried to think of a polite way to ask his question and came up short. “Do you even know how to use human money?”
But Nightmare was already gliding away in the direction of the small ice cream shop on the corner. Matty frowned after him.
