Page 34 of Never Say Die
Well, Jacob Hill had outdone himself.
Aiden folded his arms across his chest and tilted his head, assessing a chipped decal—The World is my Backyard!—stuck to the back of a beat-to-shit RV idling in a Walmart parking lot. They’d stopped on the outskirts of Vegas, per Jacob’s request, and found their manager standing in front of the ugly, beige motorhome like a proud parent.
“Congrats, you filthy degenerates. You got yourselves a tour bus,” Jacob bellowed.
“That’s a death trap,” Aiden said, assessing the RV over his sunglasses.
Georgia elbowed him in the ribs.
Shay muffled a high-pitched laugh with his palm.
Dylan sucked on his vape-pen, nodding appreciatively. “Dope.”
“Don’t be an ungrateful little shit, Moore.” Jacob slapped the side of the RV. “She runs just fine. Queen sized bed, pull-out couch, kitchenette, functioning shitterandshower, and she comes with a driver.”
Shay doubled over. Laughter burst from him in big, hiccupping breaths. “Awhat?”
The driver’s side door squeaked. Brown moccasins hit the asphalt, attached to an excessively tall woman with a pastel pink bob. She wore heart-shaped glasses, a floral button-down, and carried a—no fucking joke—beady-eyed white ferret on her shoulder.
“That’s Pru,” Jacob said, jutting his thumb at her. “I gave her an airsoft gun and the authority to shoot each and every one of you on my behalf.”
“An airsoft gun?” Georgia arched a brow.
Pru lifted her shirt, displaying the silver handle shoved into her high-waist corduroy shorts. “An airsoft gun,” she parroted, and smacked bubblegum between her teeth. She settled her gaze on Aiden and jutted her chin. “Es este el chico?”
“Por que? No, I’m not—I mean, yeah?What?What the fuck is… You’re?—”
“Puerto Rican, you clown.” She steered her gaze to Jacob. “That’s the one to watch, yeah?”
Jacob nodded.
Aiden tightened his arms across his chest. “Excuse me, but I’m a fucking adult. I don’t need a babysitter?—”
“You’re a fucking adult who overdosed six months ago. Don’t blame me for fillin’ her in on your life-threatening tendency to launch off the deep end at any given moment.”
Rage lit in his chest. He pursed his lips, staring through Pru, through their shitty new motorhome, through the blinding blue sky, and ignored Shay’s winded sound. Ignored how Shay whipped toward him. Ignored his furiously small, “What. . . ?” and the weighty silence that followed.
So, OxyContin? Bad shit. But it’d made Aiden feel absolutely nothing, and he’d spent a good six weeks trying to achieve thedeepestnothinghe could. The day he’d gotten there, reached peak void, he’d blacked-out at a party and Georgia had dosed him with an opiate-reversal. He’d woken up two days later in a hospital bed. Camila had slapped him, hard, and sobbed, and kissed his cheeks, and slapped him again. Georgia had cried over him. Dylan, too. And he hadn’t touched opiates since.
“You weren’t around, Bennett,” Jacob said, venomously. “Anyway, doesn’t matter. Past lives, past choices, past hospital bills. Pru, meet Knight’s Blood—Georgia Williams, Dylan Fisher, Aiden Moore, and Shay Bennett—Knight’s Blood, meet Prudence Domínguez. Oh, and Sherlock, her rat-cat.”
“Ferret,” Pru corrected, and rolled her eyes. “It’s a pleasure.”
Aiden gave a curt nod. “Well, I’m getting coffee.” He walked away, escaping the unspoken burden he’d placed on Knight’s Blood. He kept his face tilted toward the dirty asphalt. Chewed on his lip. Wandered aisles until embarrassment stopped curdling in his stomach and grabbed a pre-bottled Frappuccino from a refrigerator at self-checkout.
Six months ago, post-overdose, he’d ditched a band-mandated ninety-day wellness program—cute celebrity coding forrehab—four days after the first group session. Georgia had stomped and yelled, and Dylan had said something stupidly supportive likewe just want what’s best for you, man, and Thomas, freshly acquired after vocal auditions, hadn’t paidanyattention. Aiden couldn’t blame them for being hyper-fucking-fixated on him, but it’d been long enough, hadn’t it? He’d paid his dues. Proved he had zero interest in anything opioid-adjacent. Kept his shit together on stage, played killer sets, showed up on time for rehearsals. He hadn’t climbed the self-pity staircase (Step One, admit you’re powerless.Powerless?Yeah, no, Aiden would rather choke), but everyone had made gross, shameful mistakes—an irreversible moment, a deliberate fuck-up—and Aiden had spent months convincing Georgia, Dylan,Camila, and Jacob that overdosing had been his big, undoableoops.
That was before Shay, though.
Ritual sacrifice redefinedoops.
He paid and left, sipping his sugary almost-coffee, and slowed to a stop, leaning against the empty side of the RV, listening.
“No one fucking told me.Youdidn’t tell me, Georgia. He almost died and no one?—”
“Oh, don’t even, Shay,” Georgia hissed. “You were off cuttin’ new tracks with Chain while we took care of him, all right? Yeah, he hit a low. Real low. But don’t act like we owed you anything after you left us high and dry. If Aiden wanted you to know, he would’ve told you, all right? He got himself together and that’s what matters.”
Dylan cleared his throat. “Sort of together. Like, marginally together. We’re not afraid he’s gonna die anymore, at least.”
