Page 12 of Ravaged
CHAPTER 4
Ethan
We waited on an abandoned highway, with tall woods on either side of the road. The wind rustled the trees. The faint smell of salt hinted that the coast that was out there, somewhere, past the miles of ivy and fir. It was past midnight. A dark-gray luxury sedan rested a few feet ahead. The van waited behind it, looking as cliché as you’d imagine. No windows. White, dusty exterior. But there was a reason for the trite choice, and that was practicality. The three muscular men waiting outside of it didn’t help with the suspicion.
Wil adjusted the collar of his dress shirt. “So what was life like in New Mexico?” he asked.
“Why?”
“What do you mean, why?” he laughed. “Why not?”
“Why do you want to know?”
“Trying to kill time.” He shrugged. “I’ve never been to the desert. It’s always been the coastal life for the Adlers. And hell,” he forced a chuckle, “Dad sends Derek to do the Vegas work, even if gambling is my forte.” He crossed his arms. “So, humor me.”
My hometown, Gray Point, was near the mountains, but still surrounded by the same brown hills in every direction, sprinkled with a few, drab green bushes. When I went to the condo in Vegas to wait until it was safe to travel to Sage City, it had been an easy adjustment. Yes, Gray Point was a sleepy town with barely enough population to justify a school, and Las Vegas was a massive metropolitan area, housing millions of tourists. But Vegas had the climate I was used to. Beyond a few flash floods, it rarely rained in the desert.
But the rain in Sage City was constant, wetting your skin. Covering us in a sticky dew as we waited outside for Teagen. I rolled up the sleeves of my dress shirt.
“It was quiet,” I said.
“Where’d you live again?”
Axe glanced in our direction, then continued with stomping through the terrain, looking through bushes. Staking out our tracks.
“Gray Point,” I said.
“That’s by the mountains, right?”
So he had read the file on me, then. “Yeah.”
“And your mom, how’d she know our dad?”
I shrugged my shoulder. The file must not have been that forthcoming. “I guess they met when he was on a business trip to Vegas.”
“Ah. You know what they say.”
It was meant to be a joke, but all it did was irritate me. I needed to change the subject. “So what’s the deal with Vegas anyway?” I asked. “Gambling, or what?”
“We run a private high rollers club in one of the casinos,” he said. “Some shipments too, to the neighboring nightclubs.”
So it was illegal gamblinganddrug trafficking. “And who manages that?”
“We’ve got some cousins out there, but Dad and Derek go down to make big picture decisions.” He turned his shoulder, looking down as he flicked a lighter on and off in his hand.
“It must piss you off,” I said, taking a guess. Gambling should have been a job for Wil, if he handled most of the transactions at Jimmy’s, the underground gambling hall here in Sage City.
He shrugged. “It’s whatever,” he said. “I’ve got enough to keep me busy.” He cracked his neck, then turned to me. “So this Teagen chick. Is she hot?”
I drew my head back. “She’s about to be a prisoner.” My tone was harsher than I intended, and he heard it. Wil raised his arms in defense.
“Whoa, there,” Wil said. “Like I said, I’m not scheming for anything. Just trying to kill time.”
“He enjoys socializing,” Axe called from the darkness. If it weren’t for his glowing face, he would’ve been invisible in the shadows of the woods.
“And Axe here despises it,” Wil said, cracking a smile. “I do enough talking for the two of us.”
Fine, then. We could kill time. “What about you?” I asked. I leaned against the van. “What’s it like living here?” He tilted his chin towards me. “Does it bother you that Derek is ready to take over?”
