Page 45 of Bad Wolf (Wild Men 4)

Chapter Eleven

Gigi

“You want to go out. On Saturday night. Really.” I look across the small table at the coffee shop at Sydney who’s fidgeting with the sleeves of her green sweater, avoiding my gaze.

She called me, said she wanted to meet up, and this is the first thing she has to ask me?

She gives me an uncertain smile. “Yes. It’s another party. It will be fun.”

Fun. When every time she leaves me alone to go buy drugs, like I assume she does, and I have to go looking for her.

“Please, Gigi. I need you there. You don’t know…” She swallows hard. “Please. I promise we will have fun.”

“Syd, look…”

And I stop.

I really look at her. She has dark circles under her eyes. She looks like crap. She looks desperate, and honestly, I don’t know what to do about her.

She’s scaring me. Worry is eating at my stomach like acid. I should talk to her parents, only they haven’t been around in a long while.

I should talk to her friends.

She’s been my friend for so long, the person I told everything. She knows about my fears, about my nightmares. Something’s going on with her, and she’s not ready to talk. And she puts herself in danger, and that really sucks, but if I don’t go with her, I’m sure she’ll still go. Without me.

Without anyone to have her back. If anything happens to her, it’s on me.

Also going with her I may have a chance to figure out what’s going on, and to get her to open up and talk to me. Plus, if her boy harem is around, I could talk to them as well. That’d be a bonus.

And if Jarett is around…

No. I have to stop expecting that. What are the odds that he’ll be there every single time Syd and I go out? After all, I hadn’t seen him in years, and it’s not like I stayed at home and said my prayers at night until then.

Then again, a little voice points out in my mind, you only started seeing him the moment Sydney started taking you out to places where she met with drug dealers and gangsters.

Gangsters.

A gang.

Oh my God.

“Gigi? Will you go with me?” Sydney is staring at me, a pleadin

g look in her eyes.

Pushing back my chair, I grab my jacket, and mutter something about having to go and calling her later.

She’s distraught, and I barely notice because right now I’m kind of distraught, too.

I have to talk to my brother.

Merc doesn’t answer his phone. The phone at home rings and rings, and nobody picks up.

On a hunch, I head to Mancave, the garage my brother-in-law and his brother have opened on the outskirts of town. Merc likes to hang out there and tinker with engines.

Not that he’s a good mechanic. But I think he likes hanging out with the guys, Matt and Kaden, and shoot the shit with them. My brother-in-law, Matt, seems to be a good influence on him. Calm and measured, he’s much older than my sister, and is like a cross between a father and a brother to me and Merc. At least that’s how he acts, and my brother likes it.

As for me, sometimes I want to roll my eyes so hard. I don’t need a father. I did fine without one all my life. But I do appreciate how Matt helped us move out of Destiny, helped Mom pay her debts and got us into college. I’ll never forget his kindness when we most needed it, and how he did his best to take care of all of us.

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