Page 143 of Poison (Bad Boys of Redwood Academy 2)

IMANI

As soon as I parked my car in front of João’s house, he snapped open the front door and ran a hand through his messy hair. I quickly undid my seat belt, my heart thrashing against my rib cage, and hurried out of the car.

“What’s going on?” I asked.

João pulled me into the house, shut the door behind me, and pulled on his coat. “I need you to watch Ana. I have to go out.”

Furrowing my brows, I glared at him. “That’s why you wanted me to come over?”

“I’m going to find my mom,” João said.

I smacked my lips together and stared up at him through wide eyes. “Your mom? What happened? Is everything okay?” I asked, fear suddenly striking me in the chest. While I knew what she did for a living, I also knew that she always came home.

Always.

“She was supposed to be here when Ana got off the bus. Ana’s been alone all day.”

“No,” I whispered, wrapping my arms around myself.

Sometimes, when sex workers went missing, they weren’t found.

Or they were found dead.

If João walked out that door and found her dead, what would he do? How would he raise Ana alone? Would he even be able to keep Ana? What if the court ruled against it and she was thrust into the system?

“Ana’s in the bathroom.” João turned toward the door. “Watch her.”

“Wait,” I said, grasping his wrist and pulling him back into a hug.

His entire body tensed, but I held him tightly to me anyway, resting my head on his chest and hoping that he’d calm down a little bit. After a couple moments, João rested his arms around my shoulders and pulled me even closer.

“What’s this for?” he whispered.

“Because you need it.”

And because I knew that once I pulled away, that man would rush out that door without thinking anything through. I didn’t want him to run into something so blindly. He had said it himself that Redwood was dangerous, that even some of the richest people here had secrets.

Now that they had shown me the true side of Redwood, I knew it to be true.

João needed to be smart about this because she probably wasn’t with someone in the slums. If she was selling her body, it was to some rich, old guy who didn’t give a fuck about her and who could dispose of her like she was nothing.

“Please, be safe,” I whispered to him. “Call Landon or Kai to go with you.”

“I don’t have time for them to catch up,” João said, pulling away and stepping away from me, snatching the front door knob. “I have to find my mom as soon as I can. She’s in danger—I can just feel it.”

“João!” Ana shouted, running into the room from the back. “Where are you going?”

João took one last glance at her and gave her a small smile that didn’t reach his eyes, and then he looked back up at me. “Please, watch her. I’ll pay you or get you whatever the hell you want. I need to go.”

Before I could get out another word, João slipped through the door and jogged to his car. He slid into the passenger seat, the car roaring to life, then sped down the street and disappeared into the cold winter night.

I stared out the front door with my stomach in knots.

João wouldn’t be cautious or careful. João was about to tear up every rich person’s house in Redwood to find his mother. He was going to willingly put himself in danger, not in a sane state of mind.

“Imani,” Ana said, tugging on my shirt. “Where’d João go? Why is he leaving me too?”

Picking up Ana, I walked to the kitchen and searched through the cupboards for the ingredients to make her favorite snack—brigadeiros. But the cupboards were relatively empty, and I couldn’t find condensed milk and cocoa powder anywhere.

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