Page 63 of Kings & Corruption

Neo squeezed his fist in the other hand and turned away, pacing to the garage door while he muttered a string of curses.

“You should go inside,” Rock said. “This isn’t a good night for him to lose his cool. Not yet anyway.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” I asked.

Neo stalked back toward me. “Get in the back seat,Jezebel. You want to come, you can come. Don’t say we didn’t warn you.”

The threat sent a flutter of nervousness to my belly, but there was no backing out now.

I climbed out of the Hummer and Neo threw the black duffel into the back.

Right. The duffel. I should have known he’d open the hatch.

Oh well. It didn’t matter. I’d wormed my way into this… whatever this was.

Neo got into the driver’s seat and Oscar climbed in next to me while Rock took shotgun. I was surprised when Oscar took my hand, and I was even more surprised when I didn’t pull away.

Was it my imagination that he looked worried?

I tried not to think it, tried not to think about the warning in Neo’s voice as he backed out of the garage and started away from the house.

Don’t say we didn’t warn you.

Chapter29

Willa

At first I thought they’d just been trying to scare me. We entered the town of Blackwell Falls, which looked as cute as ever after dark. The old-fashioned street lamps that lined Main Street cast cozy light on the upscale brick storefronts, and there wasn’t another car in sight.

But we kept going, and the town suddenly started looking a whole lot less cozy.

Here the buildings looked seedy and rundown, more than a few of them vacant. People loitered on the corners and in the shadows, all of them casting a long stare at the Hummer as Neo drove past.

I was suddenly nervous, and I had to remind myself that the windows were tinted and it was unlikely anyone could see me in the back seat with Oscar.

A few minutes later, even that part of town seemed nice. This part of Main Street didn’t even look like the same town as the one where Oscar and I had grabbed sandwiches last week, where I’d gone with Rock and Oscar to get coffee at Cassie’s Cuppa that morning.

Here, the buildings were all abandoned, most them made of crumbling brick. They rose two and three stories into the night sky, and I wondered if Blackwell Falls had been a manufacturing hub at some point. The buildings looked like old factories, large window frames empty or filled with broken glass.

“What is this place?” I asked.

“This is the part of town I warned you about,” Oscar said next to me.

“Just remember,” Neo said from the front, “you asked to come.”

“I know,” I snapped. I didn’t need Neo Alinari thinking I was scared. “It’s fine. I’m just asking.”

Neo slowed the car, and I realized that I’d been wrong: not all of the buildings were abandoned. More often than not, I could spot faint light behind the people standing around on the sidewalk.

“Are these underground clubs?” I asked. “Raves?”

“Something like that,” Rock said.

We slowed to a stop in front of a glass-fronted building with a large marquee: an old movie theater.

The marquee was empty, but an unlit sign loomed above the place announcing it as the Orpheum. Through the glass, I could see people moving inside, shadows in the darkened interior.

Neo shut off the car. “Let’s go.”

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