Page 16 of Kings of Sherwood

Mackenzie rolls her eyes. “Who’sthey, Taylor? Come on.”

“I don’t fucking know, the deep state or whatever.” Taylor clicks off her vape and exhales a fruity cloud while looking me dead in the eye. “All I’m saying is I wishIhad four strapping young men to get me home safely.”

I do a kind of guilty smile. “Yeah, they’re very...protective,” I say. “Speaking of which...”

“Be careful!” Mackenzie calls at my back as I swing out of the bathroom. “I love your top, by the way!”

“Finally,” Will says, shouting above the bar noise as I weave my way back to them near the door. “We were about to send in a search party.”

“Girls always take forever in the bathroom,” I say back.

“Not this one,” LJ says. He’s not wrong, but I stick out my tongue at him.

“I’m getting in touch with my feminine side, okay? Besides, they had some interesting intel to share with me.”

“Intel?” says Will.

“It’s—okay, they heard about it, I mean Guy, and everything, and they think it was a murder. I mean, no, obviously it was a murder, but they think it was some kind of crazy ritualistic—”

“Slow down,” says LJ, and my mind flicks back to our encounter just before the bathroom. It’s hard not to obey him when he talks like that.

“Yeah,” Tuck says, smiling. “What...are we talking about exactly?”

I sigh and rake a hand through my hair, which is a little bit sweaty from all the dancing. “The girls in the bathroom. Te...Kayla...Mailer...” I’m slurring my words, so I give up. “Whatever. Their names don’t matter, whatever. Anyway, they were telling me to be careful, you know, like girlfriend solidarity kind of thing, get home safe, whatever, whatever. And they mentioned there was this crazy murder-suicide thing that happened. It was Guy. It was...” I trail off, not finishing the sentence.

It was us, is what I was going to say.

“Well, I’ll be,” Rob says. “Who knew all it would take to turn Maren into a private eye was a couple of tequila shots and some line dancing.”

He laughs, and Will laughs, and Tuck chuckle. LJ doesn’t.

“I don’t like it here,” he says. “Let’s get out.”

“You’re nooooo fun,” I say, but a yawn makes its way to my lips anyway, and I subject myself to being led out into the fresh air.

When we’re outside, they all move to flank me—two on one side, two on the other. Automatic as if they’d trained for it.

Hell, maybe they did.

“I’ll drive,” I say, and claw the air for the keys.

Four pairs of eyes stare me down. No one moves.

Then they all start walking again.

“What?” I fold my arms. It’s cooler outside—still warm, but just enough to get a little chill on my sweaty skin—and when none of them stops and turns back, I kind of relish the sweep of the air as I rush to catch up.

“Absolutely not,” LJ barks.

I roll my eyes. “Absolutely not,” I mock. “And why n—”

I don’t finish, because I stumble forward and smack into Tuck.

“Um, that’s why,” he says. I scowl.

“My stupid high heel,” I grumble. “Caught a crack in the sidewalk, and—”

“Keep it down,” Will says, gentle but firm. He glances at the dark cluster of buildings around us, and I realize I have no idea what time it is beyondlate.

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