Page 59 of Gather the Storm

Even high school had been sketchy, with fights breaking out every other day over something or other. It reminded me of the fight between Blake and the guys, the one I’d missed that had shown up on social media, and I wondered again if it had anything to do with his murder.

I’d tried a million times to return to the night of the party in my head, trying to remember if there had been any unusualtension between Blake and the Beasts, but I’d never had any luck. I’d just been a kid hitching a ride to a party with her big brother. I’d either been too self-involved to notice any tension or there hadn’t been any to notice.

Wolf turned away from the bar and handed me a drink, then tipped his head to one side of the room where there was a little more space to breathe.

This time Otis was the one who took my hand and if I’d hoped to be less excited by the gesture, I was sorely disappointed because apparently any kind of contact with Blake’s best friends was enough to make my panties wet.

We approached a trio of people — a woman and two men — standing against the wall.

It took me a minute to realize I knew them: it was Willa and two of the Kings.

Chapter 30

Daisy

I’d let Willa and the Kings stay at the house a few months before when they’d been lying low. I hadn’t known the details then, but they’d been on the tail of the trafficking ring at Aventine University and had needed a place to hide out.

Now Willa stood between Oscar Drago and Rock Barone, flanking her like private bodyguards while she sipped something from a glass and looked around the room like she’d seen it all before.

Her face lit up when she saw me. “Daisy! Hi!”

Willa was super pretty, with long blonde hair and a mischievous smile that made me think she was a secret troublemaker. With her hair falling in long waves, she looked like some kind of Viking princess flanked by two gods.

“Hey,” I said, returning her smile. “Small world.”

She leaned in to give me a hug. I hadn’t had time to get to know her when she’d stayed at the house — I’d been deep in planning for the Beasts to get out of prison and she’d been busy trying not to get herself killed — but she’d always seemed nice.

She leaned in to be heard over the music. “How are you?”

“I’m good,” I said, because it was less complicated than the truth:I’m turned on by the three men who confessed to killing my brother, and I don’t want it to be true.

She nodded and I moved into place beside her against the wall. It was a good spot to watch the crowd, and Wolf and Otis were talking to Drago and Rock anyway.

“Where’s Neo?” I asked.

“Fighting tonight,” she said.

“Does that worry you?” I asked. I’d heard the fights at the Orpheum were brutal.

She shook her head. “Neo needs to fight.”

I thought about Jace, half considered signing him up for fight night without his consent. If anyone needed an ass kicking, it was Jace Kane, except I wasn’t entirely sure anyone could actually kick Jace's ass.

More than likely he’d send someone else to the hospital.

Still, Jace had that same coiled rage I’d spotted in Neo when I’d approached him about using his Mafia contacts at Blackwell Correctional to get information on the Beasts.

I’d been worried when they hadn’t replied to my letters, hadn’t yet realized it was because they just didn’t want to talk to me. Neo’s contacts had kept me informed through Neo: the Beasts had been fine, more than fine even. They’d practically owned the place.

I bopped my head to the music as I watched the crowd, thinking about the three men who were my roommates. I needed to get into their rooms, snoop around a little, and I cursed myself for being stubborn about coming to the Orpheum. If I’d stayed home, I would have had the whole house to myself. I could have searched their rooms and they wouldn’t have been the wiser.

Now I’d have to find another time to do it, because that was definitely the next step. I didn’t expect to find anything incriminating about Blake’s murder, but I’d feel like an idiot if Ididn’t look and found out there had been evidence right under my nose.

In my mind, I was already one step ahead though. What if I didn’t find anything in their stuff?

Then what?

I looked around the theater and reminded myself that I knew these people, like almost all of them, in one way or another.

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