Page 44 of Wilde's End
Unable to stop myself, I say, “Considering I should know what’s happening in my own town, yeah. It’s fucking irritating.”
His eyes narrow a little while his smile stays in place. “Wilde’s town.”
“Where is he anyway?”
“If he wanted you to know, he would have told you.”
He can’t exactly tell me anything if I haven’t seen him. “He hasn’t been around since I got injured.” I force a casual shrug. “Maybe he’s backing down.”
“I wouldn’t hold your breath.”
I’m putting an end to this. I go to step around Booker and walk inside, but he immediately blocks my path.
“You’re not on the list.”
“Check it again.”
“Don’t need to. I wrote it.”
I bite back the need to swear at him. I’m going to get through this conversation without getting angry and insulting him. I can do it. “Then it shouldn’t be so hard for you to add me. Hudson Bellamy. TwoLs.”
“Damn, forgot my pen.”
I go to sidestep him again, but Booker’s hand snaps tight around my right wrist with a strength I’m not expecting. He lifts my injured hand in front of my face. “Don’t make me hurt you again,” he whispers.
“I don’t see the big deal with letting me past.” My voice is bordering on anger and pain, but I somehow keep it steady.
“The big deal is that this is a closed event. You were not invited. So I suggest you leave before things get nasty.” He releases my wrist with a shove backward, and I stumble a step.
“Can I at least talk to Wilde, then?”
Booker studies me. “No.”
My fingernails are digging into my good palm as I talk myself out of punching him.
“Not here,” he adds, and that gets my anger under control. “But I can tell you where he’ll be after this.”
“And where’s that?”
“Wayward. As soon as he’s done, he’ll head down there. He does every night that we have a—one of theseeventson—for as long as I can remember.”
Wayward. It’s two hours away.
Still, it looks like I’m not going to get anything out of Booker, and the town is bringing back a memory.
Wayward is where Wilde goes to hook up. It’s a weird bit of information to retain, but I’m glad I did because I have an idea forming.
And Wilde is going to hate it.
CHAPTER
SIXTEEN
WILDE
I’m sorer than usual after a Peril match. Foley managed to beat me tonight, but not before he got a good shot to my shoulder with his post and left a huge welt on my thigh as he shoved me off. I don’t take losing lightly, but I take it even worse after a week where my focus hasn’t been where it belongs.
I have no one to blame for the loss but myself. Even the last two days of nonstop practice didn’t have me ready to beat that asshole, and it’s a spit on my pride to see him take money we could have used in Wilde’s End and leave with it.
