Page 44 of Born into Madness
My head is still reeling from the kiss we shared when I pull my bike into the parking lot of The Red Room and park beside Mia and Damien’s bikes. The club isn’t open yet, so the onlyother people here are those handling liquor deliveries and the cleaning crew who are getting everything ready for tonight. I find Mia and Damien sitting at a corner table with Isaak and Pasha, the four of them already deep in conversation by the time I walk over and sit down. Mia looks over at me, and when she sees my pink, polka-dot Band-Aids, she raises a brow but doesn’t comment on it. She’ll wait until we’re alone before she questions me about it.
“What’d I miss?” I ask.
Damien leans back in his chair and says, “We had another incident here last night. Isaak caught some little fucker trying to sell pills.”
I turn to look at the man on my right. Isaak’s babyface is what got him assigned to this job. We needed someone who could blend in with the college-age crowd, and with his dimples and disarmingly sweet smile, he was the perfect choice. He hates it and wishes he could be reassigned so he could get the hand and neck tats he wants so badly, but unfortunately for him, we need him here. Isaak has a hard time holding eye contact with me as he says, “I saw him with the bag of pills, but he noticed me coming for him and ran out the back entrance. He was gone by the time I made it through the crowd.”
There’s a pause before he briefly meets my eyes and adds, “Sorry, Sasha. I looked everywhere, but couldn’t find him.”
Even though I’ve never once hurt any of our men who didn’t deserve it, some of them are still scared of me. My reputation for being unhinged at the best of times and downright insane during the worst means they’ll always be cautious around me. Damien is different since we grew up together, and Mia, well, Mia just flat out doesn’t give a fuck how crazy I am.
“Did you get a good look at his face?” I ask him.
Isaak nods and says, “Yeah, I got a clear shot. I’d recognize him if I saw him again.”
“Great. I’ll ask Niki to send you over a file to look through. Let us know if any of them look familiar.” He nods and relaxes a little when I don’t make any attempt to reach over and hurt him. “Anything else happen?”
Both men shake their head, and after we’ve dismissed them, I look across the table at my sister and cousin. “I’ll ask Niki to send over photos of the Alphas. Maybe we’ll get lucky and they’ll recognize some of them. I know they’re behind this. I can fucking feel it.”
“I’ve been watching the frat house cameras with him,” Damien says. “So far we haven’t learned anything aside from the fact that they all jerk off way too much when they’re alone, and there’s a constant string of girls at the house. No sign of any of them being drugged, though.”
“Anything new with the laptops?” I ask.
“Not since we last talked. He’s still digging his way through.” Damien stretches his arms up and yawns. “God, I’m fucking tired.”
Mia grins over at him. “Rough night?”
“Hell yeah it was. I promised Luka and Lara I’d help them out. Mira’s been having colic the last few nights, and they’re both exhausted. Jesus, I had no idea a baby could scream so much and for so long. Roma was so quiet, but, man, his little sister has some lungs.”
Mia laughs at his rough night, so he tells her. “Yeah, laugh it up. The next time they need help, I’m volunteering Aunt Mia and Uncle Dario.”
“Mira’s a cutie,” Mia says. “We’ll babysit her anytime they want.”
“I’ll remember that,” Damien warns her. No one asks me if I want to babysit, so I don’t volunteer. Even though none of my nieces and nephews are scared of me, I’ve never taken much of a hands-on role with them. I hold them and play around withthem when we’re together, but I don’t watch them on my own. I love that they aren’t scared of me, though. It’s always given me hope, makes me think that maybe I’m not completely lacking inside, that there must be enough good in me for them to sense.
Cyn makes me feel the same way. Someone so sweet and innocent wouldn’t be able to tolerate being near me, so maybe she senses the same good in me that my nieces and nephews do. I slip my hand in my pocket, letting my fingers feel the coil of braided hair while Damien and Mia discuss their plans to watch the club.
“I made Niki a bet,” she says with a grin. “If I can beat him to some information about Cupid, then he has to get his nose pierced.”
“And if he finds it first?” I ask.
My little sister scrunches up her nose when she says, “It doesn’t matter because I don’t plan on losing.”
Damien and I share a look before he laughs and nudges Mia’s arm. “Yeah, you’re not getting off that easy. What do you have to do if Niki wins?”
Mia cringes when she says, “The next time they have a karaoke night in here I have to get up and sing.”
“What song?” I ask, unable to hide my grin because I know how much my little sister would hate to do this.
She mumbles a quick, “‘My Heart Will Go on’ by Celine Dion.”
Damien and I both start laughing, and when I can finally speak, I say, “That’s going to be awful, Mia. You can’t carry a tune.”
She glares at me while Damien says, “Yeah, that song choice isn’t an accident. He put a lot of thought into this. There’s no way to fake it with that one. It’s just going to be godawful from start to finish and incredibly painful to watch.”
“Or listen to,” I add.
“You two can fuck right off,” Mia says, trying not to laugh. “I’m not losing, so it’s not going to happen.”
