Page 21 of Darcy
Arlo is on the seat across from them, chattering animatedly with a teenager and his friend, both of whom are looking at him like he’s hung the moon. Prophet is posing against the wall for another photo with more guests, and Slate… is nowhere to be seen.
Forcing myself to abandon the search for him—because I don’t want to know what he’s doing—I hastily chuck the bottles of water onto the nearest table and flee.
Of course, I don’t make it. Slate is right there, standing in the doorway, unintentionally blocking my exit as he frowns down at his phone.
The next five seconds seem to happen in a horrifying kind of slow motion. His thumb comes down on the screen, and—two blinks later—my phone erupts with a creepy and unmistakable horror movie giggle.
Mwahahaha.
The sound—so out of place in this cosy smoozefest—stuns the room to silence. Slate’s head snaps up, and I don’t need to look back to know that the rest of the band is staring as well.
My cheeks heat, and my brain snaps into disaster mode.
Deny, deny, deny.
“Oh, shit! I thought I had it on silent.” I bite my lip, keeping my eyes downcast. If I play dumb, perhaps they’ll put it down to coincidence. “I just came to deliver the water for Gabrielle.” I wave awkwardly at the bottles on the table. “Anyway, have a nice night.”
Before any of them can stop me, I duck around Slate and flee into the corridor, rushing down the long, straight hall as fast as my legs will carry me.
I’m not fast enough to out-run the sounds of my own traitorous phone.
Ribbit. Ba dum tss.Squeeeal.Mwahahaha.
“Oh my God! Shut up, shut up, shut up!” I growl at the device, snatching it out of my pocket as I turn the corner.
Unfortunately for me, my stupid hind-brain decides to look back before I’m completely out of sight.
Four immense bodies spill out into the hallway behind me, watching as I run away as fast as my short ass legs will carry me.
I keep running until I reach the hotel, too wound up to even think about calling an Uber. I take the stairs two at a time, cursing myself over and over for being so stupid.
This entire mission is shaping up to be a disaster. They know who I am, although I suppose they must believe their own anonymity is still intact. Even though some of their usernames are less than subtle, it’s plausible that I might not put two and two together and connect Hazardous, the band, to my clan. I’m just a newbie who got nervous when her weird ringtones called attention to her.
But are they really going to believe my being here, out of the blue, and working for them, is a coincidence?
Ugh! The whole thing is making my head hurt.
To top it all off, Miguel wasn’t here at all today, and I’ve yet to see either of his brothers.
I burst into my room, collapsing onto the scratchy sheets with a long, drawn-out groan. Then, because I have zero self control, I pull out the traitorous phone and scroll through the group chat.
[HzD]D0dgeVip3r
where are you at???
[HzD]StoneRE1
yo, @D4rk4ngel? What’s keeping you?
[HzD]Fr0gg0
we’ve gotta beat this dungeon today. Won’t be online tomorrow.
Those are just the start of yesterday’s messages, all of them sent after they left the kickoff party. It’s stupid, but my heart beats a little faster. Did they leave that party early just to play Runes with me?
I’m reading too much into this.
I scroll past their messages and reach the ones they’ve sent today. After Prophet sent his message this morning, all of them checked in, asking if I was okay, both in the group chat and privately. Arlo alone sent half a dozen messages.
