In The Darkness (Project Artemis #1)(14)

“So, when Clayton isn’t around, who’s the boss here?” Nick asked as Ponytail walked toward him to leave the room.

He stopped and thought for a moment before he answered, “I don’t know. I guess Drist, but that’s only because he threatens to kill anyone who pisses him off. But don’t worry. Just stay on his good side and you’ll be fine.”

How he’d be didn’t worry him so much as how Persephone would be under the control of that bastard. His need to constantly wave that damn weapon around made him unpredictable, to say the least.

But if cozying up to that madman was the way to make sure she stayed safe, then that’s what he had to do. He just hoped Ponytail was right about Drist being the one who would make the decisions.


By early afternoon, boredom or Clayton’s special pills had overtaken every guy in the house but Drist, so Nick took his chance to get friendly with him and hopefully ensure he could protect Persephone from that point on. He walked outside to find him sitting in the hot midday sun on the back steps that led from the kitchen to the large backyard he guessed went back for at least an acre or so.

As usual, the man had his gun in his hand. Before that moment, Nick hadn’t paid much attention to what kind of gun it was. That he pointed it at people all the time had been bad enough.

But now he saw Drist’s favorite accessory was a Glock .45. Nothing terribly unique or special, it would certainly do the job when he pulled the trigger.

Nick stared down at him for a moment as he stroked his fingers slowly along the barrel. Jesus, this guy had some love for that gun.

“Hey, man. What’s up? Everyone in there is crashed in the middle of the day,” he said from the top of the stairs to Drist who sat on the second to last step closest to the sidewalk.

He turned his head and looked up at Nick as he continued to run his fingers over the Glock. “Pussies. Why aren’t you in there too?”

“Video games don’t do a whole lot for me most days,” he said, avoiding the truth that the guys inside were so doped up that they couldn’t help but sleep in the middle of the day.

Nodding his head, Drist made a clucking sound with his tongue. “Pussies.”

He was a man of few words, and at the moment, he seemed to like that singular word. The idea that he probably had never seen a pussy in his entire life, or if he had, it had been online on some cheap porn site made Nick want to chuckle, but he stifled his desire to laugh at Drist and got down to business.

Taking a seat next to him on the step, he leaned back on his elbows and stretched out his legs. The whole movement was meant to make him look relaxed, but he knew better than to let down his guard as he pretended to stare out at the backyard.

“I hear we get to leave this shithole tonight. Thank God for that, right?”

Drist closed one eye and aimed the gun at some unsuspecting squirrel about fifty yards away. “Hell, yeah. I’ll be happy to get the hell out of this farm shit. This man needs the city, for fuck’s sake.”

“Where are we going?”

The question sounded no more different than the last he asked, but Nick had the sense immediately that Drist heard something in it that bothered him. Turning toward him, he pointed his gun directly at his head and narrowed his eyes in suspicion.

“What’s it matter to you? You writing a book?” he asked, his words laced with barely restrained anger.

It took everything in his power to keep calm as he looked down the barrel of Drist’s gun aimed squarely between his eyes. His heart beating wildly, Nick shrugged and said casually, “No, man. I just don’t have a thing for farm animals, and that’s all this place seems to have. Did you see those heifers near the end of the backyard, for Christ’s sake? The fucking things just walk around this place like they own it.”

His longwinded explanation that diverted into the discussion of his dislike of cows nearby seemed to throw Drist off, and he turned to look around for the cow Nick had mentioned. He likely wanted to shoot the damn thing.

Pointing his gun back toward the yard, he laughed. “I could go for a steak. A big, fat, juicy steak, right?”

Nick forced himself to laugh, sure this guy wasn’t playing with a full deck. He had no doubt, though, that if he got the chance, he’d take a shot at the brown and white cow nearly a hundred yards away that now slowly walked away from the backyard.

Crazy fucker. Even animals knew to stay the fuck away from him.

“It’ll be nice to be somewhere we can get a steak and we don’t have to kill it ourselves, won’t it?” he asked, hoping to get Drist back onto the subject of where they were all moving to that night.

“Yeah. Clayton won’t be sending us anywhere good, though. We need to keep moving. A few more nights until he can join us.”

“So more houses like this?”

A rabbit about twenty yards away distracted Drist, so he didn’t answer for a long moment while he eyed up his shot. When he did, he said, “Yeah. One of Clayton’s friends is going to let us use his mother’s old house in Winchester. I guess the old broad died a few months ago, and he can’t find anyone to buy the place. See, that’s what this thing we’re doing is all about.”

Unsure what the hell he meant, Nick put on his most serious expression and nodded. “I get it, man.”

“A guy gets left a perfectly good house and the motherfucker won’t sell because fucking McMansions all over the place make the world think that every house has to have twenty bedrooms and fifteen fucking bathrooms. It’s ridiculous! That’s what this is all about. It’s time to take back this world and let guys like Clayton’s friend be able to sell his mother’s house for a decent profit. I mean, it’s got like three bedrooms. What’s the fucking problem with that?”