Kings of Chaos (Dirty Broken Savages #1)(72)

At this hour, there’s no one really around other than working women at the end of their nights, and people working graveyard shifts, grabbing something before they have to head to work.

Avalon picks up a fork and has a bite of the pie, licking the sticky blueberry filling off the back of her utensil.

“I’m trying to figure out if you or any of the girls you know have been picked up by someone,” I tell her, getting down to the real reason I waited all night to chat with her.

She lifts an eyebrow. “We’re not really supposed to talk about it…”

I can hear the ‘but’ in there, so I don’t let her words stop me. “Ivan St. James,” I say. “I’m pretty sure he’s picking up girls from somewhere in Detroit, and I’m just looking for a place to start.”

Up until that point, Avalon has been pretty open. She’s been relaxed, eating her pie like she’s comfortable. As soon as I say Ivan’s name, she goes tense, her eyes getting wide and then shuttering, her expression closing off.

“I-I can’t really talk about it,” she says quickly.

It doesn’t even seem like she really means she won’t talk about it. She looks scared. Her face is pale, and her hands tremble when she goes to take another bite of pie.

It makes her look younger than before, and this woman sitting across from me might as well be a different person from the one who was leaning in car windows and flirting with potential customers for the past several hours.

For just a minute, she reminds me so much of Hannah that it hurts. Like a sharp ache in my chest that I can’t ignore.

“Okay,” I finally say. It doesn’t seem like a good idea to push her. Especially not here in the open. I grab a napkin and scribble my number down on it, pushing it over to her when I’m done. “Call me if you want to talk. If you know anything, you could really help me out.”

Avalon just nods. She still seems so small and scared, hunched over the table and her plate like she’s worried someone might take it from her. Might take everything from her.

Fuck. I know how that feels.

I put money down on the table to cover everything and then head for the door.

I don’t really remember the walk back to my car, and it feels like I blink and then suddenly end up behind the wheel. My hands are shaking a little, and I squeeze the steering wheel, trying to get them to stop.

That visceral reminder of my sister fucked me up. I keep seeing her in my mind, that same scared look on her face, that same hunched posture and wide-eyed, terrified expression. Most people seem smaller when they’re scared, and there are some fuckers out there that prey on that.

Thinking about it leaves a bitter taste in my mouth, and I start the car, hoping I can keep it together long enough to get back to the house.

I manage it, driving in a daze and gripping the wheel so hard my hands hurt. When I finally reach the now-familiar house, I park and let myself in. The house is dark and quiet since it’s so late, and I’m glad I don’t have to talk to anyone. I just go up to my room and strip down, heading for the bathroom and the shower.

My head is full of memories that I don’t want. The things I try to ignore and avoid every day. Hannah crying, shaking with fear and scrambling back away from one of the men who’s getting off on tormenting her. The way she would sob my name when she was hurting, and the feeling of anger and fear and helplessness that always rose up in me when I realized there was nothing I could do to help her.

There’s so much of this shit inside me, and it usually drives me. It manifests as anger and determination. Motivation to wipe each and every one of those fucking bastards out of existence. But tonight, it’s harder.

I scrub my skin raw, standing under the spray and wishing that the water and body wash could wash away all the awful memories that won’t stop clinging to me.

It doesn’t work.

My head is too full. At this point, this shit is a part of me, and it feels like it’s never going away. That ache in my chest is still there. It feels like shards of glass trying to claw their way out of me, and I stand under the spray until the water goes cold, trying to find some relief.

My knees start to shake harder and harder, and I sink down to the floor of the shower, tucking myself into the corner like Hannah would, like Avalon did in the diner. I wrap my arms around my legs, drawing them in tight to my chest as I try to hold myself together.

But I can’t.

I’m just pieces.

Too many pieces.

Like I might blow away in the wind.





30





PRIEST





THE HISS of the shower is still going.

I heard River come home, banging up the stairs to her room, which sits right next to mine. Who the fuck knows what she was out doing, but ever since she went to go kill Ivan and almost didn’t make it back, I’ve felt… twitchy, watching her leave the house.

She was gone for hours, coming back at that weird time of night where it’s so late that it’s almost early. I didn’t come out of my room to see her then, but she sounded like she was in one piece, and I told myself that whatever she got up to was her business, and it wasn’t up to me to care or wonder if she was alright.

River turned on the shower when she got to her room. That was almost a full hour ago, but it’s still going.