I head down the front steps after school to find Hael waiting for me in his car on the curb across the street, music blasting from his speakers, one tattooed arm hanging out and tapping a rhythm against the cherry-red metal.

Like a good girl, I look both ways before I cross, skirt around the hood, and slip into the passenger seat.

“Waiting for Oscar and Callum,” Hael explains when we don't take off right away, smoking a cigarette and blowing gray smoke out the open window. He offers me the pack, and I take one, careful to avoid our fingers touching.

I let Hael Harbin go down on me in the principal's office, I think, and then pull in a deep inhale to banish the thoughts with nicotine. And all for the sake of revenge. A small smile curves my freshly painted lips. I mean, there are worse ways to ensure the downfall of one's enemies.

Oscar appears in his suit, Callum right behind him, wearing a baggy blue hoodie with the sleeves cut off, like always.

They head across the street and I start to get out, but Hael beats me to it, climbing out and lifting his seat up so the other two boys can crawl in the back. They look ridiculous back there, like we're in some sort of clown car or something. It's far too small for them, but nobody complains.

“Can we please grab something to eat on the way to Aaron's? I'm fucking starving,” Callum groans, that throaty voice of his giving me the chills. He curls his fingers over the back of my seat and peers at my phone as I tap out yet another lie to my mother. His smell drifts over me, this pleasant mix of shaving cream, talc, and aftershave. “Maybe the drive-in?”

“If it's not sanctioned by Vic, I'm not doing it,” Hael says on the end of a forced laugh. “Pretty sure Blackbird and I are in enough trouble as it is.”

“For fucking in your car behind the school, or taking your lunch assignment to a different level?” Oscar asks, and I can see in the rearview mirror that he barely lifts his eyes from the screen of his iPad.

“Lunch assignment?” I ask and Callum chuckles, low and dark. There's some deep-seated pain in that laugh, but also a grudging sort of acceptance. The darkness is where I live; I've learned to be happy here.

I shiver.

“You know how hunters send their dogs in to flush out the prey?” Callum asks, and I glance back to give him a questioning sort of look. “Hael is the dog.”

“And who's the prey?” I ask, just before I come up with the answer on my own. “Principal Vaughn.” I hit send on my text and wonder how long my luck's gonna hold before Mom starts after me for being gone all the time. That, and because I've always got Heather with me. Always. Once she's done with her after-school program, we'll go pick her up. “I thought we were going after Kali next?”

“Kali's tied up with the Ensbrook and Charter brothers,” Oscar explains in that Lucullan smooth voice of his, like some sort of dark angel. Finally, he turns off the screen of the iPad and sets his inked hands over the top of it. “It's going to take a bit more finesse. Principal Vaughn is becoming a problem.”

“He hauled Vic into his office yesterday and nailed him with weekend janitorial duty for a dress code violation,” Callum explains, and Hael makes a sound of surprise, his hand tightening on the wheel.

“Why is this the first I'm hearing of that?”

“Maybe because you guys were too busy screwing each other to check the group chat?” Callum asks, leaning over me again and snatching my phone. He hits my text messages and pans up the long list of speech bubbles to one from Vic, timestamped for early yesterday afternoon. Oops. I was a little distracted last night when I glanced at the messages. I'm not used to actually being a part of a group chat that's worth checking. “Now, Bernadette, ask him if we can't swing by the drive-in? If you ask, I'm sure he'll say yes.” Cal chuckles again, and I frown.

“I'm not following the joke,” I say, but Callum just laughs and neither of the other guys offer up an explanation. Instead, we head straight to Aaron's, even as Callum bitches incessantly about being hungry. Vic is already waiting for us in one of the chairs on the lawn, smoking a cigarette and frowning so deeply I wonder if the expression might end up etched into that pretty face of his.

“Boss, let's order food,” Callum says, and Vic carefully lifts his dark gaze from me to his friend. Cal puts his hands in a prayer position and waits until his leader casually sighs and nods once. “Pizza, I think. Yeah, I'm feeling pizza.”

I study Callum as he slips his hood off. He's always wearing baggy tops, but his legs are muscular and trim under his black shorts, and he's got a much leaner build than most of the other guys. A series of deep scars mars his legs, the wounds old, the flesh shiny and healed over, but a clear sign of past trauma. I wonder what happened to him?

“He eats like a horse and still has a dancer's body,” I grumble as Callum disappears into the house, and I notice that Vic stiffens up slightly beside me, glancing my direction. “I'm a little envious.”

“How so?” Vic asks, his voice dark, sharp, dangerous. A hot thrill chases up my spine as he rakes that ebony gaze over me. “You're in perfect shape. Don't you think so, Hael?”

Hael pauses next to us as Oscar sighs and slips in the front door, leaving the three of us alone on the lawn. “I mean, you got a good look yesterday, didn't you? And again today?”

Hael's honey-colored eyes shift my direction and he licks his lower lip, flexing his tattooed fist around his car keys.

“She has a perfect body,” he agrees, looking from me to Vic, like he's waiting for the other shoe to drop. Victor just scoffs, flicks his cigarette into the grass, and stands up, heading into the house and leaving the two of us behind. “Fuck,” Hael murmurs, gritting his teeth. “We're in trouble; he's pissed.”

“Why?” I ask, and Hael looks at me like I'm a crazy person. He opens his mouth like he's about to answer me when Aaron pulls into the driveway, and Kara spills out the back door of the van with her cousin in tow.

“Movie night and popcorn!” she yells, pausing next to me and grinning. “Our favorite babysitter is coming over tonight.”

“So I hear,” I say, pretending that I don't feel her brother's eyes on me, taking me in, judging me. I stroke Kara's hair back, the same, wavy silken texture as Aaron's. “Do you mind if Heather joins you guys?” Kara's grin lights up her face as she glances back at Ashley, shyly clinging to Aaron's pant leg.

“She can join. You, too, if you want.”

“I appreciate that,” I say as Aaron picks Ashley up and carries her past me, tearing his gaze away and acting like he doesn't see me standing there. Whatever.

“Ladies first,” Hael mimics, repeating his words from earlier. I turn to find him with his arm out, gesturing for me to head inside. I do, and the normalcy of Aaron's house falls over me like a curtain. There's no tension in these walls, no hate, no ragged screams broken up only by dry wall. No Thing.

“Where are we off to tonight?” I ask Oscar, pausing in the living room as Callum slumps on the couch and orders pizza on his phone app, Aaron disappears upstairs with the girls, and Hael gets himself a beer from the fridge.

“We have too many open business transactions,” he says, looking at me through his black-framed glasses and smiling. Someone with glasses shouldn't look so scary, but Oscar Montauk, well, he manages to pull it off just fine. “We're going to start cleaning things up.”