A Whole New Crowd (A Whole New Crowd 1)

I frowned at her bedroom door a moment and saw the light turn off. When had that happened? Then I shook my head. Maybe it was best if I didn’t ask. When I got downstairs, I stopped on the last step.

It was Jace.

He was dressed in dark clothing. I grinned. “If you’re going for dark and deadly, mission accomplished.”

He laughed softly. His blue eyes scanning over me. “You’re unscathed, I see. The men said Brian wasn’t too kind to you.”

“He wasn’t happy that I involved you.”

“My brother should’ve been smarter. He’s blinded by his hurt. You two are done. He won’t accept it. Who else would you go to?” Jace folded his arms over his chest, then glanced upwards. “So that was the sister?”

He had driven me to their house, but he hadn’t met them. “Yeah.”

“She’s sad.”

I wasn’t surprised by his quick deduction. Jace hadn’t risen to be the leader of the Panthers at the young age of twenty-two by luck. He was sharp, he was quick, and he was lethal. Mix all that together with his looks and he was a charismatic walking weapon. I had witnessed it most my life. People followed Jace. They wanted to listen to him and do as he said. He learned of his affect when he’d been in high school and used it to his advantage. The school expelled him because he had led too many protests and riots in their classrooms. Being restless, angry, and too smart for his own good, I hadn’t been surprised when he showed up at the house wearing the Panther colors one day. Their dad went nuts, but soon he grew fearful of Jace while Brian began to worship him.

Then their dad died and all that changed. Brian began to hate him too, even while he continued to idolize him. I stopped trying to figure out how that worked long ago. All I understood was to stay away from Jace. For a few years, we barely talked except in passing when I would go to Brian’s room and he’d come home early in the morning. A few of those times, he had blood on him.

I was relieved when the blood started to disappear altogether, but then I learned he still had blood on his hands. It was the invisible sort instead. Remembering those years and how I had been fearful of him, made me chuckle softly.

“What?”

“Nothing.” I didn’t want to remember when they changed. “Brian’s okay, right? That’s why you came here?”

He sighed. The air suddenly dropped to a serious feeling. “I didn’t come about my brother.”

“Why then?”

“Evans.”

“Tray?”

He nodded. “Stay away from him, Taryn.”

No Terry. He always said Terry. I frowned. “What does that mean?”

“He’s not what he seems. That’s what that means.”

He started to leave. I grabbed his arm and held him tight. His bicep shifted under my touch and he waited for me. An urgency filled me. “Why? Tell me what that means.” He wasn’t going to. “Please.”

I saw the surrender. He murmured, softly, “He knows people in my world, Taryn.”

As the full implication of those words hit me, I let him go and stepped back. I shook my head. “No.” But I couldn’t disregard his words. I remembered Tray’s own words hours earlier.

There’s a lot of people who hide their true shit better than others.

But that didn’t mean anything. “You’re going to have to do better than that, Lanser.”

His eyes went flat as I said his last name. Then he smirked. The sight of it was deadly. “I don’t care who’s in your pants, Terry.” A stab of pain went through me. He used to use that word as a term of endearment, in times when he had been soft and gentle with me. He was using it as a shield now. The cold stranger in front of me now added, “I can’t give you facts. If I did, you’d be dead and I would have to do it. This is a warning for your own good. Stay away from Evans. Everyone will be safer if you do.”

I shook my head and closed my eyes. “Stop, Jace.” This wasn’t my brother. He was the Panther’s leader now. “Stop.”

“You heard me.” Then he disappeared. The door closed a moment later. When I returned to my room, I curled underneath my blanket and flicked a tear away. I wouldn’t cry.

CHAPTER SEVEN

Mandy acted like nothing had happened. I was eating breakfast when she came down. She didn’t say a word to me and headed out. I grunted. Maybe I should take that way of living? Pretend nothing happened? It felt good and I nodded to myself. That sounded good to me. It was how I was going to handle the day, act as if nothing happened yesterday. When I got to school, no one said a word to me. I didn’t see Tray or Samuel. Mandy ignored me and was talking with a group of girls I didn’t recognize. Moving around them and the guys beside them, I headed to my locker and grabbed my books. Then I headed to class.