Tacet a Mortuis (The Elite King's Club 3)

Her eyes connected with mine. Her frown turned soft. “Bishop?” She scrubbed the tears off of her cheek, sniffed, and then put her nose up. That pride was going to kill her one day. “You shouldn’t have come, Bishop. He’s angry today. Like, extra angry.”

My heart pinched a little for her. I hated my parents, but they’d never do the things Khales’ dad did to her, and I despised the expensive architecture I called home, but it wasn’t a run down, beat up, dingy metal on wheels shit-box that on a good day, stinks like beer, sweat, and stale cigarette smoke. Where on a bad day, it smelled of whiskey, sweat, stale cigarette, and Khales’ tears mixed with her dried blood. I felt my anger drop to its knees inside of me and beg to travel through my veins and rest on the slight tingle at my fingertips.

“What’d he do?” I asked her, pushing my hands into my hoodie pocket to hide the way my nails sunk into the palm of my hands. I wanted to protect her. She was the first friend I had outside of the Kings, and I’d known her since pre-school. I’d had a front row ticket to this same shit-show since we were kids, and I was about ready to punch our ticket and end it once and for all.

“He’s just drunk, Bishop.” A smile, so weak, so placid, came onto her face. “Can we go to your place? Or have you taken the pegs off your bike?”

My anger simmered out a little, and my shoulders slightly rested. “I haven’t. I won’t, not until you don’t need them anymore.” She pulled her hair into a high ponytail and then snapped a fluorescent pink band around it before she gestured to the bike. “Let’s go then.”

“And your dad?” I questioned, watching as she bounced over to my bike and turned to wait for me.

“Screw him.”

“He will hurt you, Lees, and you know it. I don’t want him to hurt you ever again.” I headed toward her, taking the handle bars into the palm of my hands and sitting on the chair. She stood on the pegs, her hands coming to my shoulders. “I can’t stop him, B.”

Maybe she couldn’t stop him, but I could.

And I did a couple years later. He was my first kill. I remember calling my dad, panicking with the gun hanging on the tips of my fingers. Dad, my uncle, and Johan came. I thought I would have been in trouble. I just committed murder at age thirteen, you would think that was a big deal. It wasn’t. It was a part of my initiation process, and I was the only one to ever begin at that age. My dad was proud. The Kings were proud.

I pulled my phone out when Madison’s head was rested back on my lap, and pulled out my ear pods. I pushed play on “Whoring Streets” by Scars on Broadway, and slipped it into our playlist, closing my eyes and reliving, soaking every inch of what I remember of her.

“What are you doing here?” Madison asked, stepping outside cautiously and shutting the door. She was somewhat smart to be cautious around me, that was for sure. I took a seat on one of the marble steps, and looked directly at her, only hers were on my car.

“I told you,” I answered matter-of-factly. “We need to talk.” I didn’t even hide the fact that my eyes were undressing her. She wore cute little shorts and a tight tank that rose up to display her belly. When my eyes fell to her socks, my eyebrow rose in shock. “Is that Banksy’s work?”

“I’m shocked,” she snorted sarcastically, and I had to fight the urge to rip her fucking clothes off and eat her on her parents’ doorstep. My fingers twitched, and just when I was about to throw my ‘talk’ out the fucking window, she fucking insulted me. “You know Banksy?”

“I know his artwork,” I retorted.

I could see her trying her hardest to not meet my gaze, so she flipped the box of chocolates open and gestured them to me. “I can share.”

Her eyes finally came to mine, and I leaned into my shoulder, using it to shield my mouth. My attention stayed on her, studying, trying to crack open every single cage she kept hidden. What the fuck was it with her. I fucking wanted her. “What?”

I shook my head, breaking our eye contact and looking straight ahead. “You’re different.”

“I’ve been told that all my life.” My jaw tensed. I knew that she meant that as an insult, but I didn’t say it as an insult, it was a good thing. A fucking dangerous thing, but a good thing nonetheless.

“Is that what you wanted to talk about?”

“You and Carter?” I threw her off track.