Total pages in book: 109
Estimated words: 109245 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 546(@200wpm)___ 437(@250wpm)___ 364(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 109245 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 546(@200wpm)___ 437(@250wpm)___ 364(@300wpm)
Scar stared him down, pulse steady, but his mind murderous. He’d forgotten how much restraint it took not to kill a man for disrespecting him.
Pun’s hand was on his shoulder, grounding him.
“C’mon, Scar. It ain’t worth it. Let’s roll out, bro.”
Scar exhaled through his nose and handed Pun back his lighter.
He looked around at the people who’d once sworn allegiance to him, the ones who’d followed him into shootouts and lived because of his decisions.
Now they wouldn’t even meet his eyes.
Gage had been right. His gang life was over.
He pushed away from the bar. Pun, his little brother Smoke, and Drea fell in behind him. They walked out together, silence pressing heavily between them.
The cold outside didn’t slap him as hard as his crew had.
His breath came out in white clouds and his hands shook as adrenaline crawled beneath his skin like biting insects.
Pun lit a cigarette.
“You need to lay low, man. You got ’em spooked by popping up like this. Word spreads fast, and King won’t stop gunning for you till’ he has a truth he can accept. Best disappear a while.”
Drea’s stiletto boot heels clacked loudly beside him.
“My dad’s new girlfriend has a house in Palos Hills. She’s in the Keys with him for the rest of the winter, so you can crash there if you want.”
Scar gritted his teeth. He hated hiding. But Pun was right. If the Kings thought he was a snitch, the hit on him was already out.
“Fine,” he muttered.
They piled into Drea’s Jetta—that smelled like honey and smoke—and he told her to circle the block a few times before heading to the freeway to ensure they weren’t being followed.
The city passed in streaks of light and shadows as he leaned his head back…and thought of Gage.
A man he should forget, yet he couldn’t stop thinking about him. The preacher’s kid who’d played around in a lifestyle he knew nothing about and had paid the price.
“Fuckin’ dumbass,” he muttered.
White Ravens
Gage
“Home sweet fuckin’ home,” Roz said, cutting the rental car’s engine.
Gage didn’t move, barely breathed.
But his hearing…
His surroundings whispered to him like a living thing.
They weren’t at Roz’s stepdad’s house in the city—where Roz had lived before he’d gone to jail—there wasn’t a constant stream of traffic, elevated trains screaming overhead, or pedestrians walking around having too-loud conversations.
Instead, he smelled smoke from a chimney. A dog barked twice, then quieted, and there was the electric buzz of a streetlight to his right.
The car engine ticked as it cooled, and Roz exhaled beside him, sounding bone-tired.
It had been a long ride. Long for Roz…absolute hell for him.
Every time Roz slammed to a stop because someone cut him off, Gage’s body seized. Any time a tractor-trailer roared by, the air pressure punched him in the chest. When Roz swerved like a NASCAR driver after almost missing an exit, Gage had dug his shaking fingers into the seat so deeply he felt the springs.
Enveloped by darkness, plus high speed and constant surging adrenaline, made him want to throw up.
Two times his friend had pulled over to sleep, but Gage didn’t close his eyes once.
He’d never been more relieved to be still.
“Where are we?”
Roz was quiet for a long time before he confessed. “I left the Hustlers.”
Gage frowned. There was only one way to leave the Hustlers. Jail or in a body bag.
“What happened?”
“When you got popped, I, um…I went after Jace…hard.”
Gage swallowed. “Jace didn’t force me to get in his car. You warned me about him, and I didn’t listen.”
“He knew you were off-limits,” Roz snapped, anger flaring. “Everyone did. And he still chose to do dirt with you in the passenger seat. Besides, everyone knew how clueless you were.”
“Gee, thanks,” he muttered.
“After I put my boot in Jace’s ass, his bitch-ass brothers came for me. They shot up my dad’s place, then tried to catch me outside my job. I had no choice but to do ’em.”
Gage’s eyes were blown wide, seeing nothing. “You killed Jace’s brothers?”
Roz huffed. “You were the one good thing I had in my life back then, and he took you from me. So I took what he loved from him.”
They both went silent at that.
Gage had been clueless and dumb. He’d thought he understood the lifestyle because he’d watched it. Because he’d sat in back rooms and listened to the stories.
The judge had given him three years as an accessory. And out of the three months he’d served, ninety percent of that time had been spent in the infirmary with a bruised face, cracked ribs, and his spirit bleeding out.
Then the Ravens came.
“I can’t stop lookin’ at you,” Roz whispered, cutting into his thoughts. “The prison told your parents you died. I went to your funeral, man.”
Scar was right. The Ravens had killed them.
Gage sat there, numb before he asked. “What was in the casket?”