“Gentlemen.” Dr. Kenji addresses them with a nod.
Sol waves.
Zane lifts his drumstick in goodbye.
“Doctor,” Dutch says, dipping his head too.
Dr. Kenji’s eyes slide over all of them. At the door, he whispers to me, “What’s the name of your crew?”
Funny. He thinks Dutch, Zane, Sol, and I are in a gang.
I stare him dead in the face. “The Kings.”
“Oh.” He blinks a few times.
I slam the door behind him and face my brothers and Sol. “Let’s talk. Somewhere private.”
We file into the garage where we made the song that went viral.
Zane plunks on top of his drum seat. “So, that was an actual mafia doctor?”
When I called Dr. Kenji over, I told my brothers that I met him through Kurosaki.
“Not mafia, yakuza,” Sol corrects with a shrug. “And what do you expect gang members to do? Walk into a hospital every time they get a bullet wound?”
“I’m sure they can buy private rooms in the hospital or something,” Zane says with a shrug.
“Doctors and nurses have the right to call the police. Imagine one person keeps turning up every few weeks with bullets in him. Somebody’s gonna ask questions.”
Zane rubs his jaw. “He has a point.”
Dutch straightens away from the wall, eyes narrowed. “You sure havingherin the house is a good idea?”
“I thought you were cool with Jinx now?” Zane asks.
“Just because she does one good thing?—”
“Two,” Zane reminds him. “She was the first person to get in contact with Mom.”
“—it doesn’t mean her intentions are good. She could be trying to win our trust.”
“Well, she’s winning it.” Zane grins. “I’m on cloud nine after getting that message from Grey.”
Sol points out, “Jinx hasn’t reported anything about you guys since the kidnapping. Maybe she’s changed.”
Dutch snorts as if to say, “I doubt it.”
“Jinx isn’t the enemy,” I growl. “There’s a human being behind that app.”
The entire room goes still.
Zane, Sol, and Dutch watch me like I’ve grown two heads.
Dutch adopts a challenging tone. “How do you know that she’s not the enemy? Do you even know the reason she was stalking us, reporting on us,extortingus? We know nothing about her, but you keep trusting her and looking out for her.”
“To be fair,” Zane says, “she helped us take down those guys on The Grateful Project list.”
“For a price.” Dutch clenches his teeth. “The only thing Jinx cares about is herself. She’s not afraid to ruin someone’s life to gain leverage. She’s a snake, and now she’s a snake underourroof.”
