“You wouldn’t be able to do your job anymore if you did that,” he says. “How is photography treating you, anyway? Did the classes I paid for help you out? The camera I bought you?”
I cringe.
I sold that camera a long time ago.
“How did you get up here?” I ask instead of giving him the satisfaction of replying. “This is a private party.”
“I was invited,” he replied. “The radio station thought it might be worth it to have me come and meet Young Decay in the hopes that they might be able to sway me to stop the protests.”
Rage replaces the fear, and I feel my nostrils flare. “You’rethe one trying to get them banned?”
“Not banned,” he says. “Canceled, yes. Who knows what kind of riots their music might cause during a Halloween run.”
“Why?” I ask.
“Violence… drugs… romanticizing suicide and self-harm—”
A laugh escapes me that I know I’ve been holding in for years. “You’re citing them for romanticizing suicide? I don’t know, Adam. Someone spends a few days with you, and suicide starts to look pretty fucking tempting.”
“What’s going on here?”
Reed.
He’s at my side in a flash, and I can feel his anger radiating off him.
“Who’s—wait. I know you.”
Of course, Reed recognizes him. I made the mistake of bringing the asshole home for Thanksgiving the year Reed graduated high school.
Reed takes one step in front of me. “See yourself out before one of us does,” he warns.
“Reed, I can handle this,” I say to him.
Adam grins as if he’s already won, and his gaze flickers past Reed to me. “I’d love to discuss you handling me again,” he says. “Maybe sometime this week?”
Reed shifts on his feet, fists curling. “Talk to my sister like that again—”
“And you’ll what, exactly?” Adam taunts. “Hit me? With all of this press around?”
Reed scoffs, chin dipping narrowly. “Not me.”
Maddox steps out of the darkness behind Adam, his stature casting a shadow when he pauses at his back. I have to gulp at the pure anger in his eyes. Adam turns, and despite the fake smile still pressed to his lips, I swear I see a shiver of fear flash in his gaze upon meeting Maddox’s stare.
There’s a slow, methodical aspect to the way Maddox sizes Adam up, to the quiet way he tilts his head and stares at him like he can break his neck with a snap of his finger.
“What do you think, Reed? Two-twenty-five?” Maddox says.
“Two-thirty at the most,” Reed says.
“Might need a few more blocks.” Maddox’s gaze moves to Reed. “Make sure he stays at the bottom of the river until after the weekend. Don’t want to ruin the kid’s trick or treating with trash washing ashore."
Something akin to recognition rises in Adam’s eyes then. It’s enough to make me squirm. Enough to send a nauseating chill down my neck.
Don’t remember him. Don’t remember him, I chant in my head.
Adam snaps his finger and wags it in Maddox’s face, his stare shifting to me. “This is… This is the guy, right?”
Shit.
