“So they won’t remember this?”
“Exactly,” Marcus said. “I’ll have to convince them I want nothing to do with Kallie. They won’t remember they went after her, and hopefully they won’t go after her again.”
“You think this will work?” I asked.
“What other choice do I have?” Marcus begged. “This is our only option.”
He was right. It wasn’t a fool-proof plan. These guys would wake up in the forest and wonder what the hell happened. But hopefully they came up with an explanation that didn’t involve Marcus.
“I’ve got some empty nightshade bottles I was supposed to return to Bones,” Marcus said. “We can leave them here so they think they overdosed. They’ll write off their memory loss.”
I felt around for the nearest gang member, then dripped the memory potion into his mouth. “Ancestors, Marcus. Memory potion? Nightshade? What type of operation is Bones running, exactly?”
Marcus scrambled to the next gang member. “It’s honestly best if you don’t know.”
I grabbed him and shook him. “Marcus, you need to stop this! You told me about the Warden’s office. You can tell me about the rest. What’s going on?”
Marcus froze for a moment, as if trying to decide how much to reveal. He didn’t say a thing before yanking the memory-wiping potion from my fingers and using it on the guy beside me.
“I can’t tell you. They’ll find out you know,” he insisted. “One wrong move, and that’s it for us. They’ll kill us.”
“How would they find out?” I demanded. “I’m not going to tell them.”
“You’ll tell someone!” Marcus shouted.
“Who? Ava? Kallie? They deserve to know.”
“You’ll tell Captain!” Marcus snapped.
I felt the blood in my veins freeze. Marcus gasped when he realized what he’d just said.
“Are you… did you…?” I couldn’t think straight.
“Fuck,” Marcus muttered. “Yes, okay? It’s me! I’m… I’m the one rigging the fights.”
I couldn’t believe it. I just sat there, frozen.
“When I joined the Dead Men Walking, I didn’t just become their mole,” he admitted. “I’m their strategy guy. I analyze the fight stats to predict who’s going to win and who’s going to lose. I tell them where to put their money so that they make the most out of it. I see the patterns, and I’ve studied how to fix the fights so we can win the most bets. I can figure out who’s willing to be bribed to throw the fights and who won’t. What did youthinkwere on the papers I gave to Big G that day in the alchemy room? Predictions for the fights!”
My jaw dropped. I couldn’t believe what I was hearing.
“We can fix this,” I said quickly.
“No, we can’t,” Marcus argued. “We’re both dead anyway. Let’s just do what we can to protect the girls. We’ll go down fighting if we have to.”
Hell, that was all wecoulddo. Both of us would lay our lives down to defend Ava and Kallie, and right now, it was looking like that was exactly what we were going to do.
Marcus had been right. I wish hehadn’ttold me. Because now I had to choose.
I could stay in fight club… or I could throw Marcus to the wolves.
The answer was obvious. I had to stay. But if I did, I had no doubt that Captain would become impatient with me sooner than later. I’d never seen my life flash before my eyes so fast. In that moment, one thing becameverycertain.
I was going to die in that ring to save my best friend.
CHAPTERTEN
AVA-MARIE
