The hostess, clearly familiar with Cherry, waved us over to a high-backed booth near the side, with a window overlooking the faint shimmer of the harbor.
“Five Amarula espresso martinis, right?” Jeremiah asked, remaining on his feet while the rest of us sat.
I shook my head. “Oh, I haven’t had my birthday yet, so I don’t think—”
“Don’t worry, no one’s going to card you,” Ginny interrupted, gently nudging me.
“Not a single place in this city does that. Gotta keep all the rich kids happy, right?” Cherry added, rolling her eyes.
Jeremiah returned with a tray of cocktails three minutes later, and then he squeezed into the booth next to Dylan.
“So, Violet,” he said, lightly slapping his hands on the table once the rest of us had a drink in hand. “Let me tell you about the Dionysus Club…”
4
Violet
“Before I start,let me make one thing clear.” Jeremiah paused to take a small sip of his drink before he went on. “There’s no Wiki page on these guys, for obvious reasons. So whatever we know about them is mostly hearsay that we picked up on while growing up in this area. So… take what we say with a grain of salt. But take it seriously too. Just in case.”
I nodded. “So you all grew up around here?”
The other four nodded and said ‘yes’ in unison.
Jeremiah gave me a tight smile. “Now that I’ve got my little disclaimer out of the way, here’s what I know. The Dionysus Club is the only secret society at BHU. It’s apparently been around as long as the university has—since 1742—and rumor has it that at least half the BHU founders were members.”
“If notallof the founders,” Cherry interjected, raising a brow.
“Yeah, that wouldn’t surprise me,” Jeremiah said, rubbing his chin. “Anyway, we don’t know for sure who any of the members are, orwere, because they keep all of that hidden. But local legends say it’s males from the oldest families in Blackthorne Harbor. Old money. Old blood.”
“Although we’ve heard they recruit new members every few years,” Cherry added. “But only those who meet certain standards, apparently.”
“At the end of the day, all the men that are rumored to be Dionysus ‘old boys’ have one thing in common,” Ginny said. “Power.”
Dylan nodded. “If the rumors are true, a quarter of men in high-ranking U.S. government positions were Dionysus Club members back in their undergrad days. Senators, defense contractors, foreign policy advisors… you name it. Which is insane, considering it’s all traced back to one college.”
“Not just government officials, either,” Jeremiah said. “CEOs, media moguls, hedge fund kings, private defense tycoons. Any major position of power or obscene wealth held by a man in this country… there’s a decent chance he’s a BHU alumnus who once belonged to the Dionysus Club.”
“So what do they actuallydoin this club?” I asked, cocking my head. “More to the point, why do they scare you so much?”
“They aren’t a normal collegiate society, like Skull and Bones, or whatever,” Jeremiah said. “Those societies are super-secret and elite, sure. But at the end of the day, it’s just a bunch of successful people helping their members get and stay successful themselves. A glorified networking group, really.” He hesitated and went on. “The Dionysus Club… they have a different reputation. A dangerous one.”
“People who mess with them tend to lose everything. Sometimes even their lives,” Ginny said softly. “Again, we can’t actually prove any of this. No one can. But it’s basically an open secret.”
“Do you remember hearing about a bank CEO who was murdered in Boston last year?” Dylan asked me, forehead wrinkling.
I nodded. “Wasn’t that a mugging gone wrong?”
“That’s what they want you to think. But all the nearby street and store surveillance cameras just happened to stop working when it happened, which is awfully convenient. And when you look a little deeper into the case… not long before he died, that CEO tried to screw over another bank CEO. One who went to BHU back in the day.”
“Ah.”
“Here’s another one for you,” Jeremiah said. “There’s a guy in one of my classes called Ryker Sinclair. The Sinclairs are one of the oldest families in Blackthorne Harbor, so it’s a safe bet that all the males are in the Dionysus Club. Anyway, Ryker has a younger sister, and a couple of years ago she was dating a football player who was also a student here. It turned out he was cheating on her the whole time, and of course, he didn’t have the balls to admit it to her. She only found out because she caught an STI from him.”
“Poor girl,” I said softly.
“Want to guess what happened to him?” Cherry asked.
“A mugging gone wrong, I presume?”
