12
Yeah, the Cash brothers even control your periods
It was night outside the club.
I was hiding like a sniper behind one of the trees across the street from the building.
The coast was clear. It didn’t look like anything important was going on inside.
There were no signs of a party, and I hadn’t seen anyone going in and out.
Just silence. The night was calm and slightly on the cool side, and the starry sky glowed bright like it was pleased that I hadn’t chickened out.
Maybe that’s why I was caught off guard so easily.
“Jude,” I heard from behind me.
I almost screamed. I spun around, about to punch whoever it was. But I recognized the person almost immediately.
“What the hell are you doing here?” I whispered.
“I was worried when you left,” Artie replied, with a nervous look on her face. “I figured it would be better if I went with you. He . . .” Her voice was so quiet that I could barely make her out. “He can’t do anything to you if you’re with someone.”
Wow, she really thought Aegan shouldn’t be messed with.
But her being there blew my cover and left me without a panic button, making me want to slap her. Maybe I should just trust her. At least she cared. Nobody had cared about me since . . .Well, I’d think about that later.
“Okay, but be quiet,” I said with a sigh, “because we’re going in.”
I’d have no choice but to tell her about the door. It would be a good way to test our friendship.
We entered the club. The hall, empty and quiet. Not a voice to be heard. Artie looked around, clearly fascinated.
First, we checked out the common areas a little, but the whole place was empty. Then we headed to the door.
As I turned the knob, I thought it would be locked, but it wasn’t. I opened it and found a silent hallway, with a staircase leading down to another level at the far end.
“Where are we going?” Artie asked me, whispering nervously.
“I want to see what’s back here,” I replied. “I’ve got a feeling that something strange might be going on.”
“Like what?” she asked.
“Something weird, Artie,” was all I said.
I tried to walk, but she grabbed my arm. Her raised eyebrows showed she was afraid.
“Jude, let’s go back,” she tried to convince me. “I don’t like this one bit.”
I looked at her reassuringly. “The first time I was here, Aleixandre acted strangely when he saw this door open, so I need to find out what’s behind it,” I explained.
“If we’re going to be friends, you should know I’m pigheaded, and I sometimes do stupid stuff that would be best kept between us.
So, I’m asking you: Are you up for this madness or not? ”
There was a tense silence. Artie seemed to be of two minds. She had to choose between leaving and telling Aegan I was snooping around his club, or staying.
Surprisingly, she decided to stay.
“Fine,” she sighed, “but I’ll write a message for Kiana and leave it ready to send just in case.”
“Perfect.” I nodded.
With our team formed (though I’d later have to test if Artie could really be trusted), we went down the staircase.
There was another hallway that led to another set of stairs.
Going down, we noticed the walls were different, so we figured those sections must have been added later.
The underground area was silent, and it didn’t have the classic style of the club.
Were we descending the secret stairs that led to the Vatican tunnels?
Finally, we reached a door that, to my surprise, had a keypad.
Artie and I looked at each other, shocked.
I put my ear to the door, just in case. Not hearing anything, I entered the code into the panel. The door unlocked, and I slowly opened it. I peeked in, and seeing no one, Artie and I stepped inside.
What the hell was this?
Four walls, two of them with large mirrors.
There was another door, a large see-through box on either side of it.
As I got closer, I saw they contained tons of different masks: carnival masks, animal masks, doll masks, puppet masks, cartoon character masks, some Guy Fawkes ones, and others that looked disturbingly sensual.
“What’s all this for?” asked Artie, dumbfounded, with a mask in each hand.
I had no clue, but we were about to find out. “Put one on.”
She picked a carnival one and I went for a skunk one. We used the mirror to make sure our faces were completely covered. Then I opened the next door.
Oh, for fuck’s sake . . .
This area was completely different to the last one.
It looked like a nightclub. Several lamps hung from the ceiling, casting an artificial purple glow that gave the room a clandestine vibe, like the kind of places where people went to dance, sweat, and get up to things they couldn’t get away with anywhere else.
It was split into different levels, and where Artie and I were standing, there was a balcony overlooking the lower level of the club and two long staircases on either side.
I stepped forward and paused at the edge of the balcony, taking in the view. I spotted a rectangular bar in the middle, surrounded by a few casino tables, VIP areas, and sofas. Everyone was wearing masks.
Okay, so I was like, really confused, yet kind of excited. Excited because we’d just discovered something, and confused because . . . what the hell was this? A hidden underworld? A sort of “secret place” for VIPs?
Something like Christian Grey’s playroom, only bigger?
I couldn’t make out any of the faces because of the masks . . .
I latched onto Artie, who was standing beside me as gobsmacked as I was. We dodged people as we walked down the stairs. A couple passed in front of us and threw themselves against the wall with their tongues down each other’s throats.
There was no way to know who they were; with those masks and the dim lighting, we couldn’t make anything out. You’d have to know the contours of someone’s face to recognize them. And that’s exactly what happened when I spotted someone on one of the sofas wearing a wolf mask.
I didn’t need to see his full face. The jet-black hair, elegant clothes, and—above all—the wide, thin smile framed by spiteful, arrogant dimples were unmistakable. Aegan.
First question: What was an upstanding Cash brother doing in a place like this?
He was talking to a guy who was wearing a . . . Wait for it.
Was that a mask of Ernesto de la Cruz, the character from the Disney film Coco? I hadn’t seen that coming.
I wished I could read their lips to find out what they were saying.
In fact, I tried to get a little closer, to see if I could pick up something.
Of course, all that did was make Aegan suddenly look in our direction.
I forgot I was wearing the mask and, instinctively, backed off to mingle among the crowd.
Because I’m so clumsy, I stumbled into a girl with her back turned.
“Hey!” she complained. “What the hell is wrong with you?”
I turned around. The girl was staring at the floor, where I noticed a broken glass and spilled drink—my fault entirely. I considered apologizing, but then I noticed something unusual: her eyes were red, and her pupils were dilated.
Oh, fucking hell. Where I’m from, that means you’re high.
I thought better than to apologize, because it would be a waste of time with someone in that state. I grabbed Artie by the arm and pulled her to get out of there.
But clearly, the girl hadn’t forgiven me for spilling her drink.
“Where do you think you’re going?” she shouted, and yanked my arm to stop me from leaving. “Go get me another one; you know the rules.”
I knew nothing about those rules, so I pulled my arm free.
And . . . that didn’t go down well.
The girl grabbed me again, demanding I get her another drink, but this time she grabbed my shirt and ripped it with her long fingernails. I lost my footing and knocked into somebody else. Their drink spilled on me. That person then shoved me out of the way.
This set off a domino effect.
More drinks were spilled. There was more pushing and shoving.
Chaos broke out. I felt a tug, but I slapped someone’s hand and they let go.
I lost my balance and fell into a few others.
They pushed me away in another direction.
Refusing to let myself be tossed around like a human ball, I realized I had to find a way out or risk being beaten up, so I started pushing and shoving my way through the crowd, looking for Artie . . .
Until someone held me back—someone stronger than me.
“Enough!” I heard a guy’s voice shout right beside my ear. “That’s enough!”
I shuddered as soon as I heard the voice. It was Aegan.
A strange fear coursed through me because, not only was he grabbing me, but the lights suddenly stopped flashing, the music stopped, and now you could only hear the crowd.
I saw chaos all around, nobody was dancing, and a load of masked faces were staring at each other, and at me.
I was glad my face was hidden too, but I started getting worried when I couldn’t spot Artie anywhere.
Would they know it was me?
Would my gift for stirring up trouble give me away?
Aegan, still restraining me, didn’t wait.
He started dragging me away from the crowd.
I had no idea where he was taking me, but I didn’t want to make things worse, so I didn’t put up a fight.
We went through a door, down a side hallway, and into a private room with a large sofa and desk.
Artie was there, still wearing her mask.
Aleixandre too, with the Ernesto de la Cruz mask pulled up over his head. Identity exposed!
Aegan let go of me. Artie and I instinctively stood side by side, like we’d just been caught in the act, ready to be thrown to the wolves.
“The rules prohibit any kind of fighting between members, or they’ll be kicked out!” Aegan furiously hurled at us, before pulling the mask off my face in one fell swoop.
When he saw my face, he was so shocked that he didn’t know what to say. He removed Artie’s mask and stared at us with a scowl and a clenched jaw, clearly really pissed off.
“What the hell are they doing here?”
I didn’t know what to say. My heart started racing.
I couldn’t think of a good excuse, even though I’d tried to think up a plan coming here.
My mind went blank as if an invisible eraser had wiped all my thoughts away.
I was nervous, like someone who’d never lied before.
There was no way to fix things; we’d been found out.
Then something unexpected happened.
“We were invited,” Artie told him.
What?
“By who?” Aegan asked.
“We don’t know,” Artie continued, self-assured. “We just got a message saying: ‘Friday, eight p.m., club.’”
“I want to see the message,” he ordered.
Okay, now what? I looked at Artie, silent. Aegan clearly couldn’t be fooled that easily.
Not getting an answer, his patience wore thin.
“Show me the message!” he repeated sharply.
“For starters, don’t shout at us!” I said right back, using the same tone as him.
“There’s no need to argue . . .” Aleixandre said after all the shouting.
“Bullshit,” Aegan and I blurted out in unison. Aleixandre looked at us, frowning.
“I want to see the message and the number it was sent from,” Aegan repeated slowly, no longer shouting.
I decided to put on a show to save our asses.
“Well,” I blurted out, annoyed, “we want to know what kind of place this is, because there’s nothing normal about it. And it doesn’t really fit the Cash look, does it?”
Bull’s-eye. Aegan clenched his jaw in anger. He was getting a comeback ready for me when the door suddenly opened, and in walked a guy I’d never seen before but they seemed to know really well.
“I’ve got everyone out there settled down, and I’ve dimmed the lights again,” he said. “What happened?”
When he lifted his mask, the first thing that struck me was his stunning amber eyes.
He oozed a carefree vibe, someone you could see driving around in a hippie caravan, yet also portraying Dorian Gray on the big screen.
A lock of blond hair fell across one side of his face, reaching just above his jaw, while the rest was pulled back into a ponytail.
He was wearing trousers with the cuffs rolled above his ankles and a loose white shirt.
I recognized his voice, but this time he wasn’t drunk.
It was the guy who’d called the club. The guy who’d given me the code thinking I was Sascha.
I wondered who he was. And why hadn’t I seen him around before? Would he recognize my voice? I should probably try to change it up a bit.
“This is Jude, she’s going out with Aegan,” Aleixandre told him, pointing to us. “That’s Artie, Jude’s friend.”
“And neither of them should be here because they aren’t members,” said Aegan sternly.
The blond guy, looking surprised, shifted his sparkling gaze back and forth between Aegan and me. He finished by looking at Aleixandre.
“I missed something interesting, didn’t I?” he asked, enjoying the scene.
“Aegan, I think we should explain to them,” said Aleixandre, but his brother was so worked up that he ignored him, of course.
“Let’s talk outside for a minute,” Aegan ordered the guys, before warning us, “Make sure you stay here.”
They left the room, leaving us alone. Artie and I looked at each other. She looked afraid, like she was about to burst into tears. Maybe she hated me for getting us here.
“Oh, Jude, what are we going to do?” she whined.
“Where did you pull that lie about the message from?” I asked, stunned. “Because it was incredible.”
Celebrating lies is bad, but I couldn’t help it.
I felt like I had to say something. She was trembling and biting her lower lip, like she was trying to fight back the urge to scream. “But I’m afraid, Jude! Aegan looks really pissed! And this place . . .” She looked around, distressed. “Oh, you’ve no idea what this means.”
I took her hands and rubbed them together.
“Calm down, we’ll find a way out of here,” I promised, having no clue how. “Act like you aren’t scared.”
After saying that, the three of them came back inside. Aleixandre closed the door, and I didn’t give them the chance to say a word.
“Look, if you’re worried that we’re going to say anything about this, we won’t. We couldn’t give a shit about this place. Now, me and Artie are getting out of here because this place is giving us the creeps.”
I grabbed Artie by the arm, but Aegan stood in our way like an indestructible stone wall.
“No.”
“Excuse me?” I shot back, outraged. Beside me, Artie let out a muffled shriek, pursing her lips tightly.
Aleixandre stepped forward. He was backing Aegan up, or at least that’s what it looked like.
“You girls are coming with us,” he said.
I felt Artie shudder under my grasp. I wanted to yell at her to stop because she was making me nervous too.
“No chance,” I replied, because I couldn’t show weakness in situations like this.
“Then you’ll never get out of here,” said Aegan uncompassion-ately.
Oh, fuck.
Wasn’t there a window we could escape through?