Chapter 5
CHAPTER FIVE
Rebel Arena, Freedom
Shay
“How much longer, Dee?” I whisper.
I shift from foot to foot, glancing up and down the empty corridor.
My heart is beating thrillingly fast like when I ride my Harley too quickly around a corner. It’s the same as on the ice; my stomach swoops with the sensation that I am moments from flying or careening to heaven.
Caught on that line — between life and death — is the best bloody place to be.
I tug at the sleeves of my scarlet sweater, which I am wearing over black jeans. I glance at my brother, who is crouched in front of the finance manager’s door in Rebel Arena, picking the lock.
Eden is an expert in lockpicking now. His favored tools are paperclips.
I have a feeling that he’s spent most of our lives learning survival skills, while I have been making friends.
Eden saved my life when we were kids. As adults, he still believes that he has a duty to protect me.
I don’t think he even knows who from.
Everybody?
Everything?
Yet I’m just starting to feel safe for the first time now with Robyn and D’Angelo.
Am I deluded?
I’m so bloody grateful, however, that they treat Eden and me like equals, rather than trash.
They are letting us stay with them in their home. They are even allowing Eden to take Robyn out for the first date tonight. He’s chosen to make it a quiet one in the library in what I call his Book and a Fuck Club.
Robyn deserves a deep fucking to make up for reading a boring book. It would have to be the best, deepest fuck of my life to make up for me sharing that experience, rather than the one with D’Angelo this evening.
And I’m not talking about the fun part that he’s been teasing me with that will most likely end with me crying and begging.
But rather, the part that I’m strangely looking forward to more, when we’ll be curled up together in the lounge watching Heated Rivalry together, while D’Angelo gives a running commentary.
As much as I feel like I belong, however, every time that I cuddle with D’Angelo on the couch, shoving popcorn into my mouth and then his, I wonder if it’s only temporary.
If I fuck up and fail to please him…if Eden disappoints Robyn with his date…will they abandon us?
I shake my head, trying to clear it of those thoughts.
“Are you…?” I glance up and down the corridor.
If I solve this crisis for D’Angelo, then he’ll be pleased with me, right?
I’ll be his knight in shining armor for once.
He gives me so much that I’m uncomfortable.
A bloody mansion. Gifts. Dates to places, which would never normally let me in the door.
How do I repay that? Am I meant to?
Suddenly, I hear a click, and the door swings open.
I let out a puff of relief. “Is there any crime you can’t commit? Sometimes you scare me, bro.”
“Only sometimes? I need to try harder.” Eden stands, slipping the paperclip back into the pocket of his black leather trousers, which he is wearing under a casual gray t-shirt.
He rushed over here from Freedom Mansion, when I called him about this emergency with Silas.
As soon as I told him that I had a plan to help D’Angelo, he was all in. “How long will this bastard be out?”
“I don’t know. Zach promised to keep Silas busy as long as he could.”
Eden nods, before prowling into the office. I slink after him, softly closing the door behind me.
The office lies in shadow.
My pulse is roaring in my ears, but excitement wells through me.
I glance around at the sleek room with its mahogany desk, wooden chairs, and steel filing cabinets. The desk is covered with neat stacks of folders and high-tech devices.
I whistle. “Silas is more obsessed with gadgets than Zach is.”
I pick up the closest folder, scanning the ranks of numbers. “How are we going to find evidence of Silas’ shadiness? Is he stupid enough to keep it here at the office?”
“He’s stupid enough to have come after the most loved man in the Bay Rebels.
My boss.” Eden’s eyes flash with rage. He bats the file out of my hand, before pushing it exactly back into its original position.
“But he wouldn’t leave the evidence lying around printed out.
He will have hidden it on one of these computers because he won’t want to implicate himself by having it in his house.
We only need one piece of evidence to threaten him with. ”
“You mean blackmail…?”
Eden’s expression shutters.
My twin has always been darker than me, but since we came to America, sometimes I think that I don’t know him like I thought I did.
He’s his own man now.
Maybe, I need to get to know him again.
Eden gives me a long look. “There is an easier way to make him back off.”
“Is it legal?”
Eden doesn’t reply.
“Like I thought.” I narrow my eyes. “Vetoed, bro. Let’s stick to the plan, huh?”
Eden shrugs.
Eden heads straight for the three computers. He perches in the chair, tapping each of the computers on. His hands weave across the keyboards.
It’s dizzying.
No wonder D’Angelo calls him his super PA.
I lean on the desk, watching in admiration, while Eden starts to attempt to hack the passwords of all three at the same time.
“Where did you learn to do that?” I ask.
“YouTube.” Eden’s fingers fly over the keys. “Are you okay with Noah staying with us?”
“If he needs to.” I play with the hem of my sweater.
“I understand how he must feel, you know? Having to hide who he is sucks. But then, he also lives with his abusive family. I hate seeing him come to work covered in bruises and not be able to help. We escaped, Dee. We’re not still stuck in that hell, but Noah is.
Has it always been like that for him? If I can save even one person, then I will, right? ”
Eden gives a sharp nod.
He’s wearing that vigilante look of his again, which worries me.
“Hey, bro, you’re not Batman, right?” I only half-joke.
Eden arches his brow. “More like the Joker.”
“Yeah, yeah, I get it.” I peer at the screens. “Why did you just try improvcomedy as a password?”
Eden grimaces. “I analyzed Silas’ social media on the way over here. He’s a member of several improv groups online.”
“You can do it online?”
Eden side-eyes me. “Do you want to join one?”
“I’d rather you cut off my balls.”
“That breaks your dom’s rules and isn’t one of my kinks.
“So, what’s this about improv?”
Eden gives me another dubious look, before he turns back to the screens. “Silas also belongs to Freedom’s only comedy troop. I saw photos of him on Discord. He was performing.”
“We’ve got the bastard. That’s the only evidence we need.”
Eden’s lips twitch. “I watched a minute long clip. Not a single laugh from the audience.”
“Maybe he died on the stage, and we’re now dealing with a zombie.”
“I knew that Silas was evil.”
I hurl myself to my feet with exhilarated inspiration. “What’s his stage name? He’s enough of a narcissist to have used that as his password.”
I snatch out my phone, typing a quick message to share the news of Silas being in the local improv comedy troop in the team Puckups group chat.
Now that is comedy gold.
The laugh emojis that come back in reward from the chat are more laughs than I bet Silas has ever received.
Eden furrows his brow in thought. “No Pucking Refunds.”
“Huh, at least he’s self-aware.”
I hold my breath, as Eden types in the name.
I tap my foot nervously as the first attempt doesn’t work. Eden tries again, adding different numbers at the end and then various punctuation marks.
Finally, he writes nopuckingrefunds!1234.
My eyes light up. “Yes, it worked. How did you work that out?”
Eden runs his hand through his slicked back hair. “I read that 1234 is the most common password in the world and exclamation marks are usually chosen.”
“Why?”
“How would I know?”
“Maybe all your reading isn’t such a waste. You’re smart, Dee. But how will you know where Silas has buried his shady shit?”
Eden scans the computer. “Easy. In the most innocent sounding file.”
My shoulders relax, as realization dawns.
I point at a file that is isolated at the top righthand corner. It is simply named Haha.
Cute.
Who knew that a pompous bastard like Silas had a sense of humor? Especially as his hobby is improv.
Eden clicks on the file, before he turns to me in satisfaction. “We’ve got him.”
“How has he been arrogant enough to think that he won’t get into trouble for this shit? Now that the whole thing is finally crumbling around him, unless we win the Stanley Cup and stop the club going under, he’s terrified that he’ll end up in handcuffs and not the kinky kind.”
Eden slips a thumb drive out of his pocket, pushing it into the computer to download the file.
Silas won’t know that we were here.
I snap a quick photograph on my phone of the Haha file, before sending it to D’Angelo with a smiley face emoji.
D’Angelo may spank me later for taking this risk.
But it’s worth it.
Eden pockets the thumb drive, before turning off the computer.
“I would prefer to be reading a book and drinking tea right now,” he grumbles. “But we do make a good team.”
“The Spy Twins.”
“Aren’t we normally called the Trouble Twins?”
“We do have form. Our escapades at school were legendary.” I shove myself off the desk.
“Yours were.” Eden stands up, edging around the desk. “If legendary means hanging upside down off the school roof, leading to us both being suspended.”
I grab Eden’s hand, pulling him toward the door. “It was my safe space. I felt overwhelmed. I wanted to see what the sun looked like upside down.”
Eden arches his pierced brow. “The same?”
“The sky is never the same, no matter how long you look at it. It’s incredible, bro.”
“I went up there to stop you falling off and breaking your neck.”
I stop, turning to look over my shoulder at him. “I know. I told the headmaster that you were the hero, right? But that old bully only cared about rules.”
“Strange for a teacher.”
I tighten my hold on his hand. “Was it always me getting you into trouble?”
I remember Mum and Dad’s disappointed expressions when they were called into the headmaster’s office to bring us home.
Dad lost his job because he’d had to leave to sort out my mess.
He never blamed me.
In fact, he didn’t even tell me. Except, grounded to my room, I still heard Mom crying that night through the thin walls, while he tried to comfort her.
My shoulders hunch with guilt.
Eden squeezes my hand back. “I wouldn’t have been able to speak or understand anything without you. Trouble was a small price. It still is.”
My throat is tight. “But what if…what if I was trouble when we were little? What if that’s why our parents…our real ones…sold us?”
Eden rips his hand away from mine, and my stomach sinks. “Don’t ever say that again.”
My heart breaks.
Does he think that too? Has he always blamed me for what happened to us?
My eyes prick with tears.
Before I can turn to him, however, the door handle suddenly rattles.
Shit, Silas is back already.
If he catches us in his office, then we lose the best chance of using this evidence against him. He could make a fuss about Eden being in his room, call security, and have us searched.
What if he discovers the thumb drive?
He could even insist that Eden have his access to the arena revoked, which would fucking wreck my brother.
Eden grabs me by the elbow and drags me with military speed toward the desk. He holds his finger to his lips, before he shoves me underneath into the dark with him.
He slips his arms around me.
My heart is hammering in my chest. My pulse rushes in my ears.
Even now, my brother is pulling me out of trouble.
The door swings open. Then I hear the footfalls that are crossing the room.
How are they so loud?
Why am I sweating?
My lungs burn. I’m shaking.
I struggle to pull in oxygen, slamming my hands over my mouth to keep myself silent, despite the rising terror that I can’t breathe.
Eden grabs my chin, forcing me to meet his intense gaze.
He settles his heavy arm on my shoulder, pressing his nails into my neck. The shock breaks me from the worst of the panic.
Then he quietly breathes in through his mouth and then slowly out through his nose, and I know that he wants me to mirror him.
He used to do this.
This is routine for us.
I force myself to copy his rhythmic breaths, resting my damp forehead against his.
Yet this feels too terrifyingly familiar — huddling in the warmth of my brother’s arms, while he calms me down from a panic attack, and we both hide in the dark from an authority figure who could hurt us.
For a moment, I am lost in The Room again.
For a moment, I forget that we don’t need to hide in the dark from adults who own us.
I wrap my arms around my twin, determined that no one will drag us apart. I listen as the footsteps retreat across the room.
When the door slams, I jump.
“You’re okay.” Eden cups the back of my head. “He’s gone.”
I try to answer but I’m breathing too fast.
I’m still lost in my head, the dark, and the past.