Miscreants: Next Generation by Natalie Bennett (essential reading .txt) 📗

help it. This was one of the most absurd things I’d ever seen. And people had the nerve to talk about my family? I begrudgingly took each hand that was offered.

That’s as far as I was going with this charade. The devil himself would walk through the front door before I fixed my lips to worship something other than what lurked below.

“Heavenly Father bless us and this bountiful feast we have received from thy goodness, through Jesus Christ, our Lord. Amen.”

A small chorus echoed the end of her short sermon, excluding me and Hannah. With their bullshit grace out of the way, the dishes were passed around.

The sound of the front door colliding with a wall brought them all to a brief pause. Jacob jumped up, looking right at the gun. At the same time, I grabbed the steak knife they’d stupidly placed beside my plate. Knox tried to stop me, but he was too slow. I was already on my feet, pressing the jagged blade against Tyson’s throat with one hand fisting his shaggy hair.

“Sit back down,” I commanded Jacob before he could get could to the gun.

Multiple footsteps carried from the front hall, growing closer. I remained where I was. I wouldn’t have time to get to the other side of the room, and right now I had leverage.

Jacob wavered, obviously unsure what risk to take. I had no way of knowing who had just walked in, but I should have predicted it would be him.

It wasn’t the devil who showed up.

It was someone worse.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

Timing is everything.

One look at Lilith and I knew I’d come later than I should have. We’d found this place the night before. It had looked just as deserted then as it was now, but you could never be too sure. We couldn’t rush in on some heroic bullshit until we knew what we’d be dealing with.

Amo popped the lock on the front doors and got us inside in less than five minutes.

That these dumb fucks didn’t have security was beyond my level of comprehension. Did they not know how despised they were? Most considered them bottom feeders who’d gotten lucky. Today was when that luck would run out.

“What the fuck is this?” a man with swept back hair sputtered.

“You don’t like the surprise?” Amo questioned jokingly.

His eyes went to the person who’d come in with us, and he clenched his fist, remaining silent.

Ah. I got it now.

Rumors could be surprisingly powerful.

We’d purposely spread enough around that our faction was more mysterious than most. No one knew my face yet. It’d just come out that Amo was doing my bidding on two different fronts.

There was also the Creed persona crafted for his own personal reasons, but it had still benefited me in the end.

With Jin sporting head gear tonight, these people probably thought he was me. This worked out better than I expected.

“Did we get here too late?” Amo continued to goad.

“I think we got here just in time,” I replied in the same tone.

Aside from the rough looking blonde, they all stared at us with varying expressions. The only one I cared to focus on was Lilith. She was standing behind one of the inbred with a dinner knife to his throat.

Despite wanting to wrap both my hands around her slender fucking neck, it was refreshing to see her again.

“What are you wearing?” I circled around the table so I was standing beside her.

Lilith would look gorgeous in a trash bag if she wanted to wear one. This style of clothing wasn’t her at all, though. The pigtails and blush made her look younger than she already did—like a little kid. Seeing as the men at this table were visibly much older than either of us, I think someone had a fetish.

“What are you doing here?”

Was she fucking serious?

“You don’t sound very happy to see me, Lils.” I grabbed her wrist and applied more pressure than necessary. “Drop the knife. He isn’t going anywhere.”

She winced, ultimately doing as I said with gritted teeth. I pulled her closer, leaving the knife to fall to the floor. When she looked up at me with her big, green eyes, it reminded me of when we were kids and she knew she’d pissed me off.

Little to nothing about this girl had changed.

She was still my same Lilith—just older and without anyone to save her from me now. I gently touched the discoloration on her cheek. There were a few more bruises marring her arms and dried blood beneath her usually spotless nails.

“I wouldn’t do that if I were you. We didn’t come alone,” Amo directed at the dumbass with long braids.

I hadn’t overlooked the shotgun leaning against the wall in a corner. I wanted to see if any of them had the balls to go for it right in front of us.

The old lady was the second to speak. “What are you boys doing here? If it’s about that girl, just take er and go. We don’t want any trouble.”

“You brought trouble to your door the second you touched what was mine.”

“How could we know she was yours?”

“So, you didn’t see her mark?” Amo questioned lazily.

There was one clear-cut answer to that question. You couldn’t miss the insignia on the underside of her wrist.

That’s precisely why I put it there. It was a companion to the Savage one, which they clearly hadn’t found or else they’d have known exactly who she was. There were only two people who walked around with both. She was one and I was the other.

“Let’s cut them some slack, Amo. Three of ours fell into their hands because of someone’s reckless naivety. They were so excited thinking they’d hit the jackpot that they forgot common