Freya Arsov sits on top of a world of diamonds and sports cars. Her father is a billionaire, head of a world-renown company, her mother, an esteemed lawyer. She attends the most prestigious boarding school in England. She has four amazing best frien...
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
✦✦✦
THE FAMILIAR SQUARE WAREHOUSE swam into Matthew's view. It was a big structure, all grey on the outside, frequently matching the London sky above. However, it was night and the warehouse sat cast in shadow, the only light coming from the moonlight reflected against her mirrored glass windows at the top.
It wasn't much. But it was where Matthew had called his home for two years.
A rough-looking figure approached his car as he parked on the street outside the warehouse. Grayson Winchester cocked his head at Matthew as he stood from Persephone's leather seats, shutting the door gently with a click.
His low-cut dark hair coupled with the sleeve of tattoos visible under his white t-shirt and stormy blue eyes made Grayson an endearing image. Matthew had spent the majority of his first month leading the Du Mort, wondering whether the quick-to-scowl, heavily muscled boy would strangle him in his sleep. In the end, it had appeared Grayson was friend, not foe and, coupled with Anakin, was probably the only reason Matthew's head wasn't on Kirova's pike yet.
"So, you survived a day of boarding school so far," said his Second.
"Anakin almost got his ass kicked on the first day," stated Matthew, walking around the car toward the warehouse, Grayson at his side. "Survived is a generous word."
A slender boy stood on sentry duty at the dark side of the warehouse where Matthew and Grayson entered.
Matthew didn't recall admitting him into Du Morts.
It unsettled him that the boy was younger than himself, probably Anakin's age, just like it unsettled him to learn they'd had a member at Arrowsmith covertly selling drugs in the forest around the school.
The boy inclined his head as they passed. There was the obvious outline of a gun at the waistband of the boy's jeans. That unsettled Matthew too, even though he himself carried more than one tucked under the backseat of his car. He'd debated whether to get rid of them because Persephone would've been on Arrowsmith grounds but left them just in case.
"Updates?" Matthew asked Grayson, squinting against the sudden light inside the warehouse. The few gang members who were around stopped whatever they were doing to nod at him as he passed. A group of them, two with heavy rifles flung across their chests, were in the process of opening stolen containers. A glance at them told Matthew that Du Morts had stolen them from a rival gang seeking to ship their things out of London for profit. A coiled serpent grinned at him from the side of the crate. Matthew didn't recognise the symbol, didn't care to.
The downstairs level of the warehouse consisted mainly of crates and card tables. There'd been a tattooing chair a few months ago but it had to be thrown out after one of the older members set it on fire in a drunken rage.
For that act, under Grayson's advice一 You can't be seen as soft, Matthew一Matthew had set the man on sentry duty for an entire month, during an especially rainy month, letting him shudder outside in the rain each night.
