Lie, Baby, Lie ✔️

chapter eight- mia

Chapter Eight

Purgatory is different during the day. The warehouse is still just as eerie, and every sound still echoes ominously. The energy has shifted, though. When there aren't dealers and streetfighters and druggies around, it's just another place.

Thomas must be getting paranoid. I had an early release day from school, and he wanted me to come straight here. I know he sent some men out to "handle" a few thieving workers, so he probably wants to have me close if the cops show up or worse: the possibility someone survived and is out for blood.

I'm on the ground reading a book. It's not the most comfortable place, but I hate sitting up at the thrones. Since I don't have homework and the cell service is terrible here, I don't have anything better to do. My brother left a few men to guard the doors while he ran his errand, so it's just me in this huge room, all by myself.

I'm finishing a chapter as the sound of footfall gets my attention. I look up expecting to see my brother return, but it's just Wade.

"Why are you here?" I ask.

"Thomas is sending me out for a business trip later this week. We're talking when he gets back," he answers. "Why are you here?"

I dog-ear my page and close the book. "Because he wants me to be."

Wade sits down on the floor beside me, and I notice there's a ring of purple around his wrists. I heard fragments of Thomas's phone call last night before he left, but this just confirms what I suspected.

"I heard you got arrested yesterday," I say. "Thomas bailed you out, didn't he?"

"Did he tell you that?" Wade questions.

I shake my head. "Overheard a thing or two."

He doesn't bother hiding it. "Well, you're right. I did get arrested."

"That why he's shipping you off, then?" I guess.

"Yeah, he brought it up last night," he says. "I'm your brother's lapdog at this point. I do whatever he asks."

"Most people do," I mutter dryly.

There's instability to Thomas no one ever seems to see. In school, he was so charismatic, and even now, he is. He can get anyone to believe the fake persona he wears on the outside is the real one. Sometimes, the mask cracks, and there's no limit to what he'll do to take control of a situation again. Once people know how deadly he is, they do whatever he wants. Like me. Like Wade. Like the demons.

"It's not like there's really another choice," Wade points out. "It's all about survival."

"Where's he sending you?" I ask softly.

"Mexico," he says.

"How far over the border?"

"Hell if I know," he grumbles. "Too far."

Most people don't realize just the sheer volume of drugs that come through legal checkpoints. Thomas has gotten good at cheating the system, working border security to do his bidding. I know he's been wanting to branch Purgatory out more. He's greedy, and money is all he can see. He craves more and more of it, and it swallows him up like it did to our dad.

Wade runs a thumb over his bottom lip, gaze unfocused. He's thinking, questioning, wondering what my brother has planned for him.

Even though I think I know the answer, I ask, "Is he sending you by yourself?"

"Probably," he says. "But I can handle myself."

My brother doesn't send people out alone. Not on missions this big. "Why would he do that?"