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“Uh—hmmm.” His eyes lit up with an epiphany. “Cassel said he gave you a down payment!” he declared, snapping his fingers.

“For Morsian darts,” Alfie clarified in a bored tone. “Not Venom.” He glanced at Malakai with watery, red-rimmed eyes as he poured boiling liquid from a flask. “You do business with him?”

“We’re friends.”

Travis snorted another laugh. “Liar,” he muttered.

“Shut up,” Malakai mouthed. To Alfie he said, “Didn’t he give you—what was it, twenty or something?” He was fishing—it was obvious. He had no clue what Darien had paid.

Loser.

“Fifteen,” Alfie corrected.

“Perfect. You give me the Venom, you keep the fifteen, and we’ll call it even.”

Travis scoffed. “You can’t be serious.”

Malakai sliced into him with a glare. “You got a problem?”

“Yeah, I do,” he snapped. “You can’t just piss away Dare’s money like that!”

“He’s a billionaire. Pretty sure he’ll recover.”

“You don’t need fifteen grande worth of Venom!”

Alfie said, “This won’t make fifteen. I can get ya five.”

Malakai said, “Perfect. Keep the rest of the money for those darts Darien willneverget.” The look he threw Travis’s way seemed to say,Stupid.

“You are unbelievable.”

“Yeah, well, you’re a whiner. FYI, my sister doesn’t like whiners. It won’t take her long to get bored of your shit.”

Travis bristled. “FYI, I’ve learned a lot about your sister lately, and I can tell you one thing: You do not deserve her.”

“Oh yeah?” he growled. He advanced on Travis, his hands curling into fists at his sides. “And what’d you learn? Tell me what it is that you think you’ve learned aboutmysister.” He stabbed himself in the chest with a thumb.

“That she has less than two years left to live. Yet all you care about is yourself and your need to get high.”

Malakai held up an index finger in the air between them. “First things first: You don’t know anything. About her, or about me. Second things second: So long as we’re trapped here,noneof us have two years.” He sliced that hand through the air, silver eyeteeth glinting. “So let me get my fix and leave me thefuckalone.” He turned?—

“How does your sister feel about having a pathetic junkie for a brother? I might as well askyou,since you seem to know everything about her.”

Malakai whipped back around. “I’m giving you one more chance, Devlin,” he threatened, holding his finger up again. Travis fought the urge to snap it off and shove it up Malakai’s ass. “You can either leave right now—” He pointed at the door. “—and maybe, justmaybe,I’ll let you continue to befriendswith my sister. Or: you can keep flapping your gums like the whiner you are and see where it gets you.”

“I’m not going anywhere. And I’m not just friends with your sister—I like her. A lot.”

Malakai’s nostrils flared. He was like a bull puffing hot air. “Oh, you do, do you?”

“Yeah. And she likes me.”

He scoffed. “In your dreams.”

“The minute we get out of here, I’m taking her on another date,” he declared. “And you?” He crossed his arms and leaned in. “You’re going to leave. Us.Alo?—”

Malakai punched him in the mouth.

Travis stumbled backward, grunting in surprise.