Page 103 of Ruthless Chaos

This is probably his first assignment.

I try to smile to help allay his fear, but even that hurts so it probably looks more like I’m baring my teeth. Plus, I’m covered in blood.

“What’s your name?”

“Alec, sir. Alec Jensen,” he stutters.

I hobble towards the door. “Thank you, Alec. You’re dismissed.”

The words are barely out of my mouth when he runs away.

I head to the Grand Library. The telephone there is one of the few secure lines on campus, and the only one in Kingmaker House.

That can only mean one thing.

My father’s heard I put his nephew in the hospital. He took longer than I expected to call, to be honest.

The Grand Library sits on the third floor and is one of the few untouched parts of Kingmaker House. It still has the original wattle and daub walls, and basketweave clay tiles. Some of the books are hundreds of years old. The room that houses the telephones was a recent addition, and not actually part of the original Library.

I nod to the operator when I enter, and he points me to the farthest booth.

When the door is safely shut behind me, I take a deep breath and pick up the phone.

“Have you lost your goddamn mind, boy?” My father’s voice is so loud, I instantly get a headache. I pull the phone back from my ear. “Why the fuck would you do something so stupid, Alexander? I swear if this about your dead mother—”

The mention of my mother makes me zone out of my father’s tirade.

He isn’t saying anything I didn’t expect him to say. This isn’t the first time this has happened. It probably won’t be the last, either.

The last dustup Keller and I had happened when we were teenagers. The fucker refused to keep my mother’s name out of his mouth. I beat his ass and he ran home and cried to his father like the snake he is.

My father chided me then, as he is now.

Fortunately, we’re thousands of miles away from each other so I don’t have to feign interest in what he’s saying. He can’t put his hands on me either.

I tune back into his bollocking at the right time.

“You’d better give me a good fucking reason for what you did,” he hisses. “I’ve already lost three good men to Keller’s reprisal, and if you were here, one of them would be you.” I picture him with his teeth bared. “We have a shipment coming in the next few days, and we’re fucked if Keller decides to take it any further and create problems for us.”

There’s a break in his tirade.

I have to make this make sense in my father’s fucked-up head.

“He tried to rape my girlfriend, sir.” The word is bitter in my mouth. I’ll never call anyonethat.“I warned him to leave her alone. He didn’t listen.” I take a deep breath. Just recounting this is making me angry again. I look down at my bleeding knuckles. “He made a move when he thought I would be off campus. Drugged her. I was defending her honor, sir.”

My father is silent. All I can hear is my heartbeat.

“Fuck,” he says, finally. My shoulders slump. He’s bought my story.

I can’t tell him the truth because I’m not even sure whatthe truthis. He would think I’m crazy to have risked so much for her.

I probably am.

“He’s lucky I didn’t kill him,” I say.

“Aren’t we all,” my father says bitterly. He’s thinking that killing Keller would start a war we couldn’t win, get me kicked out of Saint Fredericandtrash my chances at being inducted into the Kingmaker Society. “Who is this girl?”

I run a hand through my hair. “Her name is Allie Clarke, sir,” I say.