Page 82 of Sweet Venom

“Fuck.”

Silence stretches between us for a bit, only punctuated by a distant owl’s cry and the heaviness of the uncertainty ofwhat will become of Preston. Kane and I have been his only non-enablers in his environment.

Which isn’t comforting, considering we’re not your average college kids.

If we hadn’t always been keeping Pres busy and watching over him, he would’ve ended up in a grave a long time ago. And now that the meds are barely keeping him in check, it’s a problem.

Ahugeproblem.

And it’s probably behind the tension lodged in my bones lately. Because I refuse to fail to protect Preston as well.

That just won’t be fucking happening.

“Can your brother work on something innovative?” Kane breaks the silence. “He’s been testing all these off-the-record drugs lately, surely he can tailor something for Pres that’s better than what he’s on.”

“Eighty percent of his tests go sideways. He’s been spending more time killing his test subjects than helping them. I wouldn’t trust him with a psychiatric drug. Preston was already used as a test subject for my father and nearly died. That won’t be fucking happening again.”

“I suppose we have to wait and see if he can keep himself under control.”

“He can. I’ll make sure of it.”

He squeezes my shoulder. “You don’t have to put more responsibilities on yourself when you’re already struggling with control.”

“No, I’m not.”

“Jude, you’re stalking one of your targets and doing God knows what in between, and it’s messing with your head. You might not notice it, but I do. You’re on fucking edge and it shows.”

I clench my fists and then unclench them but choose to keep my mouth shut because he’s not entirely wrong.

“Listen up, I don’t care what you think you should do with Violet, but keep Dahlia out of it. You don’t go near her, okay?”

I narrow my eyes. Kane has never had this much interest in a girl he’s never even talked to. He’s worse than me in the opposite sex department and rarely hooks up.

However, ever since the first time he took me to that Stantonville shithole to show me where Violet lives, he’s been enamored with Dahlia.

Not sure if that’s the right word.

Intrigued? Impressed, maybe?

I was too busy recognizing Violet as the girl with the blue umbrella, but then I noticed the gleam in his eye when Dahlia used a gun—an unloaded one—to threaten the drunk who was harassing Violet.

Dahlia was firm and loud, unlike Violet, who remained in the background, then scolded Dahlia for having the gun.

That’s what Violet does best—scolding instead of being grateful.

And now I’m thinking of her, and I refuse to think of her after my recent resolution.

At any rate, Kane told me to stay away from ‘the sister’ that very night, and he sometimes plugs in a reminder to not disturb her in any form.

I narrow my eyes on him. “What’s with you and Dahlia? You arranged her scholarship, didn’t you?”

“You stay out of my business, and I stay out of yours, yeah?”

He changes the subject, talking about how we can gain more power in Vencor. Something about turning as manySeniors as possible to our side and subtly forcing our dads to relinquish power in our favor.

A sort of a coup d’état.

Kane has always had this ambition for us to become stronger and run Vencor however we please.