“All of what?” I asked.
Lockwood leveled his gaze at me. “You already know, Nicole. My sister, Catherine Flynn, killed your father. Before that, she murdered one of our own, a young Raptor freshman, during what she liked to consider extensive testing to prove their worth.”
Hearing the truth about my father’s death from the mouth of the Raptors’ commander in chief had more of an impact on my emotions than I bargained for. My chin trembled, and I bit down on my lower lip to prevent myself from crying.
“I knew about the freshman,” sighed Lockwood. He rocked forward to rest his elbows on his knees. “It wasn’t our first scandal, but it was certainly the most violent. We managed to patch it up, of course. Blamed it on another fraternity’s initiation tactics. When your father died, Catherine’s close friends informed me that it was an accident. I let it go, but in the back of my mind, I think I always knew that she had planned it.”
“You let it go?” I repeated. I found myself lifting the gun again at his confession. How could anyone simply turn a blind eye on a murderer?
“I wanted to believe that it was accident,” he insisted. “I’ll admit, I’ve ignored Catherine’s instability for nearly thirty years. I also thought that we’d left all the details of our sibling rivalry in the past. Clearly, I was wrong. When Lauren infiltrated my computer, I noticed that my other accounts had been trifled with. The changes were infinitesimal, which was probably why I hadn’t noticed them before, but it was hard to ignore what those changes meant.”
“Which was?” I prompted.
Lockwood leveled his gaze with mine. “Catherine is attempting to frame me for every crime that she has committed in the past several years.”
Lauren gasped. “What?”
“Don’t the Raptors all commit crimes together anyway?” I asked in a dry voice.
“In a manner of speaking,” replied Lockwood matter-of-factly. “But our crimes did not include regular bouts of murder until quite recently.”
“So because you weren’t murdering anyone, it was all okay.”
“I didn’t say that.”
“What are you trying to say?” I demanded. “Because to me, it sounds like you came here to tell us that your ass needs saving just as much as mine does.”
“I am saying that you and I now share a common goal,” said Lockwood.
“Oh, a common goal—”
“I know where Weston McAllen is being detained.”
That shut me right up.
“Catherine has lost the right to control any aspect of the society’s business,” Lockwood continued. He crossed one knee over the other, and his tone of voice shifted from subtly remorseful to downright diplomatic. “She needs to be ousted, but I can’t take her down all by my lonesome. If you agree to help me, I’ll reunite you with your beloved officer.”
“What advantage could my help possibly afford you?” I asked, doubtful. It was too easy. After all of the hassle of the past semester, battling against Lockwood and Flynn, making a deal with Lockwood himself felt like the worst idea ever. But if it meant getting Wes back safe…
“Anthony Costello was one of the most promising students to ever be a member of the Raptors,” said Lockwood. “It’s why it was such a devastating loss when he decided to leave us. From the trouble you’ve caused the Raptors in the last semester, let alone in the last day, I can tell that you were cut from the same cloth. We can restore the Raptors to their former glory. If we succeed, I can ensure your safety, your graduation from Waverly, and your comfort for the rest of your life.”
“The last time the Raptors promised comfort to me, I ended up kidnapped in your underground clubhouse,” I reminded him.
“This is different,” he insisted. “This is you and me joining forces to reform the Raptors. No more under-the-table deals. No more murder. We would get back to our roots. I don’t care if we have to expel every current member of the Raptors to do it.”
“No.”
“Pardon?”
“No,” I repeated, more firmly. “If you want me to help you end Flynn’s influence, then I want the Raptors shut down. Completely. No more. Promise to wall up that damn clubhouse, and it’s a deal.”
Lockwood pursed his lips together, contemplating my counteroffer. Then he simply said, “Fine.”
My eyebrows reached toward my hairline in surprise. “Really?”
He held up his hand in a three-finger salute as if reciting the Boy Scout oath. “I swear I will rescue Officer McAllen and dismantle the Raptors with your assistance.”
After a moment’s hesitation, I tucked Wes’s Glock into the back of my jeans, crossed the basement, and offered Lockwood my hand. He glanced up, gauging whether or not I was serious, then shook my hand.
“It’s a deal.”
The day had come full circle. I returned to the abandoned parking garage to wait for Lockwood to return with Wes. It seemed impossible that I had met with Lauren in the exact same parking garage that very morning. It felt like days, weeks even, had passed since then. Wes’s absence had left a desperate, aching hole in my heart, and now that I was so close to getting him back, it seemed more and more likely that something would go wrong. Too anxious to remain seated in the comfortable, heated interior of Lauren’s car, I drew the hood of my coat up and kicked the driver’s door open to get out. I paced back and forth between the walls of the garage, but when the grumble of Lockwood’s SUV echoed up from the lower levels, I was rendered suddenly immobile. As the headlights rounded the last ramp and Lockwood drove toward me, my chest tightened, unable to release my trapped breath.
“Oh, my God.”
My palms found the passenger-side window, and I peeked through to see Wes’s ashen face. I wrenched open the door, and he practically fell out into my arms. I caught him, supporting as much of
