Renegade (h.s.)

Mission: Scar

I can't stop twitching.

Mickey keeps nudging me from underneath the table to get me to stop, but I just start up again. My rented white tux feels scratchy and tight and I keep itching my forearms and thigh like I have chicken pox. The lights from the chandeliers are almost blinding and all the white in the room hurts my eyes after a while. The soft music the orchestra is playing grates on my nerves and the shrieks of laughter from the attendees makes me ill.

I hate the gaudy ballroom and the pinched faces full of Botox and the judgmental stares and I would love to get the hell out of here as soon as possible.

Filled with restless energy, my leg bounces incessantly and I know it's irritating Mickey, who somehow manages to look cool and calm and like he belongs in a room like this.

Which, technically, he does.

Mickey comes from wealth —his father is a big real estate investor with multiple homes across the country and his mother benefitted from old money, living off her trust fund her whole life. This money enabled them to send Mickey to the best boarding school in the state and fully fund his Yale education in exchange for his mandatory compliance with their wishes.

Galas like this were a dime a dozen when he was growing up.

I bet he didn't have to rent a tux.

Being the only heir to such an impressive fortune already caused quite a crowd to gather around us when we entered. I can't tell if the recognition is helping to legitimize our covers as innocent trust-fund babies in the Upper-East Side or if all the people coming up to Mickey to fawn over him is drawing too much of the wrong attention.

Throngs of older men and women approach Mickey to ask about his family and his fake job as a medical researcher and talk about their summer homes and then their gazes inevitably fall to me in confusion as if trying to figure out who the fuck I am and why I'm with the Mickey Calloway.

I'm nobody, you shitheads.

So, I introduce myself with some fake, posh name —Cornelius Collingsworth III— which makes Mickey snort the champagne out of his nostrils, sputtering and coughing for the next five minutes.

And that does ease my nerves a bit.

Still, for the first time in a long time I'm anxious as fuck and I don't like it.

I'm usually the one who is sure and calm and robotic and Mickey is the one who gets nervous jitters and agonizes over little details.

But, now our roles have reversed and not just because I so don't belong in this crowd.

No, it's because tonight I know I'm in the presence of at least a dozen white-collar criminals and literal human traffickers and can't do a damn thing about it because I have a much bigger and harder fish to catch.

The Siren is here, somewhere in this room.

There's a buzz of electricity thrumming just under my skin, heart beating against my ribs as I survey the room again.

I can just feel it, feel her.

For a while, I feared that our hunch was wrong and that The Siren wouldn't actually show up at this gala, but standing in this room, surrounded by all the wealth and corruption... I know that she's hiding amongst them.

She's either lingering somewhere near Watson, biding her time, or bold enough to already be making her move. Given her ability to transform and disguise herself, our main problem is recognizing her when we see her.