I shrugged my shoulders angrily. “I doubt it was her idea. This has Devon I’m-a-cocksucker Keeton written all over it. God, he left her there, Brooks! What a jackass!” I seethed. It was a lot easier to feel angry than to admit how freaked out I was, how one phone call could trigger a memory I had buried under a mountain of repression.

My mind threatened to relive that night. The frantic late-night call. The gut-wrenching fear. The moment when my entire life changed.

Only I had learned my lesson, and this time I wouldn’t ignore the person who needed me.

It wasn’t until Brooks and I were headed down the road that he made an obvious observation. “Do we even know where this place is?” he asked, and I could have laughed at the ridiculousness of it all.

And finally I did laugh, almost maniacally. Just because it was all so damned absurd. Here I was, rushing off to play save Renee from her shitty choices, and I didn’t even know where the heck I was going.

“Not really,” I admitted once I had settled down.

“Okay,” Brooks let out slowly, giving me his you-are-a-crazy-person look. I sure hoped his future patients were never on the receiving end of that particular expression. It could make anyone question their mental health.

“She said she was by the river at a warehouse. Considering I didn’t know a thing about Compulsion until a few hours ago, I’m completely useless right now,” I said, not bothering to hide my irritation.

“Huh, sounds like it’s down on Third Street,” Brooks offered, earning him a surprised look from me.

“Didn’t know you were so familiar with the stab-’em-and-leave-’em side of town. Makes me wonder what you get up to in your spare time,” I remarked dryly.

Brooks rolled his eyes. “I’m not allergic to social situations like you are, Aubrey,” was his only explanation. Huh. It made me wonder how much there was to my good buddy Brooks that I wasn’t aware of.

The farther we drove into the city, the more obvious it became that we weren’t in Kansas anymore. This was a rough side of town. The stay-inside-or-you’re-going-to-get-shanked part of the city. Longwood University was only ten blocks away, but it might as well be on another planet.

The streets were lined with run-down houses. Cars were up on cinder blocks, and there were more than a few burned-out streetlights. Teenagers hung out on the street corners, and the shadows seemed to hold all sorts of unsavory things that I didn’t want to examine too closely. I was experiencing a full-on case of the “icks.”

I pulled into a parking lot and turned off the car. Brooks opened the door and got out, but I sat there, staring out the window, not sure I wanted to leave the nice, warm safety of my car. Shit, we were going to get shot. I just knew it! Why hadn’t I thought to bring the bottle of pepper spray that sat, unused, on my dresser? Idiot!

When I got my hands on Renee I was pretty sure I’d wrap them around her scrawny neck and squeeze. Really, really hard.

Brooks leaned down and braced himself in the open doorway. “You coming or not?” he asked, looking amused. I gave him the middle finger, but finally, ever so slowly, I joined him. I pulled my knitted, woolen cap down over my hair and shoved my hands into my pockets to ward off the cold.

“Someone is going to steal my car, I just know it. I’m seriously gonna kill Renee and her ass of a boyfriend,” I said in a harsh whisper, stealing a look at the abandoned warehouses and dilapidated buildings around us. A group of thugged-out guys walked down the sidewalk, and I seriously contemplated jumping back in my car and heading home, leaving Renee and her bad decision making on her own.

But damned if my loyalty and annoying sense of friendship didn’t get in the way of my survival instincts.

“So, any clue as to where this place is?” I asked Brooks, hunching my shoulders as I shivered.

Brooks shrugged and pointed down the street toward the river. “I’d say we head that way. Renee said it was by the river, right?” he asked, and I could only nod. No need to point out the obvious fact that wandering aimlessly around Murderville didn’t seem like the smartest plan of action.

We walked quickly, heading toward the water. I wrinkled my nose at the stench of fish and sewage. Trash and unimaginably gross stuff littered the ground, and I tried to suppress the vomit rising in the back of my throat.

“Hear that?” Brooks asked, breaking the eerie silence.

“Hear what?” I muttered around the clattering of my teeth. Jeesh, I was freezing.

Brooks cupped his hand around his ear and then grabbed my hand, pulling me down the street. “I can hear music. It’s this way,” he said, clearly more excited by this twisted game of hide-and-seek than I was.

“There it is,” Brooks called out, yanking on my arm. Bass so loud it shook my insides served as our guide. Following the music, we crossed the street to join a line that curled around the side of an old warehouse. Compulsion was obviously the place to be on a weekend.

“You know, this club is a total legend. It’s been around since the nineties and changes locations every week. I’ve talked to a few people who have been here, but never had the balls to come myself. But I’ve always wanted to,” Brooks said low enough not to be overheard by the people around us.

Everything I knew about the underground club scene came from watching the news and the occasional crappy reality TV show. And it had all seemed so sensationalized, from drug deals, to users ODing in the bathrooms, to people getting beaten up outside. As out-there as the stories sounded, I knew this stuff really happened. I wasn’t stupid or ignorant, by any means. I was more than aware of life’s dark and scary underbelly. But I was not the type of person to search for it. I didn’t get some sick sort of adrenaline jolt from living life on the edge.