Clem and Gary were sitting pretty close to each other, Clem was staring deep into his eyes after hearing the words that had come out from his mouth, trying to read him, trying to read what was behind those eyes of his.
“I guess you just don’t want to tell me.” Clem sighed. “I understand, everyone has their own secrets, especially us stars, so we can’t let the media and the public know every little detail about us. I guess you will just never have to find out about my secret then.”
With a little show of her tongue, Clem continued to watch Rachel as she performed and the song came to an end, She clapped greatly while cheering on her fellow colleague.
Meanwhile, Gary just couldn't help but smile at her response.
‘I thought this would be the case, but I guess she didn’t even believe me for a second.’
Keeping a secret was hard, and there were times where Gary just wanted others to know the truth, but he knew the reasons why the secret had to be kept, and the plan that had been set out by Kai.
The reason why he was happy to tell Clem the truth was because he thought she wouldn't believe him, and if she did, he could just play it off as a joke because the real situation just seemed that unrealistic.
A teenage boy, around the age of 17, still not old enough to legally drink, was the leader of a large crime syndicate that ruled an entire town. Even if he was an Altered, that just didn’t make sense.
On top of that, it was clear that none of them knew much about the Howlers, too busy in their own lives, their own cities, dealing with their own things, but if they also knew that the Howlers were in control of a Tier-2 city, and it was Notsburg it would make the story of him being the leader even more unlikely.
‘It was good to say it at least.’ Gary thought.
Rachel came off stage and there were many that asked to take a photo of her. She wasn’t famous yet, but since there was a camera crew, and after witnessing her talent, there were many that believed that she would be famous at least one day, and this was her chance to jump at the opportunity.
When she finally came back, everyone gave Rachel compliments on her performance and that included Gary as well.
“You can actually sing, I thought you might have been like those other stars that just mime.” Gary commented.
“I got recruited for my talents, my good looks are just a bonus.” Rachel gave Gary a wink as she went in for her dessert.
While they were all enjoying the last course of their meal, the door opened to the restaurant as someone had entered. It was pretty forceful as well, like a small bang, causing nearly everyone to turn their head.
When they saw who it was, the staff immediately stood up straight and bowed.
“Who is that!” Rachel asked.
“She looks amazing, her presence as well, she’s captured everyone in the room.” Spring said.
“Is she a star, if she isn’t should I give her my card?” Elanor said out loud, because she too was stunned.
Walking in with a fur coat and a tight revealing dress that revealed the upper part of her cleavage she walked past everyone, and was heading straight for Gary’s table.
‘Oh no.’ Gary thought as he looked at the wall trying not to grab her attention. ‘This is the one person that I’ve been trying to avoid this whole time.’
“I hope you are all enjoying the service!” Olivia said as she greeted the table. “You see, I always like to treat outsiders quite special, and when I heard that you were in the city, I thought it would be best to treat you this way.
“If you need anything then feel free to ask, as I am in charge of all the establishments on Burnham food street.”
Now they all felt like they knew the reason why they were being treated so nicely, and the fact she claimed to own all the restaurants here, just meant she was a very important figure.
Hearing this, all hopes of scouting for Elanor went down the drain as well. An actor’s life wasn’t an easy one, and it is more likely she already had a lot of wealth as well.
After her greeting Olivia didn’t stick around and instead looked as if she was walking towards the back of the restaurant, but before going through another door, she turned her head and gave Gary a smile.
‘What was that!’ Gary thought. ‘Did she just come in here to give me a heart attack? If she acted like she knew me after saying all of that, what would I have done then? I don’t even know how far along Kai’s plan is of making me this business tycoon so I don’t even know what I can and can’t say.’
Gary was starting to realise the difficulties of being head of a gang, yet being so far secluded from it.
“I guess since we're done eating, we should get going and rest up a bit.” Gary suggested wanting to get out of here as soon as possible.
“Right, we should ask for the bill.” Elanor said.
When it came to the bell, to their surprise, or not to their surprise, it had already been paid for, according to the staff it was by the owner who they had seen earlier. If there was one thing Olvvia did succeed in, it was the fact that she had managed to get the manager Elanor on her side.
She thought there were some good people in Slough and would make it so it was seen in its best light.
Outside, the group were pretty tired, it felt like a long day and travelling always took a lot out of them. It seemed like some of them were quite used to this, but even they still yawned.
Walking towards their car they were in a multi story car park and had parked relatively high up, due to them having two large vans. The cameras had been turned off for the day
“Big shot, where do you think you and your friends are running off so fast to?”
Turning around, they could see that it was the blonde man from before, and he wasn’t alone, his friends were with him, around ten of them in total, holding weapons in their hands, one that you could get from a supermarket like a mop and baseball bats.
‘Damn it, since we were in a car park I thought it was normal to smell others here, and there is the whole camera crew here.’ Gary thought, blaming himself for not catching it sooner.
Immediately, the guard that was with them stood in front of the group. He was ready to do his job, even though he was a little nervous.
‘I could take down maybe three of them at most, but with weapons this is going to be a little difficult.’
“Why do you have a problem with us!” Spring shouted. “Shouldn’t you be taking it out on the restaurant? They were the ones that allowed us to take the seat before you.”
“Shut up b*tch!” The blonde man pointed his bat toward her. “I saw that smug smile on your face, the look you all gave us as you went to the seat. You think you're better than us, right? Well guess what, there is one thing we can do, and that's beast your arse, to get some frustrations out!”
“I can't believe it.” Tyson smiled. “These idiots can’t go against the gang here, since they're protecting the restaurant, so they go after us because they think we're easy pickings.”
There was a reason why Tyson wasn’t scared, because he was an Altered as well.
“Get them!” The man shouted and all of them charged forward, Tyson went towards the right, and the guard towards the left to take out a few of them, but there were still six others running right at them.
“AHHH!” Rachel and Clem screamed, while Spring was still shouting and pointing at them, but Gary quickly ran ahead. He jumped in the air, and split his legs kicking two of them.
The strength of his kicks chucked the two so far back that they crashed into the cars and dented them. When landing, he looked up at the Blonde man who was frozen after seeing that.
“Oh... that's right, Gray is one of the top students in the AFA... and he incredibly strong!” Clem said.
It was true, because by the time Tyson and the Guard were done dealing with the other two trouble makers, Gary had already dealt with all of them, and was holding the blonde man by his hair, kneeling down while the rest of his body was on the ground.
He had been hit in the stomach and all of the wind was taken out of him.
“You... and all of those that attacked us today, are never allowed in this city again.” Gary whispered, letting go of the man’s head.
“Let’s get out of here, before we cause a scene.” Gary said, and the others were inclined to agree as they got in their vans, and drove off.
For some reason, the blonde man felt like he had gotten away lighty, and rolled over onto his back, expecting to see the ceiling, but instead, he could see a beautiful woman instead.
“Am I in heaven?” The man asked.
“Did you not here what that person said?” The woman stated. “You messed with a very dangerous person, when you should have just gone home. You got off very lightly just getting kicked out of this town, or maybe not.”
The woman pulled out what looked like a whip.
“Because I plan to have some fun with you before kicking you out of here.”
*****
*****