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“She's actually kind of impressive,” Joe said, nudging Frank, who gave him a slight look. Joe wasn't sure how smart any of his “friends” were, because no one of them seemed to recognize Frank without the glasses and nerd clothes, assuming that he was one of them. A few girls he knew had ragged on his brother before had even called Frank hot. Joe would have to tease him about that.
Though with Nancy busy saving the girl from a peanut butter death kiss, it looked like their case was about to get busted—and not in the good way. The party would be broken up, and they'd still have nothing to show for any of this.
“You could do that, right? You had the advanced course.”
“So did you,” Frank muttered. He looked around, and Joe figured he was trying to find a way to slip away from the party unnoticed. Joe figured he could cause a distraction—another one, as if Trish almost choking wasn't enough of one—since the last thing they needed was to ruin Frank's cover when the party hadn't worked out.
He was about to start something with the guy who'd given the peanut kiss of death when Gabe went down next to him. Joe frowned. He knew Gabe had brought his own party to the party—he'd said as much when he pulled out a bottle of Jack Daniel's and started drinking it—but there hadn't been that much in it, and unfortunately, Gabe knew how to handle his liquor.
Except now.
Frank moved over to Gabe, taking his pulse as the kid started to shudder. Oh, hell, Joe thought as he recognized that. This is the drug. The drug and alcohol. Gabe, you idiot.
“Damn. He's not that drunk, is he?”
“What else did he take?” Frank demanded, and when none of Gabe's friends answered him, he repeated the question with the kind of menace you never wanted to hear from the level-headed Hardy brother. “What else did he take? If you don't tell me, he will die before the ambulance gets her for her.”
“He didn't take any—” Ben stopped when Frank lifted Gabe's hand to show off the discolored skin the drug produced. “Skittles. He took skittles.”
“Skittles?”
“It makes your skin the color of the rainbow,” Ben said, shrugging. Frank looked like he wanted to hit one of them, and that was usually Joe's role.
“Where did he get it?”
“Hey, man, I told you what he took—”
“That's not enough. The hospital's going to need a sample of this stuff to reverse the effects. If you don't have that for them, say goodbye to Gabe now,” Frank told him, still harsh. This was the Frank no one messed with, not even his kid brother.
“I don't have it,” Ben said, tugging on Pete's arm, but the taller boy shook his head as well. The whole group started fidgeting and shoving the others. Joe rolled his eyes, unable to believe this. They were all stupid, high, and none of them had any left of the drug.
Great.
“Who's your dealer?”
“Churchill. Has a place north of Rodeo.”
Joe wanted to smack someone. Or himself. Well, that was easy. All it takes is one overdose to get the answer we need.
“We're going to need to make him vomit.”
“What?” Joe and the rest of the guys demanded at the same time.
Frank sighed. “Purging his stomach is the first step to getting this out of his body and the only one we can do with the equipment we have here. The drug is already in his bloodstream, but if there's still alcohol in his stomach, we can stop that from making it worse.”
Never mind. Easy just went out the window. Joe looked at his brother. “Are you sure about this? Can't you just trach him like Nancy did that girl with the peanut butter death kiss?”
Frank's expression faltered for a moment at Joe's word choice, but all he said was, “No.”