Page 31 of Reckless Vengeance

“We’ll figure it out. Might be good to show her that we accept her friends. Invite them to Saturday’s party,” I said slowly, thinking out loud.

Lukas snorted, lying down on the floor in front of us to catch his breath. He’d been running on the treadmill for over an hour now.

“Might want to let them warm up to us first. They won’t trust our nice offer and they’ll think you just want to brag about our fancy houses. I know that girl Rory calls Mule is from the Heights. Not sure about any of the others.”

“You hung around the Heights with Rory as kids, right? Did you go to any of their parties?” Tyler asked curiously.

“A couple just before we stopped talking. Cheap beer, lots of weed, usually in abandoned houses. I saw one girl exchange a blow job on a stained mattress for a joint once. She must have been around ten years old,” he said and wrinkled his nose.

“Just tell Rory to invite the girls since they’re her friends. If we do it, we look like we’re just trying to look good by helping those less fortunate or something,” Jensen grunted, Rory’s arms dropping to her sides as she stopped taking her mood out on the bag. She glanced over, frowning when she noticed us all watching her.

“What?” she asked, walking towards us.

She held her hands out for me to undo the gloves, sliding them off her hands and dropping them to the floor.

“Who are you friends with at the Shed? Apart from Mule,” I asked, her eyebrow raising.

“Why?”

“Just thought maybe since you can’t hang out at the Shed right now, you might like to have some of the girls over. You could invite them to the party at Ty’s on Saturday,” I offered, making her wince.

“You want them to mingle with the blue bloods of Ashburn Valley? It’s asking for trouble. I don’t even know if they’d want to step foot in any of your houses.”

“Ask them. They’re your friends, Rory. You should be able to invite them over to hang out. We can convert the corner of the gym at home to a training cage too.”

Her face softened, uncertainty crossing her eyes. “You’d be cool with that?”

“It’s your house too, baby,” I promised, making her sigh.

“I can ask.”

“If you’re worried, invite Mule over to hang out at home on her own or something. You guys can check out the gym and decide how you want the training area to be done,” I encouraged, making her nod.

“Okay. Thanks. I’ll see if she wants to come over today,” she grinned before wandering over to her bag to grab her phone, texting rapidly.

We all headed to the showers to rinse off the sweat, and I slipped into the girls’ bathroom with my clean uniform in hand since the other students were all still in class, finding Rory getting ready to step into a stall.

She rolled her eyes but motioned for me to join her, and I made sure our things were hanging inside the stall to avoid being stolen, before locking it and stripping my sweaty clothes off.

I stepped under the spray behind Rory, her body instantly leaning back into mine. I pressed my forehead to the back of her head and just held her.

“Why do you think the Soldiers want me?” she mumbled, and I turned her in my arms to look at her.

“Revenge on Max, maybe?”

“What if he sold me again? He sold me to your dad to make me disappear, so it’s not too far-fetched to think he’d sell me again, right?” she asked softly, wearing her broken heart on her sleeve.

“Do you think we could cut them a deal? I’ll pay them whatever they want if they’ll leave you alone,” I promised, making her wince.

“They’d just extort you. They’d accept it, then keep coming back to threaten me and get more out of you. Don’t make a move without talking to Skeet. Please. This isn’t something simple you can just make go away with money. Besides, Josie would notice if lots of money started being transferred and she’d question it. Cops snooping around would get a bunch of us killed.”

I hated that she was right.

I cupped her cheek, leaning down to place my forehead on hers as I closed my eyes.

“If they hurt you⁠—”

“We’re going to make them pay for what they did to Slash,” she said, cutting me off. “They won’t get the chance to hurt me.”