SCANDALOUS

“I LOVE IT WHEN WE get fucking vicious.” Dean lit a joint, sprawled on a settee in front of Vicious’ Olympic pool, throwing the unlit match in the latter’s direction. “No pun intended, asshole.”

“Ha-fucking-ha,” Vicious said, popping a grape into his mouth, lying on a lounger like a mad, entitled king. “But I have to say. The look on Val’s face when she signed those papers? Priceless. I’d feel sorry for her if it wasn’t for the fact she hadn’t even asked about Luna. Bet she ran off to the nearest bar to try to score some rich old businessman before the happy hour was up.”

Vicious thumbed through the documents we’d examined earlier that week with Eli Cole, Dean’s lawyer dad. The last couple days had been hectic, with each of us ru

My stomach dropped at his last sentence, and I rolled my lower lip between my fingers, playing it off. I sat on the edge of the low table, trying to look like my heart hadn’t burned into ashes at the sound of her name and the idea she’d fucked me over by protecting him. When I’d sent Dean, Vicious, and Jaime after her, the rules had been clear—no telling her about Jordan and Val. I didn’t want her sympathy, and I didn’t want her to knock on my fucking door with crocodile tears.

Even though I wanted to knock on her door all the goddamn time.

Luna was with my parents. It was way past midnight—she was safe and sound and mine—and still, the hunger was there. The hole in the pit of my stomach sucked all my feelings and spat them back out into something numb.

“Edie talked?” I asked.

Dean laughed. “Talked? She sang like a fucking canary. She gave us so much information about how abusive Jordan was toward his son and her. Yeah, Edie padded us real good with all the info we needed. Why do you think Amanda gave you a bulletproof case? Edie told us about the abuse, the neglect, the bruising grips. Then she mentioned something about her dad constantly making her mother tea, and the addict in me got inspired and put two and two together. He drugged her mother. She just didn’t fucking realize it.”

The tea. All the info I got had been through Amanda. But a lot of what she’d given me was patched up from the cloths my friends and Edie had produced.

“Edie also hooked us up with the woman helping her with her brother’s case—your little friend, Sonya.” Dean’s lips curved into a knowing smile. We were all sitting in front of the pool, but our bodies were tilted to one another. A huge stone lifted from my heart, and I began to breathe again, coughing out the sweet, rancid smoke inside my lungs.

“How the fuck did Edie have Sonya’s contact info?” I gritted my teeth.

“Sonya is her best friend’s mother,” Vicious supplied, opening his arms in a check-out-this-shit-show gesture.

My jaw locked. “Bane?”

“Five points to the man with the sixteen-inch dick.” Dean clapped.

“That motherfucker.” Jaime laughed. “You should have seen the stare down between him and Vicious. Vicious straight up asked him if he was his Made-in-China version.”

The four of us shared a low chuckle before Vicious arched an eyebrow. “Hey, asshole?” he called to me from his lounger.

I looked up from my joint. “Yeah?”

“Do you miss her?”

Vicious was not the kind of asshole to pillow talk. Not with his wife, and sure as hell not with his friends, so I knew he had a motive. The lie danced on my tongue. No matter how big and tall and old and rich you are, when asked about the girl who broke your heart into a thousand pieces, you’ll always be the thirteen-year-old kid who still didn’t know what to do with his hard dick and out-of-control hormones.

I shrugged.

“Answer with words, Mute,” he pressed.

All eyes were on me. I looked away to the pool, squinting. “She’s in my fucking blood,” I admitted.

Vicious got up, shoved his hand into his pocket, and threw something small in my direction. I caught it, opening my palm and staring at it in disbelief.

I looked back up. He shook his head.

“She never gave this to Jordan, Trent. She couldn’t do it.”

Dean leaned toward me from his lounger, nudging his shoulder against mine. “Did you hear that, fuckface? You finally got someone to love your cold ass. You need to put that shit on lockdown because she is still young and naïve enough to like you.”

I clutched the flash drive in my fist. I swore it smelled like her.

Later that night, I sat in my car and stared at it, thinking it could be so easy. I could ignore it. I could move forward with my life. We wouldn’t have to deal with how I’d locked her father up in jail, and the judgmental stares, and the uncomfortable questions, and the fucking gossip.

We were already apart, and we were surviving just fine.

The flash drive dug into the skin of my palm until I bled. Then, and only then, I started the car and drove away.