Page 99 of Reckless Vengeance

“You mean the crew that shot the Psychos’ shed to pieces and killed their boss? Sure, I bet they’d be shaking in their boots,” he deadpanned, looking down at his food as he picked at it. “I’m not going.”

“Wait, what?”

He glared at me, anxiety and anger swirling in his eyes. “I’m not fucking going, Caden. You want to throw a party to keep the peace? Sure, be my guest, but I’m not going to sit there and risk someone in the crowd open-firing on the dance floor. They won’t show up and throw hands, they’ll bring guns.”

“They won’t make a move like that, dude,” I sighed, rolling my eyes as he stood.

“You can’t promise that. You're on your own. If anything happens, that’s on you.”

He stalked off, making Rory frown as she watched him go. “What’s wrong?”

“He’s being a drama queen,” I huffed, but Jensen snorted and stood too.

“He’s not wrong though, man. I bet Skeet will tell you the same thing.”

“Of course you’d side with Luke. Run off to comfort your sulky boyfriend,” I growled, not caring if anyone heard us at this point. Why didn’t they see this was a good idea? We needed it.

Jensen put his hands on the table and leaned down, his voice low.

“You want to pick a fight with me, all you have to do is ask, Holloway. Keep Luke out of it. I’m siding with him because you’re a fucking idiot. I’m not going to your party either.”

He walked off without another word, and I could hear a few people around us whispering. We couldn’t fight like this, it caused disruption to the food chain here.

“Deal with it after school,” Tyler warned, his eyes on me as he dropped a kiss on Rory’s shoulder. “Eat lunch so we can get to class.”

“Don’t pick a fight,” Rory said directly to me, raising an eyebrow. “If you turn their relationship into school entertainment, I’ll throttle you in front of everyone. I don’t give a shit about the hierarchy or people’s opinions of me.”

“So you’re both taking their side too?” I scoffed.

“There’s only one side for us, don’t you get that? It’s us versus everyone else. If we start taking sides against each other, we’ve already lost. We’ll talk about the party at home,” she said firmly, checking her phone to text for a moment. “D replied and said everything at home’s okay. A lot of the reporters have left and are probably out front of the school.”

Knowing Mom was okay gave me a sense of relief, and I took a deep breath before nodding.

“Thanks for checking.”

“He promised to call if something was wrong,” she stated, pocketing her phone and climbing off Tyler’s lap to stand behind me. Her arms draped around my shoulders as she leaned down to kiss my cheek, her voice softening. “C’mon, go and apologize to the guys. United front, remember? We’ll figure out a plan.”

“Things need to go back to normal here. We’ve always had weekly parties.”

“We’ll talk about it and make a plan together,” she replied, moving back so I could stand.

“You’re right,” I grumbled, putting an arm around her and making her smirk.

“I’m always right.”

“Sure,” I chuckled, motioning for Tyler to follow so we could find the others.

Lukas

“Wait up,” Jensen called as he jogged after me, and I slowed my steps to give him time to catch up.

“He’s a fucking idiot,” I muttered, shrugging his arm off as he slung it over me.

“Skeet will probably talk him out of it.”

“He’d better. What the hell is he thinking?” I snapped, stumbling as Jensen grabbed my arm and dragged me into an empty classroom, locking the door behind us. “The fuck is your⁠—”

My question was silenced as he pushed me back against the wall beside the door and kissed me, my hands moving to his chest to shove him away, but he grabbed them and pinned them to the wall.