“And I want glazed cake.” Perry patted my chest. “Four of them.”
I grinned and pulled her in close, feeling my dick get even harder. Then I pressed a kiss to her lips, backed away, and headed out the door without another word.
I found that my bike was blocked in by my brother’s truck, so I went back inside and snatched his keys before heading out.
It was when I was at the donut shop that I saw the first person that was from our school.
“Hey, is Perry okay?” the young kid asked.
I’d never met him before in my life.
“Yeah,” I said. “She’s fine. She has a concussion and some bruising, but she’ll be back at school Monday.”
“Hell of a thing that Vance did.” The kid shook his head. “It’s all over school. Did y’all press charges?”
I ignored him and everybody else that was now hanging on his every word and ordered my donuts.
When I was done, I looked at the kid and said, “Sadly, we don’t have any hard evidence that Vance was the one behind it.”
With that I left, angry all over again.
And it didn’t fuckin’ help that Vance pulled up with a fucking smirk on his face just as I was leaving.
Somebody must’ve called him.
Son of a bitch.
Putting my brother’s truck back into park, I got out and practically sprinted toward him.
He grinned like a fuckin’ loon, which was when I finally got myself under control enough to realize that it was too fuckin’ easy.
There had to be a reason he showed up. And that he was presenting himself with a proverbial bow on his head.
He wanted me to lose control.
I stopped, took a deep breath, and turned around.
When I got back into Ford’s truck, I saw Vance’s smirk had disappeared.
Rolling down my window, I said, “You won’t get away with it.”
He shrugged. “Maybe I will. Depends on what we’re talking about.”
Gritting my teeth, I drove back to Perry’s house and brought the donuts inside.
All the while everyone ate, I wondered if there was a way to kill someone and not be caught.
Probably fucking not.
Chapter 21
This is not friendship weather. Stop inviting me to places.
-Perry to Blue
Banner
“I think it’s time to get a restraining order,” my father suggested. “I was hoping to avoid it, but I don’t think it can wait anymore. You both should be getting one.”
My father looked from me to Perry and back.
“I agree,” Dawson murmured. “We can do that on a Saturday, right?”
“I’ll go with you,” Ford offered. “And yes, you can. I’ll call ahead, talk to a few people, and we’ll get you set up before we even step foot in the door. But, after yesterday, I’m fairly positive that they’re going to be ready for it.”
After yesterday.
After Perry was beaten up, stripped from the waist down, and left like a piece of trash underneath the bleachers. Bleeding and bruised.
I clenched my hand, not realizing what I was doing until all the cream filling in my donut was all over my hand.
“Shit,” I grumbled.
Perry snickered and swept her finger across the cream, bringing it to her lips.
My eyes caught hers as she sucked that finger clean, and I decided that was the single hottest thing I’d ever seen her do before.
And she damn well knew what she did to me.
“We’ll go after breakfast,” Ford suggested as he stood up, pulling his phone from his pocket.
Ashe watched her husband go, then looked from me to Ford and back.
My brows rose.
“Go,” she mouthed.
I patted Perry’s thigh with my hand and then stood, walking outside to find my brother on the phone.
He gestured me closer with his hand and then continued to speak as I polished off my donut.
It was when he was finished that I realized why I was outside.
“I know what you’re thinking,” he said. “You’re thinking that beating the absolute shit out of him would be really, really nice right now.”
I gritted my teeth.
Beating him wasn’t what I was thinking.
Killing him was more accurate.
“Don’t do it,” he said. “Today, after you get the restraining order against him, it’s going to look really bad if you go out there and pick a fight with him. We need him to break the restraining order. But there’s only so much that the judge will allow before he thinks that you’re the one who instigated it.”
I clenched my teeth.
I knew that.
But the reality of the situation was that I needed to control myself, and I had no control left.
“He hurt her,” I croaked.
There were literal fucking tears burning my eyes.
She meant so fucking much to me, in such a small amount of time, and Vance had almost hurt her so badly that she wouldn’t have been able to recover.
And I was just supposed to be okay with that?
“Yes, you’re supposed to be okay with that,” Ford said. “You have to take the higher ground.”
“How about you leave the rest up to us?”
Dawson.
I turned to find him standing next to my father on the top step. He was staring at me as if he’d never seen me before.
“You love my girl.”
Not a question. A statement.
“Yes, sir.”
“Then how about you let us figure it out from here,” he said. “Keep your nose clean. Don’t do anything that’ll jeopardize that career of yours. You being at that school will help my girl be safe. If you’re not there, who’s going to take care of her?”
Who indeed?
Because, though I liked my boys there, they weren’t me.
They cared about Perry, but I was sure they wouldn’t take a bullet to the chest for her.
But I would.
“Okay,” I finally said. “I’ll try to be good. But the moment that he gets too close, I’m not going to allow him to get away with it.”
“Restraining order will keep him away a hundred feet,” Ford said. “But we’re going to need to talk to
