Make My Move

by J Bree

  Avery laughs and leans in to whisper something to Lips that I don’t catch but it has her blushing and scrubbing a hand over her face. It’s fucking cute and I want to know what set her off so fucking bad.

  “Joey?” Blaise asks, and when Ash opens his mouth, Lips cuts him off sharply, “I’m on it. Next?”

  Fuck, I need details about that.

  “Harlow?”

  Avery hums softly and says, “She’ll dig her own grave eventually. Same goes with Devon. The real problem is Annabelle.”

  All eyes are on Blaise as he fidgets with the bottle cap from his beer because he’s the weak link here. He’s the one who always caves and feels bad about her because deep down his damage has broken him that way.

  The rest of us have damage that means she could die and we wouldn’t flinch.

  Lips clear her throat and then speaks carefully, “Do we need her to disappear? I…can make that happen.”

  Fuck.

  That’s a good option, but I wasn’t expecting her to just come out and say it.

  “So you really do have gangster connections then?” Blaise grumbles, and she flinches.

  She fucking flinches.

  I punch him in the arm, wanting it to be his goddamn jaw, and he groans. “Fuck, I didn’t mean it like that, Mounty, just…I know nothing about where you come from. I guess Avery does and Harley obviously knows something but I’m trying to figure out how the fuck a sixteen-year-old girl can calmly, casually, offer to end someone’s life. Fuck, it’s not even the killing. It’s the mundane tone, like you’ve killed a bunch of other girls for pissing in your Cheerios.”

  She swallows and slowly looks around the table at us all. “I know a lot of people from all different walks of life. Some of them are gangsters. I am not a member of any gangs, I do not fuck members of any gangs, and I do not owe loyalty in any manner to any gangs.”

  I scrub a hand over the back of my neck and attempt to defuse the situation before Morrison puts his fucking foot in it again. “Whatever, it doesn’t matter. We can’t kill her. She’s a dumb, manipulative bitch but she’s not Joey. If we’re killing anyone it’s him.”

  “No one is killing Joey,” Ash snaps, and I guess that’s the end of that.

  Chapter Twenty

  Ash

  Lance the Mounty fuck knows he’s dead.

  He knows it because the whole school knows it and he goes to the faculty to change where he sleeps because he’s that fucking scared of what will happen to him when I get my hands on him.

  He becomes a fucking ghost.

  To make matters worse, Joey finally resurfaces from whatever drug haze he’s been in and hears about the fucking warpath we’ve all been on and starts fucking messaging me again.

  Only this time he adds Lips into his little blood-soaked fantasies.

  The response I have to those messages shouldn’t surprise me at this point but the violent and possessive need to protect her, covet her, and own her takes me to my fucking knees.

  I’m fucked.

  I’m absolutely, without any doubt, fucked. Because she’s the worst possible option to feel this way about for so many different reasons. Two of the three most important people in my life are already fighting over her. She’s a fucking Mounty street kid who would be eaten alive by the social circles I was born into, and then there’s the small factor that both my father and my brother are serial rapists and killers who would love nothing more than to destroy her just to fucking ruin me.

  I can barely stay on top of keeping Avery safe.

  I can’t add someone else to that list… but she’s already fucking there.

  She’s already the first thing I think of when I wake up and the last person on my mind every night. I truly fucked myself over when I picked out all of that lingerie for her because I haven’t been able to take a shower without jerking off over each and every item, how it would look on her and especially how it would look coming off of her.

  I’d never cross the line by looking at those fucking revenge nudes Harlow took of her but fuck do I wish I knew what she looks like under the uniform and ugly sweaters.

  I wonder if Harley has seen her and then I fucking loathe him for getting the chance.

  I’m completely fucked.

  And because apparently I’ve developed a taste for torture, when Harley says he’s going down to the gym to watch Avery’s first attempts at learning self-defense, I go with him. I can’t even lie to myself and say I’m going to make sure no one goes after my sister.

  I’m going because I want to watch the Mounty in action.

  I can’t deny that her ability to take out guys three times the size of her makes her even more appealing to me, just another part of her that draws me in. It doesn’t stop me from wanting to kill anyone who’s placed bets on her, threatened her, fuck, so much as breathed wrong in her direction. But I can’t deny that seeing that streak of viciousness in her is… appealing. Maybe it’s the thought of a girl finally fighting back and winning that turns me the fuck on, or maybe it’s just all of the conditioning Joey and Senior have tried going wrong, I don’t really care either way.

  All I know is that she’s under my skin now and there’s no digging her out.

  “Don’t be a dick to Lips. She’s doing this to help keep Avery safe and, fuck, alive so don’t give her shit just for helping out,” Harley says, his voice tense as we make our way down to the gym.

  Blaise is hungover, the normal type for this early in the morning, but he side-eyes the fuck out of both of us like he wants to get a word in but just can’t bring himself to start this fight all over again.

  I get the feeling.

  All I’ve done this year is fight. With Avery, with the Mounty, Harley, and myself. It’s all been for nothing, I’m right where I didn’t want to be.

  “I’m here to support Avery; I won’t say a word to the Mounty so just drop it.”

  Harley gives me one last disbelieving look and then shoves the door open to the gym. The girls are both already dressed in gym clothes and Lips is running Avery through lessons, ignoring every grumble and whine that comes out of my sister.

  I grab a seat to watch, dragging it over to have a better view, and Harley and Blaise both do the same.

  The longer the lesson goes on, the more I wonder about exactly where the Mounty learned all of this and what her life looks like back in the Bay because… there’s nothing basic about this lesson. Sure teaching my sister not to tuck her thumb in is common sense but the stances and target points aren’t at all basic shit. She didn’t learn about that level of centering at a youth group self-defense class back in the Bay.

  Harley shares a look with me, seeing it all as well.

  Someday we need to figure out where the fuck she comes from.

  When they stop for a break, Avery looks like she’s done a four hour hip hop class and isn’t at all happy about it. The Mounty is completely unruffled, calm and contained even in the thick hoodie she’s wearing.

  “Do they teach this in Mounty school?” drawls Blaise, but his eyes are still glued on the Mounty like he wants to fucking jump her.

  I don’t like it and neither does Harley.

  Avery spots it from a mile away and comes trotting over to me, ready to deflect and distract so Lips doesn’t get caught in the crossfire. Always the fixer, the caretaker, and the glue to hold us all together no matter what.

  We’d be lost without her.

  “She’s good,” I say, and Avery smiles at me like I hung the moon just for her.

  “She is, she’s the best. If I have to learn this, there’s no one better to teach me.”

  I nod because it’s true and I’m tired of fighting everything. I’m just fucking weary, and Avery has always been my safe space to come home to, to be myself and feel whatever the fuck I needed to feel around.

  The Mounty changed that and I hated her for it… but it was my own fault.

  Lips calls out to us, “We still have more to cover, Aves, so get your as
s back over here.”

  She groans and drags her feet as she walks back over to her. “I’m not strong like you, Lips. I can’t do this.”

  That’s a load of shit.

  Avery is one of the strongest people I know; strength isn’t just the ability to fight.

  Lips sighs and leans her ass against the boxing ring, her arms crossed against her chest as she gives Avery a look that says she sees through her bullshit. “You think that because you’ve always had Ash or Harley or Blaise around to protect you but you’re wrong. You exercise six days a week. Some days you do three sessions. You’ve never broken a bone, no nerve damage, and when you froze at what Rory was doing it was fear not PTSD. Physically, you are stronger than me. What I am teaching you is the basics of self defense but the most important, the most valuable thing you need is something you already have.”

  Shit.

  She’s fucking good.

  I stalk back over to my seat, ready for them to get back into it.

  Lips ignores Avery huffing and crossing her arms as she continues her assessment. “You’re observant and intuitive. You can look at a student and make a quick assessment of what weaknesses they have and how to exploit them to take them out. So far you’ve used that strength to socially ruin the sheep but you can easily switch to reading body language and defending yourself. You’re better at it than anyone I’ve met, you’re as good as I am. You may end up better than me at it.”

  When Lips glances at us like we’re going to be a problem, Avery waves her off. “I don’t care that they’re here. But I need you to show me something real. Walk me through a situation and explain how knowledge will be better than strength or size. I need you to prove it to me so I can stop second guessing myself.”

  I share a look with Harley because Avery is too fucking good at manipulating situations to get what she wants. I hate it when she does it to me, but when it happens to everyone else and I benefit from it. Genius.

  Lips frowns for a second and then sighs like the whole world is resting on her shoulders. The look on her face isn’t that of a sixteen-year-old girl. She looks like a veteran who’s seen too much death and destruction in this world to ever be the same again.

  She grabs a stack of training mats and starts to pile them up until they’re about as high as her hip, then she slips her hoodie off and hands it over to Avery.

  Avery looks at it like it’s grown teeth and wants to take a chunk out of her, but she hesitantly takes it and pulls it over her head. She looks fucking stupid in it, fucking ridiculous, and I can’t help but take a photo of her for later use.

  Blackmailing my sister just got a little easier.

  Lips digs around in her bag until she finds a knife, slipping it into the hoodie pocket while Avery watches her every move. She uses that level of scrutiny on everything in our lives but here and now she doesn’t have to attempt to hide it so it’s more obvious.

  Then she stops and stares at the three of us sitting and watching all of this like it’s the most fucking fascinating thing we’ve ever witnessed. Fuck, it kind of is the best fucking sight because now that she’s handed the hoodie over, Lips is standing there in yoga pants and a tank top that molds to every inch of her chest.

  It’s the most I’ve ever seen of her and fuck does she live up to my expectations.

  “Look, you guys have to stay quiet. If she’s going to learn how to defend herself, you need to let me walk her through this. If you can’t hack it then please leave.”

  What the fuck is that supposed to mean?

  I nod, lying really because if I don’t like this I’m going to step the fuck in, and instantly I do want to butt in because her hand shoots out and grabs Avery’s wrist. She jumps and frowns back at the Mounty.

  Harley’s arm shoots out over my chest like he knows I’m about to jump in except… I do trust the Mounty enough to let it go.

  Doesn’t mean I like it.

  “The party that Joey insisted I go to first year. He told all of the juniors he was going to fuck me, one way or another. He found me walking back to the dorms and I knew he was high but I also knew he could outrun me. He’s not as big as Rory or Ash or most of the guys at this school because of his habit but drug addicts are unpredictable. I couldn’t just run.”

  Fuck.

  Fuck.

  I could handle it being anything, fucking anything, but Joey. Anything but the psychopath who taunts me, tortures me, fucking messes with my mind every chance he gets.

  The psychopath who knows just how much I want her.

  Lips holds up Avery’s wrist like she’s making a point. “He held my wrist harder than this. I could feel my bones bending under his fingers and pulling away meant fighting him off with a broken wrist. So…what do you do? Knowing him, reading the situation you’re in, what do you do?”

  Avery swallows but we both know the answer. “Play along. Get him talking and distract him.”

  I need to leave before I find out something that snaps the careful restraint I have over myself where my brother is concerned. I can’t do anything without risking Avery and I will not let anything hurt her again.

  Lips nods and tugs her over to the mats, sitting down and waiting for Avery to settle next to her before continuing, “Now he tells you he can fuck you by force or you can lie back and enjoy it. He kisses you. What do you do?”

  I’ll fucking kill him.

  The second I can kill him without losing Avery, I’m going to use every last brutal lesson I’ve learned over the years to draw out his death until he’s fucking begging me to end it. The simmering rage I’ve felt for him all of my life finally comes to a boil, overflowing in my veins until I feel so fucking reckless.

  It only gets worse.

  It only gets worse because Avery nearly breaks as she answers, “Play along. I have no choice, he’s still got my wrist.”

  “Good.”

  The second Lips shoves her back and covers her body with her own, I lose my fucking mind. I don’t even realize the vicious curses are coming out of me until Harley is wrestling the chair out of my hands and shoving me out of the gym.

  “Go. Go find someone to bleed out. I’ll watch out for Aves.”

  I can’t see or hear a thing as I make my way back up to our rooms because there’s no way I can fight right now. I’d kill whoever I went up against, just fucking pummel them into the ground, and it’ll be on Avery to cover up a fucking murder.

  So instead, I lock myself in my room and drink until I find the bottom of the bottle of bourbon.

  It doesn’t help one bit.

  Blaise finds me absolutely fucking destroyed on the floor next to my bed.

  We’ve been friends for too fucking long because he just grabs a beer and joins me down there, not a word said between us because there’s fucking nothing to say.

  I just want Joey dead.

  I can’t kill him.

  If he raped her… if he did to her what he’s done to too fucking many other girls, I don’t know if I could stop myself.

  I need to know.

  I’ll fucking figure it out if I have to.

  I struggle to my feet and Blaise watches me, his eyes wary but he doesn't attempt to stop me. When I stumble a little at the door he calls out, "You can't kill him in that state."

  I don't answer him, mostly because I could kill Joey high, blind, and fucking wasted if I wanted to, and I make my way out toward the girls’ room. It only takes me until the end of the hallway to get my legs working properly underneath me and half of the students are still doing everything they can to avoid me so I'm not worried about being jumped on the walk over.

  I almost just unlock the door, always having a set of keys on me because Avery would never accept me not having them, but I think better and knock instead.

  I want to fucking puke.

  The door swings open and Lips stares up at me, the shock melting off of her face and exasperation taking up residence fucking quickly. Without a word, she shoves me toward the couch, mum
bling under her breath as she locks the door, “My life is now babysitting drunk, spoiled rich kids.”

  It burns a little that she thinks of me like that. I'd rather she thought of me as an asshole than a spoiled rich kid.

  She sighs and rubs a hand over her face. “Avery is in the shower, if you need to puke please tell me now so I can get you a bucket.”

  I frown at her but, really, of course she thinks I'm here for my sister. At what point have I given her any reason to believe I'd want to see her instead. She takes a little gasped breath in and tries to step away from me, so I snatch her wrist and tug her down onto the couch beside me. “I’m not here for Floss.”

  She keeps the shock off of her face but her movements are too rigid as she settles back into the couch. “What’s wrong? What do I need to fix now?”

  I can't even attempt to soften my words. “Did my brother rape you?”

  She frowns at me and I fumble over my words to explain myself. “I know you walked her through it but I need to hear from you, that you got away from him. I need to know that he didn’t get away with it.”

  She blinks at me. “He tried but I got away from him. Don’t worry about it, I’m not losing sleep over it.”

  That's it.

  She's going to fucking hate me forever, there's no coming back from being the brother of that rapist cunt. Even if she did forgive me for everything else that I've done to her. Fuck. Do I want forgiveness? Is there enough alcohol burning through my system to admit just how badly I need her to want me back right now?

  I groan and lean forward until my elbows hit my knees and my face is cradled in my hands. How fucking badly have I misjudged her all along and now it's back to bite me in the fucking ass.

  “Fuck, how can you even stand to look at me? I look just like that fucking monster. We're all the spitting fucking image of our father.” The bitterness I feel leaks through into the laugh I choke out. “Harley looks like my mom. He gets to look like the only good we ever had in our lives and I get to stare in the mirror at the demons who own us. Fuck, now I sound like Morrison. Someone get me another fucking drink before I start singing.”