Page 88 of Pretty Vengeance

I lean down, bringing us closer together. “Go then. We’ll talk tomorrow. I’ll come for you after class.”

“I don’t know.” She shoves a hand back in a bid to push me away so she can open the car door.

My feet might as well be nailed to the ground.

Turning her head with fury flashing in her eyes, she stares at me. “You’re seriously going to push the issue? Right now?”

I’m tempted to stop her from leaving. I want the misunderstanding behind us, so I can have her back. But it’s not only us here. There’s Ash. And there’s War. Neither of them will be cool with my pulling Sawyer into the house.

“Right, no.” Stepping back, I shove my hands in my pockets. “But tomorrow, Sauce. Wewilltalk.”

Ash appears next to me and gives me a gentle push to get me farther away. Then she opens the passenger door for Sawyer. “The men in my family are crazy. Really sorry about that.”

Sawyer drops into the passenger seat, and Ash closes the door.

Ash turns and looks at me with a skeptical expression. “Sort yourself, James, or I’m going to stop helping you.”

“You won’t. But I will sort this out.”

Ash gives me a brief, violent hug before she shoves me away and turns and stalks to the driver’s side of the car.

I wait, watching as Ash gets in and the car starts. It’s not until they pull away and completely disappear that I jog up the metal stairs to enter the house.

War sits on the couch, scrolling on his phone. Without looking up, he says, “You’re fucking kidding, right?”

“I’ll handle her.”

His nearly black eyes rise. “That’s the problem.”

War’s proven himself the best sort of mate a killer could have, so I don’t fault him for a thing.

Avoiding Sawyer is in the interest of protecting myselfand himfrom the hell-storm that would rain down if anyone found out what we’d just been up to.

It’s a shame I can’t do the smart thing.

Sawyer’s mine, and I want her back.

40

SAWYER

When we get to the dorm, Ash and I eat in the dining hall, and then because it seems like everyone in the freaking dorm is doing her laundry after getting back from holiday travel, we go to our room and settle into our beds with laptops and Nutella lattes.

When Ash puts in earbuds to stream something, I’m finally able to concentrate and circle back to the encounter with Jamie. I’ve worked out that Brad must’ve done something really horrible for Jamie to blame me for not turning him in, but I have no idea what that was.

Online investigations reveal Brad’s fraternity had a serious scandal two years ago. Apparently, guys took photos of sleeping or passed-out nude and semi-nude girls who stayed over. After, the guys shared the pics across campus, sometimes even selling them.

There were concerns the women might have been given sedatives to ensure they didn’t wake while the guys removed their clothes and posed them for filming.

From the articles, the men whose involvement was proven were expelled. In some cases however, the perpetrators couldn’t be identified. The entire fraternity was sanctioned, and it narrowly missed being closed for good.

At least two irate fathers made threats against fraternity members.

Unlike some of his fraternity brothers, who’d been accused but whose involvement couldn’t be confirmed, Brad wasn’t named in any of the articles about the investigation or proceedings.

But since the only people in my family Jamie could’ve heard gossip or accusations about would’ve been Brad or my bio mom, Brad had to be the problem. The rest of my adopted family lives out of state and haven’t been involved in any public scandals—or any private ones that I know about.

Flashing back to Jamie’s fury on the night he accused me of covering for Brad makes me think Brad hurt someone Jamie cares about.Like Ashling. My stomach plummets at the thought. She did tell Crosby she never wanted to see Brad around. She claimed it was because of the way he treated me, but it might’ve been something more.