“Information that I obtain by whoring myself out.”
“No. It’s not like that. You’re not going to actually do anything with him. You’re going to use your feminine wiles to get what you want. Women have been doing it for years.”
“And it still sucks.”
I nod. “You’re not wrong. I don’t love the idea either, but what else do we have? He needs to pay for this crime…and Ror, we could sure use ten grand.”
Rory pauses a moment, twists her lips. She’s thinking. That’s the Rory thinking pose.
“All right. But we’re going to need help with this.”
“Carmen. Carmen and Jordan. They’ll help us.”
“Can we trust them?”
“Jordan’s our cousin. Of course we can trust her, and you and Carmen are friends. Besides, she drank that shit too, and I swear it nearly obliterated her.”
“All right. We’ll bring them in.” Rory rolls her eyes. “Do you really think I can pull this off?”
“Rory, you’ve starred in every school musical since you were in the sixth grade. You’re an actress by nature. Of course you can pull it off. Plus, you’re Rory Pike. You’re the only person who can.”
“I hope you’re right, Cal. Because this is the freaking role of a lifetime.”
Keats and Karen leave the room, and Rory and I stare at the closed box sitting on the table in front of us.
“Now or never,” Rory says.
“Just open the damned thing.”
She rests her fingers on the lid. “I’m frightened, Callie.”
“Either it’s there or it isn’t. We have to know, Rory. We have to, so we know how to approach this.”
“I can’t believe this is all coming back to bite us in the ass.”
“Well, it is. So open the damned thing, will you?”
Rory bites her lower lip. “Do you ever wish you could go back and relive a certain time in your life?”
“Ror…”
“Screw it all. All right.” She lifts the lid of the metal box.
CHAPTER FOUR
DONNY
I head over to Ava’s for lunch. As soon as I open the door, though, I wish I’d chosen something else.
Brendan Murphy, his long ginger hair pulled into a low ponytail, sits at one of the small tables in the bakery, and Ava stands next to his table, her black apron smudged with flour and her pink hair piled into a hair net, talking to him.
“Shit,” I mutter under my breath.
Ava looks up when the bells on the door tinkle. “Hey, Donny!”
“Hey, cuz. Brendan.”
Brendan meets my gaze, his blue eyes glaring. He’s not happy, though of course I don’t expect him to be. How much of his attitude am I projecting onto him because I’m upset at myself for putting all this shit in motion?