Page 82 of Tutoring Mr. Hotshot

“Yes, ma’am. Please do that. I don’t know how long this will take.”

She comes around the corner and plants a kiss on my cheek. “Be careful. Call me if you need bail money.”

I laugh as I leave her place. Aries doesn’t live close enough for me to walk, so I call him to come pick me up. He tells me he’ll be right over.

A few minutes later, he comes to a screeching halt in front of the house. I hold up my hand to stop him from coming over as I jog down the steps and to the passenger side.

Once I’m buckled in, I motion for him to drive. “Let’s get to your place, then we can talk. I want to tell everyone so we can make a solid plan.”

He frowns but does as I ask. We pull into his drive a second before the others arrive.Well, Bellamy and Bishop at least.I suspect the others will take longer since they were eating.

“Everyone inside. Daddy Alliance Emergency meeting time.” Aries rushes in the door, then calls out, “RAYMOND!”

His boy comes running down the hall, his socked feet sliding across the entry floor. Aries grabs his waist to stop him.

“Daddy, why did you yell?”

Aries kisses his nose. “Because your friends are here to play with you. I’ll bring your pizza to your playroom once it arrives.”

Finn and Atlas step up with big smiles of their own. The three of them start whispering to one another as they rush back in the direction Raymond came from.

“Let’s take this to the living room,” Aries tells us.

We all file in the space, the guys taking a seat as I stand in front of them. “Before I start, know that everything is ok. I handled what I could but now I need your help.”

Aries frowns. “What’s ok?”

“Rodney is ok.”

He freezes. “What happened to my brother?”

Bellamy places a hand on his friend’s shoulder. “If you chill for a minute, you’ll find out. Go ahead, Andry. Tell us.”

“Thanks,” I tell him before starting the story all over again. This time, I make it all the way through without interruption. The guys keep it together up until the very end.

Then it becomes chaos.

Aries explodes from the couch as Bellamy pulls out his phone and immediately starts texting someone. Bishop stands slowly, then comes over to me.

His arms wrap around me in what I eventually realize is a hug. “I’m sorry you had to see him that way. Your boy should not have been hurt today.”

“Yes, he shouldn’t have. I wanted to kill Liam for what he did. I still sort of want to.”

“SAME! Let’s do it. Murder is a good option. Who do we know? Surely we can get someone to clean this up.”

Bellamy chokes out a laugh and stops long enough to look up. “We’re not committing murder. There is no need for a cleanup crew because we’re all going to behave.”

“That’s not… we can’t…. I need to get back at him for this. Someone hurt my brother, BB!”

“I know that. And believe me, we will hurt him. But taking his life makes the pain short. What if you could draw it out for years and years? Wouldn’t that be better?”

My gaze locks on the big quarterback sitting patiently on the couch. He’s clearly not as calm about this as I thought.

“This is why I asked you guys to meet me. I need smart decisions. Something that will make him stop and leave my boy alone. I can’t — I won’t let him get away with this.”

“And he won’t. I promise it,” Bellamy vows.

Bishop asks him, “What do you have in mind?”

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