Adler (The Henchmen MC 14)

"Her sister owns Phallus-opy," Lenny explained. "So if you ever need a good bullet or rabbit, you know who to come to for a recommendation."

"So who is ready?" Peyton asked a few moments later after we all got a chance to talk to each other, get to know basic facts.

Like Rey had a mismatch of jobs from dog-sitting and walking to making her own herbal remedies. And Savea worked at a local pet store. Jamie was a mechanic working for someone named Colton King whose very name made all the girls fan themselves dramatically.

"I think my car is due for an oil change," I decided, never having met the man in question.

"Get it done while you can," Lenny insisted.

"What do you mean?"

"Repo is a mechanic. He gets butthurt if any of us go to a shop when we could use him. Goes on rants about the price of labor and... honestly, I don't even know. I kinda glaze over when words like catalytic and pistons come up."

"So, ah, do you girls belong to Henchmen too?" I asked, realizing how little I knew about how everyone interconnected in this incestuous little town of ours.

"Well, Rey is with Reeve, as you know. But Savvy is moon-eyeing a certain Rivers brother."

"I am not! I moon-eye them all equally."

"Bullshit," Peyton called her bluff. "You eyefuck Kingston so hard that it makes me blush."

"Who are the Rivers brothers?"

"Oh, you sweet, naive girl," Peyton said, moving to sit next to me, patting my head like an ignorant child. "So, we have the Mallicks, right?"

"Who own Chaz's as a front for their loansharking," I supplied.

"Precisely. Well, my sister is married to Eli Mallick. And his brother Mark is married to a woman named Scotti. Scotti's brothers are the Rivers. Kingston, Nixon, Atlas, and Rush."

"Nice names," I decided, nodding.

"Right? I swear their mom planned for them to be like reality stars or something. Anyway. They're all hot. Tall, dark, dark-eyed, gorgeous manmeat. And Savea pretends that she has a crush on them all when we all really know it is King's meatstick she wants in her ladycave."

"Oh, dear God," Savvy whimpered, ducking her head so her hair fell forward to hide her face that must have been a brutal shade of red right then.

You'd think that by being a friend to someone such as Peyton, she'd be used to the blunt and over-the-top comments by now, but maybe it was different when it was your 'ladycave' being discussed in front of a crowd.

"She wants his babies. And then we'd finally be technically family in a very roundabout way."

"So... what were we supposed to be 'ready' for?" Jamie asked. "Not another of those fucking slasher flicks of yours, right, babe?"

"I learned my lesson last girls night," Peyton declared, rolling her eyes. "How was I supposed to know Dusty would go green and puke?"

"Because she's a human being?" Lenny suggested. "And that movie had people being hacked to death with machetes in brutally realistic detail for such a campy C-film."

"Seriously, where do you find that shit?" Jamie asked, shaking her head.

"They're all killjoys," Peyton told me, shaking her head. "But I get it, you all have weak stomachs. So I picked something tamer. Let me introduce you to a sexy, badass little assassin by the name of Nikita."

The next three hours were full of food, jokes, a few drinks - less for me since I was the only one driving home - and a new show I decided I needed to binge watch.

But then Rey declared that Reeve was on his way to get her, giggling herself to tears when Peyton made some lewd comment about fucking her, proof that she had enjoyed far too much of that rosè Peyton kept her plied with since she walked in the door.

Savea excused herself to bed in the spare room because she apparently got up early to open the pet shop.

And then Lenny decided to have Edison come to get her as well, everything seeming to wind down.

Then Sugar was at the door, eye-fucking his woman, a clear sign it was time for me to shuffle out as well.

"Do you need a ride?" I asked Jamie as she moved out with me.

"Thanks, but I am gonna walk. It was nice getting to know you, Lou. I hope you hang around."

And, well, I hoped I would as well.

For the first time in my life, I knew what it was like to have friends, to socialize.

And I found I liked it.

More than I could have expected.

I unlocked my apartment, still smiling to myself over some of the shit that was said between friends, openly inviting me into the fold with them to laugh at Peyton's antics or Rey's babcia, or Lenny's interactions with the first class clientele at Meryl's.

"Got ya."

I stopped short, finding Adler sitting on my counter, a coffee cup cradled in his hand, shooting me a sly smile.