A Red Queen Black Friday

Flat-Screens and Lingerie

As three muscular guys all over six feet fall, Bree, Tramy, and Cal had little to be afraid of in Best Buy.

Or so they thought.

The shoppers in there had no morals, no restraint. Displays of TVs toppled, people ran rampant through the aisles, and the security scanning gates went off every five minutes. It still eluded Cal why, if you were planning on shoplifting anyway, it mattered that you do it on Black Friday.

The Barrow brothers and their sister's boyfriend had so far managed to snag three out of the five flatscreens they were assigned to buy, along with an iPad for Ruth Barrow and an Xbox that Bree and Tramy would put to good use. That left two TVs, a Mac for the family, a sound system, two printers, a washer and dryer, and—

Cal didn't want to think about it. With Mare's brothers constantly badgering him about the nature of his relationship with their sister, their frequent mentions of welding bars to Mare's bedroom window, and the general distractedness of the day, Cal's team had no chance of winning.

"So Cal," Bree said, returning from a counter with Tramy where they had just scored a Mac and two MacBooks. Cal, in spite of being the son of a billionaire, was beginning to think that his father had given Mare too much money. This day was getting out of control, and he could hardly imagine what was going on with the Holy Trinity at the Ashley Furniture Homestore. "I'm supposed to ask you a question."

Cal, wearing his usual plain jeans, T-shirt, and the leather jacket he wore when he rode his motorcycle, tried to stand a little taller as the Barrow brothers approached him. It still confounded Cal how his girlfriend, at five-foot-two, had brothers that were just as tall as him

The twin conniving smiles that Bree and Tramy wore didn't help.

As Tramy dumped the packages into the three carts that Cal was guarding, Bree showed Cal a particularly incriminating photo on his cell phone. "Mare just texted me, and she's wondering if you like it. I guess they're having a great sale at Victoria's Secret today."

Cal stared down a magnificent photo of women's lingerie, and no matter how hard he tried, his mind went straight to imagining Mare in the scarlet lace on the phone in front him. Not that she looked bad in anything, but her curves and ass would look just perfect in that magnificent—

My colors, Cal thought. She's trying to kill me.

Still, Cal was very intrigued by what Mare was doing at Victoria's Secret.

He also decided that he would have to get away from Bree and Tramy long enough to text Mare that he definitely thought she should buy it.

Though he had nothing in his throat, Cal swallowed anyway before looking a vengeful Bree Barrow straight in the eyes. "I don't know why she would be asking my opinion about nightwear, Bree."

Tramy shook his head. "That's not nightwear, Cal."

Cal blinked, trying and failing to play dumb. "Well, then you tell your sister that I have no interest in seeing her in that sort of outfit. That would be highly inappropriate. I prefer when she wears sweatshirts and sweatpants."

In truth, Cal had seen Mare in outfits far skimpier than the one on the screen.

Tramy narrowed his eyes. "Are you telling our sister how to dress, Cal? Because we live in the twenty-first century, and that's sexist, you know."

Bree started muttering as he turned his phone back to himself. "Cal says you would look disgusting . . . sexist jerk . . . break up with him."

Cal sighed, remembering, at least, that Mare's mom liked him. Shade and Gisa didn't hate him either.

Bree and Tramy, however, along with Daniel Barrow, had made it clear enough to Cal what would happen if he made one false move. Over the weeks, the three of them had made countless jokes about poisoning Cal, convincing Mare to cheat on Cal, and running Cal's motorcycle off the Brooklyn Bridge. Cal was beginning to think that he should start checking his brake line every time he left the Barrow house.

Whoever had put him on a team with Bree and Tramy most likely wanted to see Cal dead. His money was on Evangeline, but it just as easily could've been somebody else.

Bree gave Cal a good ol' slap on the back. "Come on, Cal. Let's go look at printers."