Call Me...Vengeance: Book 1 in the Vengeance MC Series by Natasha Thomas Page A

into slavery if she thought it would further the family name.
     
    Forget the fact that most of the boys tried to grope me before we made it to dinner or a movie, let alone they were ugly as sin inside and out because none of that mattered. Appearances and good pairings were the only things that factored into the decision about who I would eventually marry. Well, fuck that. Why do you think I got the hell out of dodge?
     
    One date, in particular, stood out in my memory. It went on record as the worst date in the history of dates ever. And just happened to be one my Mother organized. There was more to it than that, but for a long time afterward I refused to acknowledge how much more there really was. I don’t think I was trying to repress what had happened. I wanted to forget it that’s all. I wanted to erase it from my memory and pretend it hadn’t.
     
    My opinion on whether or not I wanted to go out with Oliver wasn’t considered. But let’s just say – if I would have been asked, my response would be – I’d prefer to endure a trip to the Sahara with no water, food, or hope of rescue, and my corpse picked over by carnivorous animals before being forced to date an asshole like, Oliver Markham.
     
    Simply put, Oliver is a world-class douche canoe. It really is a shame he can’t sail away down the longest river, floating out into the ocean to be eaten by a herd of passing Orca. Violent, maybe, but nevertheless true. He is a smarmy, self-involved prick, which I was used to, but Oliver took that title to a whole new level and owned it.
     
    It was a Friday night when Oliver picked me up in his brand new Jaguar his Mommy and Daddy bought him. He planned to take me to Glades Country Club, a place I couldn’t stand. It was ostentatious and filled pretentious men and women who believed they were above the ordinary citizens who served them and cleared their plates. I had worked there as a lifeguard for all of one summer before I was told flatly by my parents it wasn’t a respectable job for a girl like me.
     
    I would have preferred to go and grab a burger or pizza like the other teenagers our age did, but Oliver wouldn’t hear of it. He wouldn’t entertain going somewhere as common as, Larry’s Pizza Parlor on Grand. All of the seniors who attended the public high schools on this side of, Knoxville went there on Friday nights after their football games, and I for once wanted to be part of something like that. Laughing, joking, sodas and slices, but it wasn’t to be. The country club it was.
     
    In retrospect, the date didn’t start off as badly as it could have. Oliver complimented me in front of my Mother telling me I looked fantastic, opened the car door for me, and made a half-hearted attempt at small talk on the drive to the country club, but those were the highlights. Everything went drastically downhill from there.
     
    It wasn’t even Oliver trying to educate me on proper posture, which silver went with what course, or that it’s considered the man’s duty to order for his date that made the date an epic failure. Although, none of that helped.
     
    The fact that spelling, b-o-r-i-n-g out in my head was more entertaining than his company made for lighthearted relief albeit he wasn’t aware that was how I was passing the night with him. Not even Oliver’s incessant chatter about how talented my Father is, how inspiring was all that bad. I mean, I didn’t really give a shit about his opinion of my Father, and if Oliver thought it would get him into Donald’s good graces brown nosing him when he couldn’t lap up all the attention, then he had another thing coming.
     
    “You know, Bethany,” God, I hate it when people call me by my full name. I don’t say anything, though because what would be the point. “I think it’s wonderful that you’re planning on applying to Harvard Law to continue your family’s tradition.”
     
    Say what? I have no idea where he’s getting his information from, but