Justice: A Billionaire Romance Read Free Page A

follow Mom into MJT or Dad into politics.
    Riley's biggest flaw was that he didn't take it seriously enough. He treated everything like it was some sort of grand game, not to be taken seriously. In a family of people that ran by a strict time schedule, he was always the one that would be late, showing up five minutes or so after we were supposed to leave, acting like nothing was wrong. Even when he went on patrol, he was the one who was most likely to break the rules that our parents had worked so hard to drill into us. Sophie says that Riley takes after my Mom, as apparently my mother was that sort of party girl when she was younger, but she’d grown more serious as she got older. "It was just before meeting your father that Tabby grew more serious," Sophie had told me after I complained once when Riley was in high school. "She had her heart broken very badly."
    "Pressman?" I asked. Sophie had looked at me, surprised. "Mom told me the basics. She left out the gooshy parts."
    Perhaps that was what Riley needed, I thought as he came into the gym. As opposed to the old layout of the house, where the gym had been located in what previously had been the sanctuary of a church, our gym was located in a custom renovated building that had been part of the mental hospital that made up our Mount Zion estate. From the outside it looked normal, but inside the first floor and basement had been joined, all the flooring in between removed to expose the steel structural beams. It had been my playground, my sports field, and my training center for almost my entire life, and I knew every nook and cranny of the room. I’d been inside for nearly ten minutes, warmed up and stretched when Riley sauntered in. He was still wiping the sleep from his eyes, his blond hair still twisted up in the remnants of sleep.
    "Chill out Carter, it's not like Tabby is going to fire you if you show up for work ten minutes after noon," Riley yawned. "Besides, we're just doing barbell work today anyway, not jumping around in the nest overhead."
    I glanced up at the network of bars, cables, wires and other obstacles that comprised most of what had been the first floor of the building, my lip lifting in frustration. Some of those gaps, ones that Riley, Andi, or even my sister Barbara could fit through with ease were just too damn small for me. "Lucky for you. I noticed that you're getting a bit of a frat boy look to you, Riley. Forgetting your roots, are you?"
    "Fuck you, Carter," Riley shot back. I had gotten to him, which is what I wanted. Riley did better when he was slightly pissed off. "Just because I wanted to go to Harvard instead of staying in town like you and Andi doesn't mean I've forgotten where I come from. Now let me get stretched. Load the bar."
    I did as he asked, setting up the squat rack while Riley started doing jumping jacks, then burpees to warm up his hips and legs for the workout. We were doing safety bar squats that day, and those need a good warm up. I took my time setting up the bar, then did a quick fifteen reps with the empty bar to let myself get into the groove. "You ready?"
    Riley went over to the wall, where we had weight belts hanging on hooks. He took down his favorite and cinched it in, and I noticed he was cinching it tighter than when he'd been living at home full time. "How much weight are you down?"
    "Only ten pounds," Riley said. "Just trimming down the stomach."
    "Trimming down what?" I asked as I put the first set of forty-five pound plates on the bar. "You had a six pack last time I checked."
    "Yeah, but a thirty three waist," Riley complained. "That is so not suave with the girls."
    I rolled my eyes, biting back my criticism. We'd been taught since birth, we train for performance, not for looks. If we were at our athletic peaks, the fact is, we'd look good too. Instead, I turned it back on Riley. "So what about the new girl? What's she think of your new look?"
    "Just fine so far," Riley said. "We're seeing each other again