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(PART SIX) : FINAL

Kyle sat terrified as the man held him up by his hair, eyeing him like he was an expensive piece of artwork himself. He couldn't help the little whimper that came out as he felt fingers roughly tighten through his hair. "Well? I don't recall this little guy being on the list of assets." the man sneered, turning toward Roxanne.

She didn't even skip a beat. "That's the hostage. Insurance against the police, nothing more." she brushed off. Kyle couldn't tell if she was really that nonchalant about it or if she was just pretending to be for his sake, but it didn't matter. He groaned as the man gave one final, harsh tug to his hair before him back onto the ground. "Well you see, he still counts as an asset. One that you ladies didn't disclose." he growled menacingly, and neither Kyle nor the Thorny Roses missed how his fingers seemed to twitch toward his left pocket. "This might make our price negotiations...interesting."

"Then by all means, let's negotiate." Roxanne replied coldly, turning on her heel and strutting toward the dining room without bothering to check if the men were following her. The first two dark suits trailed behind her without complaint. The third one sneered again before begrudgingly doing the same. One by one, Pepper, Dani, and Annie followed, though Annie lingered behind long enough to bend down and whisper in Kyle's ear, "Don't worry. We'll be done and have them out of here real soon."

Kyle looked up at her mask, trying to meet her eyes from behind the dark cloth. She gingerly patted the already-forming bruise on the side of his face where Dani had hit him, before finally turning to follow the others. The door closed behind them, and Kyle was left alone, bound and gagged on the plush carpet floor. Not having much else to do, he squirmed and strained his ears, trying to hear anything other than low muffled voices from the other room. He didn't like this. The Thorny Roses were thieves, but they were self-proclaimed "thieves with morals." He especially didn't like how that one man looked at him like he was something to eat...

Whatever conversation they were having, it seemed to be getting less and less friendly. Soon enough Kyle could hear shouts coming from multiple people, though he still couldn't determine what they were saying. Not wanting to stick around, he desperately tried to shimmy down the hallway and into another room, but was interrupted when the door suddenly burst open and multiple heavy footsteps made their way toward him.

"So what?! He's an asset, one that you bitches PURPOSEFULLY hid from us, so I think it's only fair that we get to take him as a consolation."

"And WE told you, you're not taking him anywhere. That wasn't part of the original deal."

"Who the hell died and made you queen? In case you haven't noticed, you're not exactly in a position to be-hey you little bastard, where do you think you're going?" the blue-eyed gangster, the one that originally had given Kyle the creeps, spotted the brunette in his attempts to crawl down the hall. Stalking across the room, the men roughly grabbed him by the roots of his hair and held him on display for the others in the room to see. "See? No respect for authority, honestly you should be thanking me that I'm offering to take him off your hands." the man sneered. Kyle whimpered, sending a pleading look to Roxanne and the others.

Though their masks still disguised their faces, he could clearly see each of the girls tensing. "I'm warning you. That's our insurance. You take him, and law enforcement will have no problems busting in here guns blazing. If that happens we won't be the only ones taking the fall for this botched heist." the redhead seethed, only thinly veiling her threat.

Kyle writhed, trying to twist himself out of the gangster's unforgiving hold on his hair. Unfortunately for him, that only seemed to make the dangerous man even more annoyed. "You know, I almost thought you bitches might have been worthy associates one day. Too bad it looks like nobody in this house has any respect for their elders." he growled, raising his hand ever so slightly back toward the sharp outline of a pistol that lay in his coat pocket.

"Hmmph!" Kyle tried to let out a cry to warn the girls, twisting violently away from the man to try and knock him off balance, nearly losing some of his hair in the process. Those brief moments were just enough to allow Roxanne to step forward and, brandishing a pistol of her own, fire at the man who had been holding him hostage.

After the first gunshot rang out, the entire house devolved into chaos. Kyle groaned as he was suddenly thrown to the floor, landing painfully on his side as he began twisting and trying to crawl toward any bit of cover he could. Loud bangs filled the air around him as the gangsters and the Thorny Roses duked it out...but it wasn't just their bullets either. Windows crashed from the outside, flooding the house with spotlights as police sirens blared just outside.

"You cunts! You sold us out?!"

"Don't pretend this was ever going to end well!" Roxanne's voice could be heard screaming out, just as a stray bullet grazed Kyle's arm. He whimpered, curling up into a ball as tight as he could and trying in vain to pretend that he couldn't feel a steady trickle of blood seep into his shirt. At some point in the chaos the screams from the gangsters grew fewer and far between, until finally the only thing the bound brunette could hear were anxious shouts from the Thorny Roses and a police intercom demanding their immediate surrender.

"Oh sweetheart, I'm sorry we got you into this mess..." Kyle unraveled slightly, just enough to squint up at Roxanne's unmasked and worried face. He let out muffled grumbles at her, teary eyed and still in pain. The redhead cooed sympathetically, tearing off a strip of black cloth from what used to be her mask and tying it around the wound where a bullet had grazed him to staunch the bleeding. "I really am sorry." She whispered again.

"Boss we gotta move NOW!"

"Oh shit they got one of those battering rams to break down doors!"

"Roxanne please!"

The leader of the Thorny Roses shot her former captive one final sympathetic look before bolting off, out of Kyle's line of sight. Within a few seconds he heard the front door burst open, and soon enough he was being untied and carried off by uniformed police officers.

The next few days were a fast paced blur of police questioning, hospitalization to receive stitches in his arm, and filling out copious amounts of paperwork. Turns out the cameras at the museum had caught his abduction on tape, and the police had been on the hunt for his kidnappers ever since. "It's alright now, you were gone for a few weeks but I promise you'll get to go home soon." a sympathetic officer who had come to interview him had said. She had asked him all the usual questions. Could he give a description? Any names? Did he know of any motive? Apparently, SOMEHOW, all four of the girls had managed to get away. Whoever those "buyers" they had originally lined up were higher on the food chain when it came to organized crime, so the police targeted them first as they made their way through the house. No one knew how the Thorny Roses managed to evade capture.

Kyle honestly couldn't tell the police how Roxanne and the others escaped. At the same time, he also glossed over the important information. He lied and said he didn't know their names. He told them that they were planning to sell stolen art, but they never let him be around when they were negotiating with potential buyers. Technically, that part was true. After a couple rounds of questioning by the police he was also questioned by the museum staff and some insurance company, who gave him a contract which he signed without much thought. He just wanted to go home.

When the police finally DID let him go home, they made sure to give him a list of phone numbers to call if he ever felt the need to talk to a psychiatrist or if he suddenly remembered everything. Kyle just nodded the entire time, closing the door and flopping onto his bed when they were gone. Or at least he tried to, because the doorbell rang soon after. Groaning, the former captive went back to the front door, ready to tell the police that he just wanted to be left alone.

Much to his surprise, instead of the cops come back to interview him there was nobody there. All that was on his front step was a plain, unassuming suitcase with a sticky note stuck to the top of it.

'Here you go Sweetheart, a little something for your troubles.' It was left unsigned.

It didn't take a genius to figure out who the note was from. Glancing nervously around to make sure that no one was watching, Kyle gingerly took the suitcase back into the house. He wasn't able to catch a glimpse of who had left it. Placing it on his coffee table, the brunette contemplated opening it. He wasn't sure if he liked the sound of whatever a "little something" was, but in all honesty his curiosity was getting the better of him.

Drawing in a deep breath, Kyle finally worked up the nerve to open the case.

He nearly fainted when he saw what was inside.

SEVERAL MONTHS LATER

Kyle drew out his keys from his back pocket, pausing for a moment to smile up at the newly-painted sign that hung proudly over the front door of the small building 'KC's Coffee and Confections' it read. Unlocking the door, he made his way into the back room, whistling as he did so.

Turns out that the paperwork the museum had insisted on him signing was a sort of settlement. A very large check was made out to him by his former employers, and in exchange he wouldn't sue them for everything that happened to him while he was being held captive by the Thorny Roses. It was a big enough sum that he was able to stop pulling one-night-only jobs like that one and finally start up a business of his own.

The building was modest, an old hole in the wall that used to be a Chinese restaurant. Still, with some careful investing of the settlement he got, a small loan from the bank, and some very, very careful handling of his anonymous donor's "gift" was enough for him to get the place started. Now all he had to do was hire an extra barista or two to help out around the place and he could open it up for business.

Meandering to the back office room, Kyle pulled out a manila folder that held the resume from a promising applicant, a Miss R. Smith. She was his first interview of the day, and from the looks of it she was well versed in making sweets and pastries, which would be a great help to him if this place was to live up to its name.

A light tingle of the front door bell alerted him to the presence of another person, probably Miss Smith herself. "Here in the back room!" Kyle called, putting away the folder and setting his hands on top of his modest desk. The sound of sharp, confident heels clicking against the linoleum floors got closer and closer, until finally the door opened and Kyle's eyes went wide.

Blazing red hair greeted him, and a smile so wide it made the pair of sharp green eyes crinkle at the edges. "Hey there sweetheart, you miss me?" Roxanne teased.

Kyle sat dumbfounded as his former kidnapper confidently took a seat across from him, carefully glancing around the place before letting out a low, disapproving whistle. "Damn boy, I would've figured you would get someplace...I don't know, a little bigger? In a nicer part of town? I sent you a million dollars to work with after all. You could have at least put in wooden floors, gotten some crown molding or something." she chastised.

Blinking, the brunette regained some of his senses at her criticism. "And how exactly was I going to spend a million dollars without somebody asking me where all of it came from?! I'm trying to live a comfortable, under-the-radar life here you psycho, not have the government come knocking at my door asking if I'm a mob boss or something." he growled.

Roxanne threw her head back and laughed "Heh, never thought of that. No wonder the other girls gave me funny looks when I sent that package. Oh well, just shove it under your bed or something and use it in small increments I guess. You'll never have to order takeout from your own pocket ever again," she joked, leaning forward and resting both elbows on the desk "Which reminds me, I'm in need of some steady, legal income myself and heard you were hiring. Whaddya say?"

Kyle blinked again "Wait-you're out of the robbery business?" he questioned. Without thinking he raised a hand to rub at the raised scar on his arm. Roxanne noticed the tic, but didn't draw attention to it, instead sighing and looking down at the space between her hands. "Yeah...me and the other girls, we decided that things just were getting way too out of hand. Sure it's fun when you start but, when things go wrong like that, you're reminded that folks in that kind of businesses tend to be pretty cruel. And nobody really lasts long. So we all decided to take the money from this last job and go off to do our own thing."

Oh. Kyle frowned "I-I'm sorry." he mumbled sheepishly, not really knowing what else to say. Roxanne looked up at him and quirked up an eyebrow "Boy, why do you look like somebody just killed your puppy? For god's sake I meant we all are going to find different jobs, we didn't do that whole 'ride into the sunset never to see each other again' bullshit, the Thorny Roses are as tight as ever. I LITERALLY just tagged all three of them in a facebook post."

Oh. The brunette could practically feel the blush rising up his face. "That...that's good to know I guess, so the other girls are doing alright?"

"Oh yeah, just peachy. Annie and Pepper got a place together and started taking classes at a community college, Dani actually managed to get an IT job for some bank, which she swears she won't hack but time will tell."

Roxanne sent another pointed look to her former captive. "So then Mr. Kyle Connolley, I assume you've already read my resume. I've got plenty of experience in the kitchen making sweet things thanks to Annie, I've got great people skills, and I can kick the ass of whoever might come in here to start trouble because, again, this ain't exactly the nicest part of town," she stood up, extending a hand toward him "So am I hired?"

Kyle looked down at her outstretched hand. Then her eyes, practically brimming with excitement. Smirking, Kyle stood up and took her hand in his. "First of all, those things are only marginally true. BUT I think I'd be willing to take a chance on a friend." he smiled.

The redhead balked for a second, before smiling wide "Friend? Geez sweetheart, didn't figure I had given you Stockholm Syndrome."

Immediately Kyle's smile fell "In your dreams. This just saves me from having to spend the rest of the day pretending there were any more resumes even remotely promising." he huffed. "Now go grab an apron and help me get the windows cleaned, now that you're on my payroll we might be able to open this place by the end of the month."

She laughed again, following her captive-turned-employer out into the main room of the building. "Sure thing boss! Hey, this means I can call you boss now, this is awesome!" she snickered, rambling on about how she couldn't wait to get the girls together again to come see the place when it was done. Kyle tuned out her chatter, grabbing a rag and a soapy bucket and setting to work on the first window.

"Just imagine, the Thorny Roses have a new secret hangout! I bet once we finally get this place open we could all have a party at my place too you know."

The brunette shook his head, but smiled at the same time. Things had gone from bad, to merely annoying, to incredibly bad before he had been able to return home. Still, everything had worked out...pretty much for the best. Not that he wanted to jinx it of course, actually working with Roxanne could be a whole new challenge to deal with.

As the two of them got to work though, Kyle found himself shrugging off those negative thoughts.

What's the worst that could happen?

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(PART SIX) : FINAL

Kyle sat terrified as the man held him up by his hair, eyeing him like he was an expensive piece of artwork himself. He couldn't help the little whimper that came out as he felt fingers roughly tighten through his hair. "Well? I don't recall this little guy being on the list of assets." the man sneered, turning toward Roxanne.

She didn't even skip a beat. "That's the hostage. Insurance against the police, nothing more." she brushed off. Kyle couldn't tell if she was really that nonchalant about it or if she was just pretending to be for his sake, but it didn't matter. He groaned as the man gave one final, harsh tug to his hair before him back onto the ground. "Well you see, he still counts as an asset. One that you ladies didn't disclose." he growled menacingly, and neither Kyle nor the Thorny Roses missed how his fingers seemed to twitch toward his left pocket. "This might make our price negotiations...interesting."

"Then by all means, let's negotiate." Roxanne replied coldly, turning on her heel and strutting toward the dining room without bothering to check if the men were following her. The first two dark suits trailed behind her without complaint. The third one sneered again before begrudgingly doing the same. One by one, Pepper, Dani, and Annie followed, though Annie lingered behind long enough to bend down and whisper in Kyle's ear, "Don't worry. We'll be done and have them out of here real soon."

Kyle looked up at her mask, trying to meet her eyes from behind the dark cloth. She gingerly patted the already-forming bruise on the side of his face where Dani had hit him, before finally turning to follow the others. The door closed behind them, and Kyle was left alone, bound and gagged on the plush carpet floor. Not having much else to do, he squirmed and strained his ears, trying to hear anything other than low muffled voices from the other room. He didn't like this. The Thorny Roses were thieves, but they were self-proclaimed "thieves with morals." He especially didn't like how that one man looked at him like he was something to eat...

Whatever conversation they were having, it seemed to be getting less and less friendly. Soon enough Kyle could hear shouts coming from multiple people, though he still couldn't determine what they were saying. Not wanting to stick around, he desperately tried to shimmy down the hallway and into another room, but was interrupted when the door suddenly burst open and multiple heavy footsteps made their way toward him.

"So what?! He's an asset, one that you bitches PURPOSEFULLY hid from us, so I think it's only fair that we get to take him as a consolation."

"And WE told you, you're not taking him anywhere. That wasn't part of the original deal."

"Who the hell died and made you queen? In case you haven't noticed, you're not exactly in a position to be-hey you little bastard, where do you think you're going?" the blue-eyed gangster, the one that originally had given Kyle the creeps, spotted the brunette in his attempts to crawl down the hall. Stalking across the room, the men roughly grabbed him by the roots of his hair and held him on display for the others in the room to see. "See? No respect for authority, honestly you should be thanking me that I'm offering to take him off your hands." the man sneered. Kyle whimpered, sending a pleading look to Roxanne and the others.

Though their masks still disguised their faces, he could clearly see each of the girls tensing. "I'm warning you. That's our insurance. You take him, and law enforcement will have no problems busting in here guns blazing. If that happens we won't be the only ones taking the fall for this botched heist." the redhead seethed, only thinly veiling her threat.

Kyle writhed, trying to twist himself out of the gangster's unforgiving hold on his hair. Unfortunately for him, that only seemed to make the dangerous man even more annoyed. "You know, I almost thought you bitches might have been worthy associates one day. Too bad it looks like nobody in this house has any respect for their elders." he growled, raising his hand ever so slightly back toward the sharp outline of a pistol that lay in his coat pocket.

"Hmmph!" Kyle tried to let out a cry to warn the girls, twisting violently away from the man to try and knock him off balance, nearly losing some of his hair in the process. Those brief moments were just enough to allow Roxanne to step forward and, brandishing a pistol of her own, fire at the man who had been holding him hostage.

After the first gunshot rang out, the entire house devolved into chaos. Kyle groaned as he was suddenly thrown to the floor, landing painfully on his side as he began twisting and trying to crawl toward any bit of cover he could. Loud bangs filled the air around him as the gangsters and the Thorny Roses duked it out...but it wasn't just their bullets either. Windows crashed from the outside, flooding the house with spotlights as police sirens blared just outside.

"You cunts! You sold us out?!"

"Don't pretend this was ever going to end well!" Roxanne's voice could be heard screaming out, just as a stray bullet grazed Kyle's arm. He whimpered, curling up into a ball as tight as he could and trying in vain to pretend that he couldn't feel a steady trickle of blood seep into his shirt. At some point in the chaos the screams from the gangsters grew fewer and far between, until finally the only thing the bound brunette could hear were anxious shouts from the Thorny Roses and a police intercom demanding their immediate surrender.

"Oh sweetheart, I'm sorry we got you into this mess..." Kyle unraveled slightly, just enough to squint up at Roxanne's unmasked and worried face. He let out muffled grumbles at her, teary eyed and still in pain. The redhead cooed sympathetically, tearing off a strip of black cloth from what used to be her mask and tying it around the wound where a bullet had grazed him to staunch the bleeding. "I really am sorry." She whispered again.

"Boss we gotta move NOW!"

"Oh shit they got one of those battering rams to break down doors!"

"Roxanne please!"

The leader of the Thorny Roses shot her former captive one final sympathetic look before bolting off, out of Kyle's line of sight. Within a few seconds he heard the front door burst open, and soon enough he was being untied and carried off by uniformed police officers.

The next few days were a fast paced blur of police questioning, hospitalization to receive stitches in his arm, and filling out copious amounts of paperwork. Turns out the cameras at the museum had caught his abduction on tape, and the police had been on the hunt for his kidnappers ever since. "It's alright now, you were gone for a few weeks but I promise you'll get to go home soon." a sympathetic officer who had come to interview him had said. She had asked him all the usual questions. Could he give a description? Any names? Did he know of any motive? Apparently, SOMEHOW, all four of the girls had managed to get away. Whoever those "buyers" they had originally lined up were higher on the food chain when it came to organized crime, so the police targeted them first as they made their way through the house. No one knew how the Thorny Roses managed to evade capture.

Kyle honestly couldn't tell the police how Roxanne and the others escaped. At the same time, he also glossed over the important information. He lied and said he didn't know their names. He told them that they were planning to sell stolen art, but they never let him be around when they were negotiating with potential buyers. Technically, that part was true. After a couple rounds of questioning by the police he was also questioned by the museum staff and some insurance company, who gave him a contract which he signed without much thought. He just wanted to go home.

When the police finally DID let him go home, they made sure to give him a list of phone numbers to call if he ever felt the need to talk to a psychiatrist or if he suddenly remembered everything. Kyle just nodded the entire time, closing the door and flopping onto his bed when they were gone. Or at least he tried to, because the doorbell rang soon after. Groaning, the former captive went back to the front door, ready to tell the police that he just wanted to be left alone.

Much to his surprise, instead of the cops come back to interview him there was nobody there. All that was on his front step was a plain, unassuming suitcase with a sticky note stuck to the top of it.

'Here you go Sweetheart, a little something for your troubles.' It was left unsigned.

It didn't take a genius to figure out who the note was from. Glancing nervously around to make sure that no one was watching, Kyle gingerly took the suitcase back into the house. He wasn't able to catch a glimpse of who had left it. Placing it on his coffee table, the brunette contemplated opening it. He wasn't sure if he liked the sound of whatever a "little something" was, but in all honesty his curiosity was getting the better of him.

Drawing in a deep breath, Kyle finally worked up the nerve to open the case.

He nearly fainted when he saw what was inside.

SEVERAL MONTHS LATER

Kyle drew out his keys from his back pocket, pausing for a moment to smile up at the newly-painted sign that hung proudly over the front door of the small building 'KC's Coffee and Confections' it read. Unlocking the door, he made his way into the back room, whistling as he did so.

Turns out that the paperwork the museum had insisted on him signing was a sort of settlement. A very large check was made out to him by his former employers, and in exchange he wouldn't sue them for everything that happened to him while he was being held captive by the Thorny Roses. It was a big enough sum that he was able to stop pulling one-night-only jobs like that one and finally start up a business of his own.

The building was modest, an old hole in the wall that used to be a Chinese restaurant. Still, with some careful investing of the settlement he got, a small loan from the bank, and some very, very careful handling of his anonymous donor's "gift" was enough for him to get the place started. Now all he had to do was hire an extra barista or two to help out around the place and he could open it up for business.

Meandering to the back office room, Kyle pulled out a manila folder that held the resume from a promising applicant, a Miss R. Smith. She was his first interview of the day, and from the looks of it she was well versed in making sweets and pastries, which would be a great help to him if this place was to live up to its name.

A light tingle of the front door bell alerted him to the presence of another person, probably Miss Smith herself. "Here in the back room!" Kyle called, putting away the folder and setting his hands on top of his modest desk. The sound of sharp, confident heels clicking against the linoleum floors got closer and closer, until finally the door opened and Kyle's eyes went wide.

Blazing red hair greeted him, and a smile so wide it made the pair of sharp green eyes crinkle at the edges. "Hey there sweetheart, you miss me?" Roxanne teased.

Kyle sat dumbfounded as his former kidnapper confidently took a seat across from him, carefully glancing around the place before letting out a low, disapproving whistle. "Damn boy, I would've figured you would get someplace...I don't know, a little bigger? In a nicer part of town? I sent you a million dollars to work with after all. You could have at least put in wooden floors, gotten some crown molding or something." she chastised.

Blinking, the brunette regained some of his senses at her criticism. "And how exactly was I going to spend a million dollars without somebody asking me where all of it came from?! I'm trying to live a comfortable, under-the-radar life here you psycho, not have the government come knocking at my door asking if I'm a mob boss or something." he growled.

Roxanne threw her head back and laughed "Heh, never thought of that. No wonder the other girls gave me funny looks when I sent that package. Oh well, just shove it under your bed or something and use it in small increments I guess. You'll never have to order takeout from your own pocket ever again," she joked, leaning forward and resting both elbows on the desk "Which reminds me, I'm in need of some steady, legal income myself and heard you were hiring. Whaddya say?"

Kyle blinked again "Wait-you're out of the robbery business?" he questioned. Without thinking he raised a hand to rub at the raised scar on his arm. Roxanne noticed the tic, but didn't draw attention to it, instead sighing and looking down at the space between her hands. "Yeah...me and the other girls, we decided that things just were getting way too out of hand. Sure it's fun when you start but, when things go wrong like that, you're reminded that folks in that kind of businesses tend to be pretty cruel. And nobody really lasts long. So we all decided to take the money from this last job and go off to do our own thing."

Oh. Kyle frowned "I-I'm sorry." he mumbled sheepishly, not really knowing what else to say. Roxanne looked up at him and quirked up an eyebrow "Boy, why do you look like somebody just killed your puppy? For god's sake I meant we all are going to find different jobs, we didn't do that whole 'ride into the sunset never to see each other again' bullshit, the Thorny Roses are as tight as ever. I LITERALLY just tagged all three of them in a facebook post."

Oh. The brunette could practically feel the blush rising up his face. "That...that's good to know I guess, so the other girls are doing alright?"

"Oh yeah, just peachy. Annie and Pepper got a place together and started taking classes at a community college, Dani actually managed to get an IT job for some bank, which she swears she won't hack but time will tell."

Roxanne sent another pointed look to her former captive. "So then Mr. Kyle Connolley, I assume you've already read my resume. I've got plenty of experience in the kitchen making sweet things thanks to Annie, I've got great people skills, and I can kick the ass of whoever might come in here to start trouble because, again, this ain't exactly the nicest part of town," she stood up, extending a hand toward him "So am I hired?"

Kyle looked down at her outstretched hand. Then her eyes, practically brimming with excitement. Smirking, Kyle stood up and took her hand in his. "First of all, those things are only marginally true. BUT I think I'd be willing to take a chance on a friend." he smiled.

The redhead balked for a second, before smiling wide "Friend? Geez sweetheart, didn't figure I had given you Stockholm Syndrome."

Immediately Kyle's smile fell "In your dreams. This just saves me from having to spend the rest of the day pretending there were any more resumes even remotely promising." he huffed. "Now go grab an apron and help me get the windows cleaned, now that you're on my payroll we might be able to open this place by the end of the month."

She laughed again, following her captive-turned-employer out into the main room of the building. "Sure thing boss! Hey, this means I can call you boss now, this is awesome!" she snickered, rambling on about how she couldn't wait to get the girls together again to come see the place when it was done. Kyle tuned out her chatter, grabbing a rag and a soapy bucket and setting to work on the first window.

"Just imagine, the Thorny Roses have a new secret hangout! I bet once we finally get this place open we could all have a party at my place too you know."

The brunette shook his head, but smiled at the same time. Things had gone from bad, to merely annoying, to incredibly bad before he had been able to return home. Still, everything had worked out...pretty much for the best. Not that he wanted to jinx it of course, actually working with Roxanne could be a whole new challenge to deal with.

As the two of them got to work though, Kyle found himself shrugging off those negative thoughts.

What's the worst that could happen?