by Emilia Finn
“Pissed!” He tosses his silver knife down to the table. “I’m pissed, Ally. Because a life was stolen from me, and I was never given a choice.”
“So, what? You’re going to avenge it all now? Payback is sweet and all that?”
“Maybe! I already lost it all, so what do I have to lose now?”
“Well…” My dinner sits high in my belly, on top of the alcohol, and reminds me every few minutes that I ate garlic. “I know it doesn’t seem like it, but I think you still have a lot to lose. So don’t get ahead of yourself with this plan of revenge. Haven’t you watched any Road Runner cartoons? The coyote never wins.”
“He might this time.” He grabs the knife again and turns it on the tip. Anyone watching us from the outside might be scared of that knife, but not me. I’m on the inside, and mostly, I’m still wearing my goofy grin.
It all makes so much sense now.
“Do you wanna go someplace else?” Jason’s haunted eyes come up to mine. So much pain. So much heartache. “We could head back to the hotel, and maybe get a little coffee in that front parlor.”
“Mm. I wonder if they have the fire going?”
“I could get it started, if not.” He sets the knife down with careful, precise movements, then lays his cloth napkin on top. Pushing to his feet, he comes around the table and extends a hand. “Come with me, Ally. The storm is only getting worse, so it’s probably best if we get back to our hotel now.”
“What about my car?” I take his hand, and sway on my way up. I’m not, like, sloshy drunk, but rather, exceptionally smiley, rubbery bones drunk. The best kind. “I can’t drive.”
“Leave it here,” he answers easily. “You can ride in my truck, then tomorrow, I’ll bring you back to get it.”
Luke
There’s That Kick in the Nuts
The storm is feral and mean, ice falls to the ground and makes the earth slick and slippery. It’s not like snow, it’s not gentle or soft, not graceful or wonderous. It’s fucking ice, sleeting and painful, and each time the wind picks up, it rocks the truck so much that Rob grunts his frustration as he tries to drive.
While we head from the apartment to the restaurant, I search in the gap between the seat and the back of the cab for a spare hoodie, and when I find it, I plop it over Emma’s head. None of us are wearing enough clothes for this bullshit, but she’s the one who needs protecting.
Her mom and our mom are best friends. We were raised to take care of the Kincaid girls, even if most of them are older than us. And despite the rage and worry that courses through my blood, my brain still computes enough to know how fucking cold it is outside, and that any spare hoodie we have automatically goes to Em.
Funnily enough, she’s so conditioned for that behavior, she merely lifts her hands and lets me dress her. Zero hesitation, zero confusion.
“Stay in the truck.” I’m not sure who I speak to, who I’m trying to save from jailtime. But as Rob brings the truck around the last corner before the restaurant, carefully, so we don’t slide around and end up in the wrong lane, Pinocchio’s comes into view, and my heart seizes. Her car is in the lot. Her fucking car is in the lot.
“Stay in the fucking truck,” I repeat and rest my hand on the door handle. In my mind, I count it down. Ten seconds until launch. Nine. Eight.
Just ahead of us, a fancy white Mercedes pulls in – slowly, so it takes me only a second to realize that’s probably Miranda – then the restaurant door opens, and out they walk. Ally and fucking Jason, side by side. Jason slings his arm over Ally’s shoulders and pulls her in tight so her face rests on his chest.
And my brain explodes.
“Cool it,” Emma starts. She even grabs my sleeve for just a second, but then Ally trips and falls to the concrete – or maybe Jason tosses her down. Fuck knows, but he follows her down, and I explode from my truck like the Hulk.
The door groans on its hinges so loudly that I’m certain I bent the steel. Icy cold wind slaps me in the face and makes my eyes water, but I run against the battering sleet anyway. Head down, arms pumping, chest heaving, I sprint away from the truck, past the Merc, where the occupant is yet to open the door, and over the graveled space leading to the restaurant.
With a roar of rage, I dive at the couple on the ground, straight over Ally, who lays with her eyes closed and her hair turning darker from the ice melting into it. I slam into Jason’s solid body, more muscle beneath his dress shirts than it looks, and send us both sprawling until the back of his head cracks against the ground with a solid thump that makes my stomach swirl.
These are the situations our parents warned us about. Fighting outside the gym, full of rage and recklessness; one wrong hit, one wrong landing, and a man will die, and we’re going away for life.
But I catch sight of Ally laid out on the ground, coming to, and groaning when she presses a finger to her bleeding temple, then I turn back to Jason and snarl. I scramble into mount, sit on his hips, and swing at his face until blood explodes onto the ground the way blood might splatter in a cheap horror movie.
His nose caves in, blood pours free and coats my hands, and like some strange, horrible detail that must be mentioned, the strings from my hoodie dangle in the blood, and draw lines over Jason’s fancy shirt.
“I told you to stay the fuck away!” I hit again, and again, and again. “I fucking warned you.” And again.
I’ve got the element of surprise on my side, and a shattered nose to distract him with. Behind me, Miranda skids down beside her daughter, and with them, Emma comes to help. But Rob… he saw Ally fall. He saw Jason trying to lead her someplace else. So he ain’t all that inclined to stop me or my fists.
“I fucking warned you, asshole!”
“Luke, no.” Ally’s voice is cracked and pain-filled. Barely a whisper above the growl of the wind. “Luke!”
“I fucking warned you to stop coming near her!” I slam my fist down on his jaw again, and when he finally collects his senses and bridges up to fight back, I bounce before he can flip us.
I bound to my feet, agile and ready, and when he comes up, faster and smoother than I would have expected he could manage, I race forward and slam my shoulder into his gut so that we tumble to the ground again. He’s a solid motherfucker under those fancy suit outfits; his stomach ain’t soft beneath my shoulder, but I’m younger, trained, and fucking pissed. So when we slam to the ground, I scramble to be on top again, and when he tries to escape, I clip him on the jaw, and thrill when he’s stunned.
“Luke!” Ally shakily climbs to her feet in my peripherals. “You have to stop.”
“Rob!” I only have to say his name one time, one order, for him to grab her before she comes too close and ends up with damage from my elbow.
“No!” Ally’s shouts turn more and more pointed, so when Rob grabs her, she’s firmly awake after her trip to the ground, and now she’s enraged. “Luke! I said stop!”
“Jerry?” Miranda’s voice cuts through the noise, through Ally’s kicking legs as Rob carries her away, and over the roaring wind. “Oh my god, Jerry. Is that you?” She approaches us on her hands and knees while tears track over her cheeks.
I continue to hit Jason. I slam fist after fist against his face, and he takes it. But my hands slow when Miranda comes closer. Rob is busy with Ally, and I’ll be damned if I accidentally hit the mother of the woman I want to marry.
“Jerry?” She says it again, shakily, and then stopping beside my thigh, her knee touching Jason’s ribs, a sob tears along her throat. “Oh my god.”
Like she’s made of electricity, Miranda shoves me to the side and fusses with Jason’s face. The blood, the broken bone. He has to turn halfway to the side to spit out blood or risk choking on it, so she helps him roll, and presses a hand to his shoulder while he spits and coughs.
“Oh my god,” she cries out. Silent tears turn to wracking sobs. “Jerry?”
“Maria.” Smiling past bloody teeth, the guy rolls into her side and rests a hand on her th
igh. But he smiles.
And then he sleeps.
“Luke!” Ally escapes Rob’s hold, and dashes over to skid down beside us.
Except she’s not coming to me. She’s not coming to see if I’m okay.
She runs to the dude and fusses over him. Amidst the rumble of the storm, the wail of sirens, the blue and red flashes of light that play against lightning shooting from the sky, an ambulance races in our direction.
My gaze snaps up to Emma. To the phone in her hand, and the apology in her eyes.
“I had to make the call,” she murmurs. “You sent him to sleep, Luke. I had to call.”
Luke
“Welcome back, Mr. Hart.” Her honor, Judge Florence Abram sits atop her throne and looks down on me with disappointment blazing in her eyes. “We’re seeing each other a little sooner than I anticipated.”
My mom stands beside me, much like last time. My lawyer on my other side. And my stately judge sits at the front of the courtroom, robed, and fucking pissed.
“You just couldn’t stay out of trouble, young man?”
I reach up and fuss with the tie that threatens to choke me to death.
“You need to shut your piehole,” Jess hisses beside me. “Don’t speak. Not a single fucking word, or I’ll let them send you to prison.” She flattens the slight wrinkle in her skirt, stands tall, and meets the judge’s venomous eyes. “Your Honor. Please, if you’ll allow me to explain.”
Ally
My dad is in town.
Those words, even though I don’t say them aloud, still manage to make my stomach swirl and tingle.
My dad.
My dad.
I moved out of my hotel room weeks ago. I said goodbye to Sonia and Calla, Nora and Galileo, Darcy, and the rest of my new friends in the small town just an hour from here. I finished up my time at Sonia’s office a little early, but she promised to sign off on all my hours on the provision I send her my final paper for her to read before I submit it.
And so, to give myself enough time to finish it, and to give her time to read it, that’s what I’ve been doing these past few weeks.
I’ve been writing a paper on Jason Donnerson – my dad.
It’s funny how, all of my life, the very few times I’ve asked about my biological father, my mom called him Jerry. When I was born, I was given her maiden name – Moore – which is the name her father took when he ditched town and all things Rivera, and because of my insane need to be independent, I never looked into who he was. In my mind, he was a punk teenager who ran away from responsibility.
To be fair, that’s not what my mother told me. She never once spoke ill of him. But I made assumptions, and as the years went on and he remained gone, my resentment grew. And so, I was too stubborn, too mad to go searching for more.
All of those stories Jason told in Sonia’s office about his Maria were about my mom. My peace-loving, trouble-making, picket-protesting, wild nights and high-school-suspension-receiving mom. And so now, it makes sense that I kept coming back to him for more. I wanted to learn more about Maria, I wanted to know where her story led, because his love for her made me love her.
He’s still so in love, it’s a complete tragedy that they were ever separated. A tragedy caused by two sets of parents who thought they knew better, who refused to take their children’s thoughts or feelings into consideration when changing the course of three lives.
“So, what was Stan like?” Jason-Jerry-Dad walks into my bedroom one Saturday afternoon several weeks after we left behind that old town and came home. He sits on the foot of my bed and hitches a leg up, and turning to me, he smiles past his black eyes and a nose that sits slightly askew despite receiving medical assistance. “Tell me all about him.”
“You need to stop.” I select a pen from the collection pooling beside my thigh, and toss it at his chest. “You were gone. It had been years, and Stan was a really nice man. You’re gonna have to get over it.”
“But I had dibs,” he teases. “Now this other dude thinks he can come in and marry my girl, raise my daughter?” He shakes his head. “I wish he were here.”
“Why?” I drawl. “So you could duel?”
“Exactly! I would fashion a sword from a stick I found in an enchanted forest, infuse wasp stings into the end, and then take care of business. May the better man win.”
“You realize you’re speaking of my deceased stepfather, right? I actually loved him. Like, a lot.”
He smiles and looks down into his lap. “I know.” He leaves his head low, but glances up between his lashes. “I’m actually not mad. He took care of you guys when I couldn’t, and no matter how many times or ways I ask about him, I’ve never heard a bad thing about him. He’s a patron fucking saint inside this home.”
“He was really cool.” I push my laptop aside and sit up so my spine arches back in the direction it should go. “Stan was like… a bear,” I explain. “But a cuddly kind. He never got mad, he never raised his voice, he never not smiled. He worked hard, and helped us create memories. We never gave gifts, but rather, experiences. Dinner dates, movies, vacations. We made memories all the time, like he knew his time was limited. And then there’s the fact he never felt the need to lie about his name to get our attention.”
“Ugh.” Jason pokes a finger into his mouth and mock-gags. “You’re making me have feelings for the dude. I’m trying to like him, because he’s special to my girls. But let’s not forget he slid into my seat when I wasn’t watching. If he was alive, we’d have beef. You know that, right?”
“So you’re here to sweep her off her feet, huh?” I roll my eyes and cast a glance over to my computer screen, to the dash that flashes on and off, on and off, and awaits my final touches before I send the document away to Sonia.
I’m stuck on the final paragraphs. The final words where I declare what I’ve learned about human behavior, about the brain, and emotions, and love, and loss. I’m stuck, and it annoys me, because I know what is blocking me.
“I’m here to reclaim what’s mine,” he explains. “To wow your mother, to remind her why I was always who she thought of. And when she’s being a little less fucking stubborn about it, I’ll probably marry up and lock her down.”
“Wow.” My eyes widen, and I introduce him to something Luke learned long ago: sometimes, I don’t genuinely mean wow. “That sounds charming and all that, but I wouldn’t lead with those words if I were you.”
“The locking her down thing?” He wrinkles his lips – the exact same way I do – then hisses when he remembers it hurts.
“And the bit about her being stubborn,” I laugh. “Perhaps she is, and maybe she even knows it, but it would be a rookie mistake to say so.”
“So start with flattery?”
“Always.”
I draw a deep breath until my lungs stretch, then let it out again. I’ve been curled up and cramped on my bed for hours, staring at that flickering line and waiting for inspiration to hit so I can be done with this paper. Ten thousand words – the first nine and a half thousand flowed from my fingertips like water from a hose. But the last little bit, the final touches… they elude me.
“So…” Jason smiles, and it bothers me to realize his smile is the same as mine. Mine is the same as his. For more than twenty years, half of my genetic makeup has been missing. But now he’s here, and I see it. I see the way his lips curve – mine do that. And I see the way he does this noncommittal shrug when he doesn’t want to answer a pointed question. My shoulders do that too. “You done pouting yet?”
I scowl and snatch up my laptop as a type of shield. “I’m not pouting. I never pout.”
“No?” He looks down at my phone on the bed. Screen facing down, but the device vibrates against the covers. “Not gonna answer that?”
“Nope.”
“Could be an emergency.”
“It’s not. You’re here, and Mom is here. So there’s no one left for me to accept emergency calls about.”
“Aw…” He
flashes a wide grin, so large and taunting that I’m tempted to pop him on his sore nose. “You got your stubborn from her, huh? That’s cute.”
“Up yours.” I slam my laptop shut and fold my arms. “I’m not stubborn. And I’m not taking that call.”
“But it could be Luke.”
“You don’t even like him!” I explode. “Every single time you were in the same space together, you taunted him.”
“He was dating my daughter! I had to see what he was made of. I had to know whether he would protect you, or if he was a yellowbelly who would slink away.”
“He’s not a coward.”
“No,” he chuckles and reaches up to touch his nose. “He’s not. I also wanted to see if he’d be able to control his emotions. That guy walked away from so many fights, Ally. He’s got the willpower of a saint.”
“He smashed your face in! Are you seriously defending him right now, even with two black eyes?”
“Well, to be fair, you were drinking,” he sniggers. “You stumbled in the snow, bonked your head, and I followed you down to check if you were okay. From his point of view, all he saw was the guy who wouldn’t stay the hell away following you to the ground.”
“He fought you!”
“He pulled every single shot,” he declares, “and when you got near, he seized up and didn’t hit at all till his clone pulled you away. Oh, and on that note,” his eyes widen. “I had no clue he was a twin. I owe his brother an apology, because I may or may not have been taunting two of them, thinking there was just one.”
“Ugh.” I flop back against my pillows and groan. “What did you do to Rob? He’s a sweetheart.”