by SE Jakes
Childhood games of hide and seek gave way to evading the truant officer and finding a way to make some cash. At first they’d done some low-level gambling—mainly street dice, and it was from those associates they’d learned about the underground fighting. They’d both liked it a lot in the beginning but as time went on, John liked it more. Prophet recognized early his friend’s need to get out his aggression, and hell, who was he to judge?
Joe Drews was alternately a shitty father and semiabusive, but not as bad as John’s father. Later, after Prophet learned that John’s father had molested him, he realized just how many degrees of shitty there were.
Joe’d been a sailor. Prophet liked the idea of following in some traditions. The genetic eye disease that’d been dogging the men in his family for generations and made them form the blind suicide club? Not so much. In fact, Prophet went so far as to sit down with Joe Drews at the age of nine and was granted an answer to a single question.
Prophet had asked, “Do all the men in this family die from the eye disease?”
And on that day, he’d learned that the eye disease hadn’t caused the deaths, which made him feel better, and way worse, because Joe had told him, “They all killed themselves before the disease took their sight.”
“Are you going to kill yourself too?”
Joe said, “I agreed to one question.”
Prophet took that as a yes, of course, and said, “So that’s what Drews men do? Join the Navy and kill themselves? Gotta say, not all that enticing.”
“So do more,” his father told him brusquely.
“You suck as the head of this family,” Prophet informed him, knowing he’d get a knock on the head for that later, and not caring.
But before Joe had done just that, he said, “One day, when you’re staring down the barrel of this gun, you’ll understand.”
Prophet had stared down the barrel of many literal guns since that day. Now, he was staring at the only one he’d never be able to control . . . unless he followed in his family’s footsteps.
And yeah, he got it, the whole don’t judge till you’ve walked in my shoes thing. But he was here, walking in those goddamned shoes, having gotten further in life in general . . . but he was younger than Joe or his grandfather.
Maybe that was why he’d packed so much into his life at such an early age. Like he’d known he would only have so long for one kind of life.
Whether or not he’d accept another kind was anyone’s guess.
Seven years after the conversation with Prophet, Joe killed himself, a single shot through the temple with an unregistered gun. There was a short note in his hand that the police brought to them when they knocked on the door.
It’s your legacy, son. Make the most of the time you’ve got.
Joe hadn’t lived with them at the time, had moved out when Prophet was ten but was never far. The police had contacted several of his known associates, who told them that Joe had been playing poker and talking about his death. He’d given them his deck of cards and his chips. He’d made a check out to Prophet, which one of them handed to Prophet soberly.
“Any idea why he’d plan his suicide?” one of the older cops asked Prophet.
“He was going to go blind,” Prophet told him. “Runs in the men in my family. He’s fourth generation.”
Prophet saw the look of pity flash across the cop’s face and he fucking hated that more than anything.
“Don’t take that way out, son,” the cop told him. “My father’s in a wheelchair and he’s doing just fine. Plenty of people are fucked up in one way or another. No reason to leave everyone you love behind.”
Maybe he didn’t love anyone. Maybe the Drews men were all too selfish, or not built for love. Because hell, Judie was left behind more than Prophet was. Judie couldn’t take care of herself, no matter how badly she wanted to. And she did try—Prophet saw that.
Even when Prophet decided to enlist at seventeen, Judie hadn’t begged Prophet to stay—had even signed the papers the Navy needed—and that probably made him feel guiltier. She was working part-time, collecting disability and Prophet would send her home money regularly. He’d banked a lot of his fighting money and there wasn’t real cause for him to spend it on the Navy’s dime. He saw the world—too much of it, probably—and he learned shit no one should ever have to learn. And he’d long ago realized that was his lot in life and accepted it.
That didn’t mean he didn’t fight it every now and again.
Something happened daily, and although there was no sign of John, it felt like a petulant child was trying to get their attention, like the bomb threat at Remy’s school that made Tom and Prophet side-eye each other.
“Probably nothing,” Tom ventured, wanting it to be true.
Prophet didn’t argue, but they both decided that school was off-limits for a bit. Remy, of course, didn’t mind a damned bit. Mal offered to tutor him in the interim and that actually worked out quite well. Then again, for all Tom knew, math was a code for bomb building.
When he mentioned that to Prophet, all he got in response was, “They’re both useful life skills.”
And still, there’d been no sign of John taking the package. Prophet’s plans remained in limbo. They kept things as normal for Remy as possible, dealt with lawyers and the foster care system. They were making plans, or rather, Prophet was and Tom was trying not to get pissed that he wasn’t a bigger part of the process.
It was slightly similar to the way they had been in what Prophet began to refer to as the good old days. But in the beginning of their relationship, the good old days were full of lust and hate and the thin line those rode.
Not that that was a bad thing.
Prophet’s PTSD flashbacks continued—and escalated—including a pretty nasty one with Prophet nearly strangling Tom, who was only relieved that there was no sign that John had actually been there in the aftermath. Afterward, Prophet claimed to not remember what the flashback had been about, and Tom hadn’t believed him but they’d both pretended otherwise.
Beyond that, their lives were oddly domestic, for lack of a better word, Tom surmised, if he could ignore the fact that every day, twice a day at least, Prophet checked for the envelope that remained untouched.
Finally, on the eighth evening, when it still remained so, Tom found Prophet talking to his connections to charter a private plane, off the radar.
“Takin’ me on vacation?” Tom drawled, leaning over his shoulder to bite his partner’s neck.
Prophet turned to him and narrowed his eyes. “You just want me to drink those umbrella drinks again.”
“I wouldn’t mind.”
Prophet conceded, “Me neither,” and then, more seriously, “It’ll be over soon.”
Tom leaned against the table so he was facing Prophet—and not looking at the screen. “I know. Then what? Because I’d much rather plan for that.”
Prophet smiled, but Tom knew there was something bittersweet about leaving these days behind. Because of so many reasons, but most especially because of Prophet’s sight. If there was anything Tom could do to fix it, he would. He’d tried, of course, read up on the genetic condition (fairly rare, running in families) and then gone into full-on research mode, and Prophet had let him, almost like he somehow knew Tom had to go through the same steps of grieving that Prophet already had. Granted, it was a different level of grief.
One night, Prophet had found him sleeping, head down next to the computer. He’d woken, expecting Prophet to be angry that he was contacting doctors on Prophet’s behalf. Instead, Prophet turned the computer off and said, “Take me to bed.”
Tom had, fucked both of them into the mattress. He wanted to do that now, but he had a feeling Prophet had other plans.
He did. It went: Check on Remy. Call Mal. Check cameras. Cillian’s apartment. Alarm the place. Brace the bedroom window shut.
And then Tom found himself stripped, tied and fucked. And yeah, that was more than okay.
Finally, Proph
et had gotten Tom to fall asleep first. The guy would stay up all night, every night, just to watch over him, like he was a child, which Prophet found both endearing and utterly fucking annoying.
Jesus, almost strangle a guy once . . .
He glanced over at the big man, whose arm was slung over his eyes, taking slow, deep breaths, still looking flushed and handsome.
Prophet was grateful Tom had pushed to come along on this very unauthorized and highly necessary mission. If Tom hadn’t pushed, Prophet would’ve gladly left him home with Remy, and there were times he wished Tom would change his mind. But he knew how bad his eyes were getting—really fucking rapidly—and the thought that he might leave for a week, a month and not actually be able to physically see Tom again after that . . . that made him curse John and all of this more than anything.
But the longer he waited, the more sure he was that John would get away with everything, that the past eleven years, from the way his team had been forced to live to Mal almost losing his life, and Chris losing his, would be in vain.
“You’re thinking so loudly,” Tom murmured.
Fucker. “You were pretending to sleep so I’d sleep.”
“Yes.” Tom opened his eyes. “It’s what you’d do, right?”
Again, fucker. “You get cranky when you don’t sleep.”
“Right, I’m the cranky one.” Tom turned on his side and threw his arm across Prophet’s chest. “Can we talk about where Remy will go during the next however many weeks? And yes, I’d love to stay here with him but no, because you need me more. I told Remy I’d get you back safely.”
Prophet sniffed. “Funny, I told him the same thing.” He rubbed a hand along the scar on back of his neck, an old habit he’d gotten into shortly after someone had tried to chop his head off. With a machete.
Tom once told him that he could completely sympathize with the guy who’d been holding the machete. Prophet guessed he could too. “I think Remy should go with Della for a bit,” he said finally. “It’ll be all around easier.”
“Unless he stays with Phil,” Tom said.
Prophet’s face hardened but he made no comment. “How about Mal’s until he’s got to come to us? He can hand him off to Doc or Della, depending on what’s happening.”
“I trust that.”
“Think he’d be okay at Della’s if that’s where Mal decides? Because of his mom?”
“He can at least have a visit with her. It’s what the social worker wanted to see happen. Wants to see us making an effort to keep Remy close to his roots. Plus, Della’s not going to let those visits happen without supervision.”
Yeah, Della would protect Remy as fiercely as she once had Tom. Plus, Remy was almost sixteen and soon enough, they weren’t going to be making decisions for him so much as advising him. “We’ll tell him first thing. Ease his mind.”
“He’s not going to be happy about it.”
“Yeah, well, neither am I.” Prophet rubbed his neck again. “If he ends up with Della instead of Doc, I’ll call in a favor. Have someone stay with them, just in case.”
“Someone I know?”
“Jin. Easy enough to underestimate him but whoever did so would be damned stupid.” Jin was a former Navy pilot who’d explained about Prophet’s bad luck with flights. Jin might not look the part of a bodyguard, but he was pretty lethal in his own right.
Tom agreed. “Della would probably appreciate that.”
“We can say he’s a cousin of mine,” Prophet added.
“And if the social worker really looks into that?” Tom asked and Prophet just waved his hand with a pffft sound. “Like that’s really going to magically take care of it?”
“It just might, Tommy. It just might.”
Tom woke early the next morning but Prophet was already out for a run and Remy was just stirring. Tom made him breakfast and watched as he ate three helpings of it and yes, they might need to take out loans to feed this child.
“Is there any more?” Remy asked hopefully.
Tom handed him the eggs he’d made for Prophet, a not so subtle attempt to get him to eat something other than sweets for breakfast.
Remy grinned and downed what was on the plate. After he finished, Tom broached the subject of leaving. “Hey, you know that Prophet and I have a job that’s coming up—one that will take us away from here for a little bit.”
“How long?”
“I’m not sure. Less than a month, we’re hoping.”
“You guys have been walking around with your heads together and whispering, so I’m guessing it’s a big job,” Remy said.
“Yes.”
“What makes it so big?”
He knew Remy deserved to know some of the truths. “He’s got to hurt someone he was best friends with.”
Remy pushed a little away from the table, pulled his knees to his chest and wrapped an arm around his knees. “And he can do that?”
“The guy’s not the same person anymore.”
“Still. I mean, somewhere in Prophet’s mind, wouldn’t he be the same?”
Tom ruffled a hand through Remy’s hair. “Proph’ll be okay.”
“You’ll make sure of it, I know,” Remy said, with more trust than a fifteen-year-old should have to have. He’d be sixteen by the time this was all over. “Did you know that Prophet eats Twizzlers for breakfast sometimes?”
“It’s not breakfast. It’s like a pre-breakfast,” Prophet explained as he walked in, wearing fresh clothing and hair wet from a recent shower. Tom hadn’t even heard him come in from his run. “Where do you think I’m going to get all the calories that my body needs to keep functioning. Kale? I don’t think so.”
“What’s kale?” Remy whispered to Tom.
Prophet frowned and told him sternly, “Don’t think about shit like that—you’re too impressionable.”
Tom shot him a look, then turned and left them to their own devices.
“Somewhere in Prophet’s mind, wouldn’t he be the same?”
Prophet had been listening to Tom’s explanation, and Remy’s questions, especially that one, sat uneasily with him. Probably because the innocence of Remy’s observations were like a knife point in his conscience, and the loss of innocence was impossible to explain.
Prophet refused to be the one to take Remy’s innocence away. “You know I don’t want to leave you, Remy. Neither does Tom.”
“Then tell me what’s happening.”
“What did Tom and Mal tell you?”
“That there’s some asshole who hurt you—and now he’s trying to hurt all of us.”
“Pretty much the way it goes,” Prophet said. “I can’t give you more specifics now though, Rem.”
“I understand.” But he didn’t, not really. At that age, Prophet wouldn’t have either, and would’ve demanded answers (and gotten ones he’d had no idea what to do with). “It’s like the guys who hurt my dad and his friend—more than once.”
“Kinda is,” Prophet agreed. Etienne had lived through hell in high school and then lost his life because of those same events, many years later.
Remy was watching him carefully. After a second, he said, “Listen, I knew you were both leaving, before Tom told me.”
“How?” Maybe Remy had Tommy’s Cajun voodoo shit.
“Mal told me.”
Yeah, thanks, Uncle Crazy. Prophet wasn’t sure if he wanted to hug Mal for that or kill him, which was pretty much his everyday feelings for the man who’d become a brother to him. They took care of each other, and Prophet could draw a parallel to the way he and John had once been, but he and Mal were different. Prophet could easily see that now. Mal watched out for him. Worried. Cared . . . and all because he wanted Prophet to be okay. It wasn’t about owning him, cutting him off from the world. “I want to stay.”
“I know. But you can’t.” Remy was up and pouring him a mug of coffee . . . and handing him a donut.
“Why are you buttering me up?”
“You can’t worry about me.�
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“Unfortunately, that’s never going to happen.” Then he added, “If there was another way . . .”
“Is there?” Remy asked.
“Sit here, let the world blow up and hope my one-time best friend leaves me and my family alone,” Prophet said. “Plenty of people step back every day.”
“But that’s not you.”
“No. Sorry.”
Remy nodded. “Will Mal be here, like he says?”
“Until he can’t be. From there, we’ll let him decide if you stay around here with Doc or head to Della’s—or a combination of both? Are you okay with him choosing what’s best for you at the time?”
Remy nodded. “I’m cool with that. Because it’s only temporary.” He clearly meant it, as much as any fifteen-year-old who’d lost their father and was worried he was about to lose two more could be.
Prophet’s heart squeezed. “You’re not. Neither am I.”
“This guy—John? He really fucked up?”
Prophet ignored the curse because there was no better way to say it. “Yes. And at one point, I’d do anything to help him.”
Prophet had met John in middle school . . . in the principal’s office. On Prophet’s first day of school after moving to Texas. He could see himself clear as day trying to break into the attendance office . . . just to prove he could. For him, it was never really why, but rather, why not.
John had lived in that town his whole life and would sometimes tell Prophet that he felt like he was in trouble for simply being alive.
At times, Prophet thought that was pretty damned accurate for both of them. From that day on, they just tended to get into trouble together. And they were extremely talented in doing so. As the years went by, they got even better at not being caught. They got bolder, but while Prophet got stealthier and more cautious, John got more reckless.
Once, when John was drunk, he’d admitted what had happened to him, and then never spoke of it again. After that, Prophet realized perfect families never existed—the facade was just that. The dose of reality helped him in several ways, but nothing could’ve prepared him for his father’s suicide.