by Emery Rose
All I wanted was to get back to the way it used to be when we were close, and he was the big brother I looked up to and adored.
A few minutes later, I heard the door close behind Brody. Sobs wracked my body, and I could barely breathe. This time he hadn’t even put up a fight. He did as I asked, leaving me in an all-white ocean suite in Miami, my tears soaking my brother’s shirt, a gaping hole in my heart that used to be filled by Brody.
“If you need anything, I’ll be right down the hall,” Marcus said on his way out. I’d forgotten he was even here.
“Thank you,” I said. But Marcus couldn’t give me what I needed. Nobody could.
Chapter Forty
Brody
Ridge wrestled the bottle of whiskey out of my hand.
“Give it back.” I stood up from my chair and lunged at him. He darted out of the way and I lunged for him again. Fuck. My hand reached for the banister to hold myself up. It slipped out of my grasp. I tumbled down the porch steps and landed on the ground. I didn’t feel a goddamn thing.
I started laughing. I was laughing so hard tears sprang to my eyes. Then I rolled onto my back and stared up at the dark sky, trying to bring the stars into focus. Everything was blurry. The world was spinning.
“Come on, bro. Let’s get you inside.” He tried to lift me, but I smacked his hands away.
“Leave me the fuck alone,” I mumbled.
He crouched next to me and peered into my face. “You can’t keep doing this to yourself.”
“Wanna bet?” I closed one eye, trying to bring him into focus. He had a black eye and a split lip. “I’ll do whatever the fuck I want. You shouldn’t have gotten in that fight.”
“Nobody is gonna talk shit about my brother and get away with it.”
“My honor’s not worth fighting for. I don’t have any. I’m the son of a monster. I have his blood running through my veins. Same DNA.”
“You’re not him. You didn’t kill Shiloh’s mom.”
“Might as well have pulled the trigger…” My eyes drifted shut. I wanted to sleep on the ground. Maybe when I woke up tomorrow, I’d realize this had all been a bad dream.
Ten days. That was how long it had been since I’d last seen Shiloh. Ten days since she told me she never wanted to see my face again. Couldn’t blame her. If I were here, I would have felt the same way.
When I woke up, I flinched at the light. Too bright. I closed my eyes again. My head felt like there was a jackhammer working inside it and my mouth was so dry I could barely swallow.
“Morning, sunshine.”
I groaned. Just what I needed. My smug cousin. “What are you doing here?”
“Someone needed to haul your ass off the back lawn last night. Drink this water and take these aspirin. Doctor’s orders.”
I forced my eyes open, knowing damn well that nothing I said would make Jude leave, so I sat up. I was on the living room sofa, fully dressed except for my boots, a blanket covering me. I took the aspirin from his hand and washed them down with water. I felt like a fucking baby.
“This needs to stop,” he said. “Drinking your sorrows away never works. Take it from me, the dumb shit who tried to do it for an entire year. You’ll only make things worse.”
I huffed out a laugh and winced at the pain that shot through my head. “Really can’t see how it could possibly get worse. Might as well be drunk while I sit back and watch my whole fucking world fall apart.”
He sighed. “I know it feels like that now, but it won’t always—”
I held up my hand to stop him. “Save the speech, Dr. Phil.”
“Yeah, okay. So what are you going to do about it?”
I scrubbed my hands over my face. “There’s not a damn thing I can do. If I could go into that first-grade classroom and kick every kid’s ass who talks shit around my kid, I’d fucking do it. But something tells me, folks wouldn’t take too kindly to that. Noah’s suffering because of this. Ridge is having to deal with it… everyone around me is dealing with the shit storm that I caused.”
“You didn’t cause it. None of this is your fault.”
“My name is mud around here. I wouldn’t give a shit what anyone said if this was only affecting me. But it’s not.”
He was sitting on the coffee table across from me and leaned his forearms on his thighs. “Fuck. There must be some way to fix this.”
“Not everything can be fixed, Jude. You know that as well as I do.”
He nodded. “Have you heard from Shiloh?”
I shook my head. “No. And I won’t. She’s done with me.” I rubbed my chest. Fuck, it hurt. All of it. I’d lost the only girl I’d ever truly loved. There would never be another Shiloh for me.
“What time is it?” I thought to ask.
“Eight.”
“Fuck.” My day usually started at six thirty. Jude stood up at the same time I got to my feet. “I need to get to work. Did Ridge—”
“He was just leaving for school when I got here. He’s worried about you.”
“I don’t want anyone worrying about me.”
“It’s what we do. We’re family. I need to get going but I’m only a phone call away.”
I nodded once, acknowledging that I’d heard him.
“You’re going to get through this, Brody. You’ll come out the other side.”
“And then what?” I’d be alone. A lonely, miserable bastard.
He shrugged one shoulder. “Time to start rebuilding. Time to figure out how to get her back.”
“Not happening.” He opened his mouth to protest, but I held up my hand again to stop him. “It’s over, Jude. Save your breath.”
He nodded once then turned and walked out the front door.
After I took a quick shower, I poured coffee into a travel mug and carried it out to the barn. My only saving grace right now were my horses.
Four days later, we celebrated my son’s seventh birthday. Instead of the party we’d planned, it was just a family affair at Jude and Lila’s house.
As soon as Noah answered the door with Lila standing behind him, the baby in her arms, I handed him his gift. “Hey little man. Happy birthday.”
He shoved it back at me and crossed his arms over his chest. “Keep it. I don’t want it.”
“Noah,” Lila said, her voice sharp. “Tell your daddy thank you.”
“It’s okay,” I said. “He’s not too happy with me right now, are you, buddy?”
He shook his head, his eyes not meeting mine. “I didn’t want any of my stupid friends to come today. But I wanted Hayley…” He raised his eyes to mine and the look on his face, the devastation, his eyes swimming with tears, nearly made me cry like a fucking baby. I’d hurt the most precious thing in my life, and I had no idea how to make this better.
“What happened with Hayley?” Obviously, Lila hadn’t been telling me the whole truth about what was going on in Noah’s life. Last weekend, he hadn’t even wanted to see me, and I’d said it was fine, not wanting to force him to spend time with me if he didn’t want to.
“Her mom and dad said you’re a bad man. Because you beat people up. And they don’t want her around you anymore.”
My eyes closed briefly. Then I crouched in front of him. I’d been so caught up in my own shit that I hadn’t really sat down to talk to him or tried to explain things. I’d left it up to Lila, thinking it would be better coming from her. He was confused, and I couldn’t blame him. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry for everything. I never…” I stopped talking and ran my hand through my hair. Fuck, I hated myself right now. The shame was eating me up inside. Making it hard to breathe. And I didn’t know what to say or do to make his world a better place.
“I made a lot of mistakes in my life, Noah. And I’ve done a lot of things I’m not proud of. But there’s nothing in this world I wouldn’t do to make your life better. What do you need from me? What can I do to make this better for you? Name it and I’ll do it.” There was probably something in the parenting manual that sa
id this was the wrong approach. I was asking my own kid to tell me how to fix this, and there was something so fucked up about that. But I didn’t have the answers. I’d disappointed my boy. Had failed him miserably. Had done everything I always promised I wouldn’t. And guess what? Parenting didn’t come with a manual. When you fucked up, you had to figure out how to fix it on your own.
“If you go away, Hayley can come over,” he said.
I rose to my feet and staggered back like I’d been struck. That would have hurt a hell of a lot less.
“Noah. You don’t want that,” Lila said. “Your daddy loves you and he would do anything in the world for you. You know that.” She’d never had to play mediator between me and Noah before and I hated that she was having to do it now. I didn’t want that either.
“It’s okay. Let him speak his own truth,” I told Lila, my gaze returning to Noah. “Is that what you want? You want me to leave?”
Noah considered my question, not answering right away. Then he asked, “Was he a bad guy?”
“Who?” I didn’t know if he was talking about my sperm donor or someone else.
“The guy you punched on the video. Was he a bad guy?”
“He… said some things about Shiloh that weren’t very nice.”
Noah gave that a moment’s thought. “You were standing up for her?”
Not sure I deserved to be let off the hook, but it was the damn truth, so I nodded. “But fighting isn’t the best way to settle a disagreement.”
“I know. Mommy always tells me that.”
“I’m sorry, Noah.” I’m sorry that I’m human and flawed and a total fuck-up.
He looked at Lila then back at me. “It’s okay. You can come to my party. And maybe… I might want that present.”
I laughed a little, relief flooding my body. “You think so?”
He nodded vigorously. “I really do want it.”
I handed him the present and he clutched it to his chest and granted me a smile before he ran into the family room to open his gift. Lila gave me a sad little smile. “How are you holding up?”
“I’ve been better. But shit happens, right?”
“God, this is just… so unreal. I can’t believe…” She didn’t finish her sentence, but I knew what she was referring to. “What were the chances?”
One in a million. About the same odds that a cowboy would end up with a rock star.
“Right now, I’m more worried about Noah than anything else.”
“He’s going to be okay,” she said as we walked into the family room. Everyone was already gathered. It wasn’t the party we’d planned but they’d tried to make it festive, the room decorated with Spider-Man streamers and balloons, a Spider-Man cake on the sideboard next to a bowl of red punch with black candy spiders floating in it.
“Brody,” Lila said, sucking in a sharp breath when Noah lifted the cowboy boots out of the box then flashed around the photo of a horse so everyone in the room could see it. “What did you do?”
I bought my kid a goddamn horse. That was what I’d done. Was I trying to buy his love? Was it guilt? I didn’t know. But I’d gone ahead and done it. As long as I had that horse in my stables, Noah would want to come over and see it, ride it, spend time at the ranch. Yeah, I was pathetic.
Noah ran over to me with the photo, his eyes wide. “Is he mine?”
“He’s all yours.”
“What’s his name?”
“Thought I’d leave that up to you.”
“I’m gonna call him Spider-Man.”
I laughed. “You think he looks like a Spider-Man?”
He looked down at the framed photo on his hand. “He looks like he could use a best friend. I’ll be his best friend.”
And my fucking heart cracked just a little bit more. I scrubbed my hand over my face to hide my emotions. Lila squeezed my arm. Kate gave me a little smile and nodded as if to say that everything was going to work out just fine. But I had no idea how that could possibly be true when everything was broken beyond repair.
One week later, on a Sunday evening, I showed up at the Petersons’ front door. I’d just dropped Noah off after having spent the weekend with him and I wanted to try to make things right.
Dale answered the door, looking wary as if he was nervous that I’d plant my fist in his face. “What did you need, Brody?”
He didn’t open the door all the way nor did he invite me into his home. That said it all, didn’t it? But fuck it, I was here for Noah, so I’d say my piece despite the chilly reception. “You can think whatever you want about me…” I refrained from adding that I didn’t give a shit what he thought of me. “But my boy deserves better. Don’t punish him for the sins of his father.” The irony wasn’t lost on me.
He rocked back on his heels and tucked his hands in the pockets of his pressed khakis. “We just don’t feel comfortable letting Hayley spend time with you. As a father, I’m sure you can understand where we’re coming from.”
I wanted to argue that I was the same man who had hosted all those playdates for Hayley and Noah. I hadn’t changed, but the media had painted me to look like a villain. A man with a history of violence just like his ‘father’. In the days following that first story, they’d dredged up more shit about me and unleashed a media storm. My mother was a junkie, my father was a murderer. I was the spawn of the devil.
People came out of the woodwork, speaking up about Brody McCallister’s ‘character’ or lack thereof. The asshole sheriff had confirmed that I’d been a juvenile delinquent and as far as he could tell, I was still a brawler and a rule breaker with a bad attitude. Hell, there were even guys from my rodeo days who claimed I had a quick temper and was always the first one to throw a punch. A woman I’d supposedly slept with claimed that I’d ‘roughed her up.’ That was a goddamn lie. I’d never laid a hand on any woman. Everyone wanted their twenty seconds of fame. The truth got twisted, the stories were sensationalized and that video of me punching Landry had gone viral. Interestingly, Landry came out looking like the victim, my ‘attack’ unprovoked according to him. Fucking weasel.
By now, my story was yesterday’s news, taking a backseat to all the other scandals going on in the world of celebrity gossip. But once that shit was on the Internet, you couldn’t do a damn thing about it and you couldn’t make it go away. It was out there for everyone to Google and read about.
“Hayley is Noah’s best friend, and I don’t want him to lose her because of me,” I told Dale.
He nodded. “I can understand that. They’re still friends. Noah’s a good kid. Meredith and I are happy to let them play together. But like I said, we’re not too comfortable leaving our baby girl with you. We’ve decided that would be best for now. For our own peace of mind.”
How could I fault them for wanting to protect their daughter? I couldn’t. Having no choice but to accept it, I nodded. “Thanks for your time. Sorry to interrupt your Sunday.”
“Thanks for stopping by.”
My eye caught on Hayley who had come to stand next to her dad. He put his hand on her shoulder as if to stop her from taking a step closer to the bad guy. She smiled at me, the dimples in her cheeks making an appearance and I returned her smile. Then the door closed in my face, blocking my view of Shiloh’s little girl. It felt like I’d lost the very last piece of Shiloh. Like there was nothing left of our relationship except for the memories. And I had a shitload of them.
Some days I wished I could shut them off. Whenever I closed my eyes, I saw her face. I heard her voice in my head. And I remembered all the good times we’d had. The smiles and laughter, the sex and intimate moments, and all our conversations when we opened up and shared pieces of our soul with each other. Even though she was gone and there was no hope in hell she’d ever come back, I couldn’t stop loving her or missing her or hoping she was okay. All I’d ever wanted was to be the man who never failed her. The one man in her life who would be there for her through thick and thin, the one person she could rely on when she
didn’t know who to trust. But that wasn’t how it worked out.
I was there the night Michael Jenkins shot and killed Shiloh’s mom. I stayed in the car like he’d told me to do. Scared shitless that if I didn’t do as he said he’d punish me for it. What kind of a monster would bring an eight-year-old kid to an armed robbery? I’d hidden in the back seat. It was dark and I was scared, and I heard the screams, and sirens from the police car. But I’d stayed hidden. By the time the cops had found me, I’d peed my pants. I’d been so ashamed for peeing my pants that I’d refused to answer any of their questions. After that night, I’d blocked the memory, never to be revisited.
Until the night Landry had shown up at Shiloh’s hotel room and flashed his phone in front of my face, forcing me to confront a sick and twisted turn of events I’d never in a million years have thought possible.
What were the chances that my path would have crossed Shiloh’s on that fateful night? One in a million.
Later that evening, I went to visit Phoenix in the pasture. She came right over to me when I whistled, like she knew it was her I’d come to see.
“Look at you. You’re a beauty, aren’t you?” I rubbed behind her ears and she nudged her nose against my side. “Yeah, I brought you something. Don’t tell the others. They’ll get jealous.”
I fished the apple wedges out of my pocket and fed them to her. “What am I going to do with you now? You were born to do better things than hang out in a pasture all day.”
Phoenix didn’t have an answer for me.
“Talking to your horses now?” Ridge asked, joining me next to the fence.
I’d always talked to my horses, but I didn’t usually have an audience. I side-eyed him. He’d just come home from work and smelled like smoke from the barbecue pit. The bruises on his face had faded but I still remembered his words, that he wouldn’t let anyone talk shit about his brother. Ridge and I had come a long way over the past year. “You doing okay?”