Brothers

by Helena Newbury

  Not unless my brother had gone soft.

  And that got me thinking about my other brothers and how they might have changed. For the first time, the cold started to creep in through my cut.

  We stopped for gas for the bike and the much thirstier SUV. We also refueled ourselves, gorging on frosted donuts and huge paper cups of steaming coffee to keep our eyes open. But even inside the heated gas station, even with my hands wrapped around my coffee cup, I couldn’t seem to get warm.

  Ever since that day I’d run away, I’d been twisted up inside, convinced I’d done the wrong thing. I was the oldest. I should have stayed and somehow kept everyone together, protected everyone. That was what had made me give life and soul to the MC all these years, trying to pay back the debt I felt I owed. Annabelle had lifted some of the guilt and seeing Aedan again had helped. I knew now that he didn’t hate my guts for leaving. And Kian seemed okay with me, too. But soon I’d have to face the hardest one of all: Sean, the youngest of the family.

  I knew he’d been taken into foster care after I left. I didn’t know what sort of family he’d wound up with and I didn’t

  know if he blamed me. I just knew that, tomorrow, when

  his plane landed, I’d be facing everything I feared. That’s why I was pushing this so hard, that’s why I’d gone to Washington to get Kian, why I was determined to find Bradan. We all wanted to put our family back together but I felt I had the most to make up for.

  It was morning by the time we neared Chicago. The traffic grew heavier and we slowed down. Drivers started to look at us: first they’d see Annabelle’s long red hair whipping in the wind. Then their eyes would track down to that ripe, perfect ass, its curves shown off by the tight denim.

  And then they’d glance forward to see who she had her arms wrapped around and see me glaring at them. They’d turn pale and suddenly become very interested in the car in front.

  Kian waved for me to come alongside. He lowered his window and I could feel the warm air bathing my frozen face. I would never admit it but, just for that second, the SUV didn’t seem so dumb.

  “Where are we heading?” Kian had to raise his voice over the slipstream. “Does Aedan have an apartment here or what?”

  “He does, but he’s never there,” I yelled. “But I know where he’ll be, this time of the morning.”

  I twisted the throttle and roared forward and he followed me. Soon we were moving through the city and I had to wait for him every time we hit traffic: I could thread my way through small gaps but he couldn’t. I tried not to smirk at him in my mirror.

  I pulled up outside a gym. Not the sort of place bankers go to pound on a treadmill for an hour; the sort of place men spend all day in, thumping bags and lifting iron. I went straight inside, still taking off my helmet, Annabelle and Kian falling in behind me.

  We pushed through the doors just in time to see Aedan punch Sylvie right in the head.

  7

  Sylvie

  My head rang like it was a bell and someone had whacked it with a hammer. I was wearing my padded head protector but I still wavered for a second. Aedan’s eyes lit up with concern: he’d only hit me with about a tenth of his power but still, his brows lifted: are you okay?

  I glowered at him and struck back with a quick one-two, then ducked under his hands and landed a hook on his side. He oofed, frowned and then gave me that smile, the one that said I was in trouble now.

  I danced around him. He stood like a colossus in the center of the ring, stripped to the waist, his muscles gleaming with sweat. I felt like a hummingbird buzzing around a bear. I was getting in three hits to every one of his but wow his hits were hard, even with him pulling his punches. I was sweating too: we’d been at it for two rounds already, each of us holding our own. We were spiraling toward the conclusion but neither of us knew which way it was going to go: he couldn’t take much more of my dodging and sharp, quick blows but I couldn’t take many more of those big hits, either.

  Both of us were drunk on adrenaline. We’d lost track of everything outside the ring: I could distantly hear people cheering but they might as well have been on Mars. My entire world was those blue Irish eyes. We were connected on a level most people never know, communicating without words, daring each other to attack, drawing each other out. He suddenly lunged forward but I darted out of the way and my glove hit those iron-hard abs with enough power to wind him. He wheeled around and I grinned at him...and unconsciously, I pressed my thighs together beneath my shorts. We had rules for what happened in the bedroom, if I won a fight.

  Movement in the crowd caught my attention for a second. Some woman shaking her head, aghast. She didn’t understand, didn’t know the adrenaline rush you get from fighting someone you’re truly in love with. All she saw was a muscled, scarred fighter. She didn’t understand that I loved every part of him, even those scars: they were evidence of everything we’d been through to be together. Once, I’d sought him out because he was the scariest fighter around, a man everyone thought was a monster. I hadn’t been ready for what I found, or how meeting had changed both of us. He’d lost his coldness and let me in. I’d gone from being scared to holding my head up high: I didn’t shy away from a fight anymore, in or out of the ring. And now, months after it all happened, Aedan and I had never been closer.

  An incoming punch from Aedan snapped me back to reality. His gloved fist seemed as big as my head and it was driven by a body that was nothing but muscle, from that rock-hard midsection to the wide shoulders and thick biceps. I ducked just in time, the rush of air from his fist lifting the hairs on the back of my neck. A shot of primal fear sluiced through my system...and soaked down to my groin.

  There were rules for what happened in the bedroom if I lost a fight, too. Losing was just as much fun as winning.

  I backed away, panting. I was having the time of my life and I wouldn’t trade this for anything. Even though Chicago still felt...temporary. It still felt like we were treading water here. Maybe it was because, in New York, my brother Alec and I had lived in our parents’ old apartment: it had felt like home in a way Chicago didn’t. And I didn’t have a single friend here. Everyone I’d known was in New York and I couldn’t even visit them, given that I was meant to be dead.

  I saw Aedan ready himself: that slight narrowing of the eyes, the infinitesimal lifting of his fists. This would be it: a final charge and either he’d take me down or I’d take him down. Then we’d kiss and he’d drag me off somewhere and...the heat that had been building inside me all through the fight tightened and compressed even more.

  He charged. I darted forward, trying to judge which way to dodge to get under his attack: left or right? High or low? And then—

  And then he dropped his hands. What? Aedan never dropped his guard. It’s one of the first things he taught me. And he was staring off into the crowd. He never did that, either.

  As he came to a halt I dropped my fists, too, and tried to pull up short, but I was going too fast. I skidded on the canvas and whumped into him. Even distracted as he was, he folded his arms around me and gathered me into his chest...and I just melted inside. It felt even better than victory.

  I followed his gaze to see what the hell had distracted him so completely. His brother, Carrick, was standing there and Annabelle was beside him. I’d seen them both a few times since they’d come to Chicago to find us. But that alone wouldn’t have drawn Aedan’s gaze, not in the middle of a fight.

  I looked again...and this time I saw the other man. I hadn’t even glanced at him the first time because he was in a suit: I thought he must be someone who’d wandered into the wrong sort of gym by accident. But now I saw his face, one I’d seen on TV. Oh my God! That’s—

  8

  Aedan

  Kian. I’d seen him on TV: for a good while following the attempted coup, he wasn’t off the screen. I recognized the expensive suit, the quiet confidence: a man who could blend into a crowd but could put you down with one punch. He looked every inch the S
ecret Service bodyguard.

  What I couldn’t believe was that this was my brother. Right here. In the flesh.

  I grabbed the ropes and swung myself out of the ring. Behind me, I heard Sylvie doing the same. The crowd of people who’d gathered to watch our fight turned to follow us as Kian moved in front of Carrick. “Holy feckin’ shit,” I muttered under my breath. We stared at each other….

  And then we grabbed each other at the same moment and pulled each other into a fierce, bone-crushing hug. The emotion hit me all at once: something about the closeness, the feel of someone you love right there against you. I was blinking, the room blurring. Jesus….

  When we finally moved back I stood there shaking my head, trying to take it in. He’d changed so much...I hadn’t seen him since I went back to Ireland, well before he joined the military. And now he’s with the President’s daughter…. A flush of shame went through me. And I’m still boxing. Just like when I was a kid. Hell, just months before, the fights weren’t even legal. I’d started to make some money at it, since we came to Chicago and I went legit, enough that I’d been able to quit working at the docks and train full time. We were getting by but it didn’t change the fact that I was still earning my living with my fists. Always would.

  And that brought me back to what had been weighing on my mind for weeks. I automatically glanced at Sylvie, then quickly looked away. She already knew something was up and I didn’t want her asking questions.

  “Nice suit,” I managed at last.

  Kian looked down at himself, frowning, as if he’d forgotten he was wearing it. For a second, he looked as embarrassed by the gulf between us as I was.

  Sylvie stepped forward and embraced Kian. Then Alec stepped forward. “Sylvie’s brother,” he said by way of introduction. He nodded at me. “Your brother saved my sister, this summer. Any brother of his….” Then he slipped his arm around the waist of a curvy woman in long blonde hair. “And this is Jessica,” he told Kian, snugging her close to his side. “My girlfriend.”

  We’d had to flee New York after Sylvie faked her death. But Alec still needed physiotherapy: the bones in his shattered leg had mostly healed while he’d been in the coma but he’d been immobile for a month and that had left his joints and muscles in need of attention. When we came to Chicago, I took a job at the docks and Sylvie helped Alec find a physiotherapist.

  I’d driven him to his first appointment and, from the very first time he met Jessica, I could see it. I saw it in the way his jaw dropped when she straightened up from her position beside some kid’s wheelchair to look at him, tossing back that long golden hair. I saw it in the way she blinked and swallowed as she laid eyes on the blond, muscled boxer. I knew exactly what was going to happen.

  Jessica had spent long daily sessions with him, his arm around her shoulders and his teeth gritted as he’d struggled to walk without crutches. When we ran out of money and couldn’t pay the bills, Jessica started helping him outside of hospital hours for free. Alec had been frustrated by his slow progress, even grumpy: he was determined to get back in the ring. But every time I dropped him off at the hospital and he saw Jessica, his face lit up. Jessica had been patient and gently firm, catching him when he stumbled, encouraging him when he wanted to give up. She was cautious, full of nerves about getting

  involved with a patient, even if it was all happening off the books. The tension between them grew until every touch of his hand on her arm and every brush of her hair against his shoulder made them both tense.

  Then the day came when Alec pushed himself too far and fell. Jessica tried to catch him, his muscled bulk pushed her to the floor and he wound up on top of her, his legs between hers. The way Alec tells it, they stared into each other’s eyes for all of three seconds and then they were kissing.

  After that, they were inseparable. Alec slowly progressed to walking unaided and then to running and they’d go on punishing runs together around Chicago’s streets. Not long after that, he moved into her apartment. By then, I’d quit my job at the docks and was training full time, and Alec started to spar with me. He wasn’t quite ready to join the fighting circuit yet, but instead he’d done a course in personal training and started taking clients at an upmarket gym: the business executives loved the idea of being trained by a real-life fighter.

  Sylvie had done a similar course and then applied for a job teaching a boxercise class at the same gym. Some of the staff had laughed when they saw her slender form: right up until the point when she kicked their asses in the ring. She got the job and, after all the hardcore boxing training I’d put her through, she took no prisoners when it came to her class. It quickly became notorious for being the toughest class the gym offered, with the most calories burned. People loved it: the class now ran three times a week and the waiting list to join was up to two months and counting.

  As Alec and Jessica stepped back, Carrick stepped forward. He clapped a hand on Kian’s shoulder and looked me in the eye...and that’s when I knew this wasn’t just about Kian paying a visit. I drew in a long breath. Carrick had told me his plan when he went to get Kian but I hadn’t believed it could really happen.

  “We’re putting our family back together,” said Carrick.

  I swallowed. “Sean?” Just saying the name made my throat close up. The thought of all of us together was too much.

  Kian nodded. “I’m in touch with him. He’s flying in from LA. He’ll be here in a few hours.”

  Sean! He’d been in LA all this time? I had about a million questions.

  Carrick’s next words drove them all away. “Once we’ve got everybody, we’re going after Bradan.”

  In a split-second, I was a kid again. Bradan’s young, pink hand pressed against the car window, its warmth soaking through the glass and into my own palm. My mom yelling at us to get out of the way, revving the engine—

  I closed my eyes and felt myself rock back on my heels. The sweat on my body turned to ice water. Jesus. I didn’t want to face all the possibilities this opened up. What if he’s dead?

  What if he’s alive and they’ve had him all this time and I’ve been living my life with Sylvie while those bastards—

  I felt a hand grip my arm, soft and comforting. I opened my eyes to see Sylvie looking at me with concern.

  “What makes you think you can find him?” I croaked. “I looked for him for years.”

  “We all did,” said Kian. I could see it in his eyes: he was thinking the same thing I was. “None of us got anywhere.”

  “Because we were doing it wrong,” said Carrick, his voice like iron. “We were doing it on our own. This time, we’ll be together. And we’re not quitting until it’s done. Until we know he’s dead or until he’s back with us.”

  I nodded. Knowing they’d been through the same process: the looking, the giving up, now the guilt that we might have given up too easily: that made me feel better. And knowing that we were in this together, whatever we found...that gave me the strength to do it. “Okay,” I said. And turned to Sylvie.

  When she saw what was in my eyes she tilted her head to one side and narrowed her eyes. “Don’t even think about it. I’m coming with you.”

  I should have known better. “Okay,” I said at last. “But what about your classes?”

  “I’ll take them,” said Alec. “I’ve filled in for her before.” He looked at me. “It’s the least I can do.”

  Sylvie nodded. “People love it when he fills in. The women go nuts.”

  Jessica gave Alec a sidelong look and he flushed. To cover his embarrassment, he stepped forward and wrapped Sylvie into a hug. “Go,” he told me over her shoulder. “Do what you need to do.” He squeezed his sister hard. “But take care. And just call if I can help.”

  I nodded and took Sylvie’s hand. “Alright,” I told my brothers. “Let us grab a shower and stop by our apartment to throw some stuff in a bag. And then let’s go get Sean.”

  9

  Sean

  The automatic doors to the arri
vals hall slid open...and I stopped. I felt the other passengers pile up against my back and heard a few curses. Then, as they looked up and saw my size, they mumbled apologies and quickly walked around me.

  I didn’t respond. I was staring at my family.

  Kian I recognized from when I’d gone to Washington. But standing beside him were two more men with jet-black hair and blue eyes that matched my own. I knew their faces, even across all the years. One was a little older, wearing a biker’s leather cut. Carrick! One was more my age and had that unmistakable athlete’s build, broad chest narrowing to a tight waist. Aedan!

  I finally got my feet moving again and took a stumbling step towards them. I didn’t know what Carrick and Aedan had been doing but likely they’d done better than me: enforcer for the drug gangs, now a construction worker. My step-dad’s words echoed in my ears again: wrecking stuff’s all you’re good for. My next step was smaller, the next one smaller still—

  And then all three of them were stepping forward, closing the distance between us in huge strides, reaching forward as one to pull me into their arms. I wound up crushed into Kian’s chest with Carrick’s arm and Aedan’s arm around my back.

  And I suddenly wondered what the hell I’d been worried about. Because these were my brothers and nothing else mattered.

  “Welcome home,” said Kian, his voice thick with emotion, and we all nodded because we knew what he meant. The arms around my back might as well have been made out of girders. I wasn’t getting out of that hug anytime soon.