Always Crew

by Tijan

  I didn’t know who these people were, but I took pictures of them just to be safe and as thorough as I could.

  I was leaving when I saw headlights sweep the place. Someone was pulling into the parking lot.

  I couldn’t think. I had to move.

  The door was shut, so I hurried out, hitting and holding a big red button. I was hoping it was the one to man the alarm system. As it clicked on, I was moving through the door connecting to the offices just as I heard a truck’s door open from the front.

  I sprinted to the register, slipping the key back in.

  The front door beeped open just as I shut the cash register. I dropped low to the ground.

  Thankfully, whoever was coming in left the lights off. They moved through, knowing where they were going. I moved to the other side of the front desk, closer to the back door—my destination—as I heard the cash register being opened.

  For a second, I panicked. Had I put the key where it’d been?

  I froze.

  “There you are.” It was Brock. He grabbed the key, shut the register, and I straightened up from my crouch, seeing him going to the office. I moved to the back door but purposely dropped Trundle’s key on the ground just as I moved outside, closing the door.

  The lights were turned on in the office as I darted across the lot, merging with the shadows and following the tree line until the sidewalk. I continued, keeping off the sidewalk until I got to my truck. Moving inside, Bren’s face was pale. “I didn’t know if he caught you.”

  Everything inside me was locked tight, but I couldn’t talk, not yet. We needed out of there as soon as possible. Turning the truck on, keeping the lights off, I moved forward. Once I took a turn onto another block, I flicked the lights on and headed back to the house.

  “Shit!” I could breathe easier now.

  She stared at me. “They never gave me a key.”

  “I know.” I reached over, taking her hand.

  She slid her fingers alongside mine. “You think they’ll look at the security cameras?”

  I shook my head. A big fat fucking boulder was sitting in my gut, but I didn’t have anything to make it all go away. “Let’s hope not.”

  “What about Justin’s key card?”

  “I dropped it on the ground. It’ll look like it came off his shirt, or out of his pocket or something.”

  She exhaled a deep breath, moving to face the front again, but her hand never let go of mine.

  She held me tight the whole way back.

  BREN

  Cross dropped me off, and I was showering as he went to pick up Zellman and Jordan.

  I knew he had a bombshell to drop on me. It was late, and I’d been happily buzzed. I wasn’t anymore.

  The other rooms didn’t have much. Anything important must have been put away in a filing cabinet, but there was obviously a reason they didn’t want me in that second room. Had to be.

  Why keep me on?

  Why bring me on in the first place?

  Was I being used?

  After Brock brought up my dad the first day, no one had said anything again. I was the office intern, helping where they told me.

  I hadn’t called Channing or my dad again. A part of me wasn’t ready, and I was glad neither had called me back. To an extent, I enjoyed sticking my head in the sand when it came to my dad. I wasn’t surprised about Channing not reaching out. He didn’t want me involved with anything concerning our dad, but a part of me had been waiting for his call telling me to stop working with Coug r Lanes, too.

  On a whole, everything had been quiet regarding Tabatha and Harper, too.

  It was a feeling, though. It was low, deep, and it was spreading.

  Something was going to get blown up. I was figuring my job since we just broke into it.

  I was finishing up in the shower when Cross pulled up. The headlights swept over the inside of our bathroom. I was toweling off and starting to dress when they came inside. A second later, Cross was coming into our bedroom.

  He had pulled off the black sweatshirt, but he was still in the dark pants.

  Seeing me, he tore his clothes off. He rasped out, “Where’s your clothes?”

  I pointed to the floor.

  He grunted before disappearing into the closet. He came back out in sweats that were low on his hips, deliciously low, and he was pulling a gray Henley over his head, tugging the bottom down. I slept with him, had explored his body on many occasions, but seeing that V leading down to his groin, the one that disappeared under his sweatpants, and I was feeling all sorts of other sensations.

  Warmth. Maybe that buzz was coming back? A throb was starting deep inside of me.

  He ignored me, bent and grabbed my clothes. He carried them to the other side of the bed, stuffing my clothes and his clothes into a bag.

  “What are you doing?”

  “I’m going to burn these.”

  “What?” Alarm spiked me. “I think that’s a little much, don’t you think?”

  He stopped just in front of the door and pinned me with a dark look. “We broke into a bounty hunting company. They work with law enforcement. They have confidential information on some big people. There’s probably cameras with us on them. We need to get rid of evidence. I’m not messing around with this.” He looked through the bag. “Where’s the ski mask?”

  “I took it off just inside the garage door.”

  He nodded.

  It was then I saw the tiredness clinging to him.

  “Hey.” I moved to him.

  He paused.

  I touched his arm, pulling him to me. Lifting a hand, I wiped my thumb over some tension lines around his mouth. “They won’t do anything.”

  “You don’t know what they’re capable of.”

  “True, but—”

  “You didn’t see that second room. I did.”

  He had me there.

  He grabbed the doorknob, but looked back. “We’re crew. We don’t lie to each other, but what I saw in that room—I want to call your brother about it before I talk to you. Can I do that? I need your permission to do that.”

  I opened my mouth, unsure what to say. The alarm spiking within me was about Cross and how he was acting, not even about what he saw. He was worried, and whatever they had in there, I’d deal. My dad would deal. This wasn’t the first time we were dealing with law enforcement agencies, and I knew that I hadn’t done anything wrong. Well, except for beating up Harper and breaking and entering my own place of employment, but besides those things, I was pretty clean.

  When I didn’t answer, Cross rested his forehead to mine. “I need to talk to your brother. Trust me?”

  He asked me to trust him.

  “Okay.”

  I was trusting him.

  He reached up, cupping the side of my face for a moment, before he pulled himself away. The bag of clothes went with him. A few minutes later, now dressed, I headed out for the kitchen. The upstairs light was on, so I was guessing Zellman was up there. Jordan was staring through the back window, looking out over the yard with a bottle of water in hand.

  He took a sip, asking a question as I passed him by for my own water, “Why’s Cross burning clothes?”

  I grabbed a bottle and went to stand next to him.

  The silhouette of Cross was clearly visible. He was feeding one piece of clothing into the bonfire after another. He looked calm and patient. There was also an air rippling off of him. An air that I felt inside of me, spreading through every inch of my body, setting my hairs upright, but not in fear. In awareness. That was our leader, the same guy who had stepped forward when we were about to face off against Alex Ryerson in the Roussou school’s parking lot and who needed an entire group of guys to wrestle him down at the police station when I was arrested. Seeing him incinerating those clothes was a sober enough moment that Jordan was picking up on it.

  I didn’t answer.

  Jordan slid his eyes sideways to me, tipping his bottle back for another drag. “That
have something to do with where you and he went after you dropped us off? Why Cross had a ski mask in the seat next to him?”

  Again. There was no answer.

  But Jordan was my crew. I patted his shoulder and said what I could, “Let’s wait until he comes in. He has to make a call.”

  Jordan watched me, and I was picking up the same vibes that Cross was giving out. Patience and calm. He nodded, going back to taking a drink from his water. “Okay, then.”

  CROSS

  Channing picked up after the first ring. “Is Bren okay?”

  All the clothes were burned. Maybe Bren was right and I was overreacting. I’d rather be safe than sorry, but I still needed to get this call over with. And I was tired. I was so tired. I turned for the house, going to the patio table and sat down. “Yes.”

  He sighed on his end. I heard rustling sounds, something creaking. Channing yawned as he said, “I’m assuming I don’t want to hear what’s going to be said over this call. It’s almost four in the morning.”

  “Probably not.”

  “Fuck.”

  I wasn’t one to waste time. “You haven’t called Bren this week. Why is that?”

  “Say what?”

  “You haven’t called all week, about the raid. Why haven’t you?”

  Channing was quiet a second. “How’s that your business?”

  Because Bren was my business. But I answered, “Bren wasn’t satisfied with your non-answers when you called her last week. So she called your father, instead.” He swore from his end. “Dammit.”

  “He told her about the raid.”

  “What else did he say?”

  “Just that there was a raid and that law enforcement only got four out of the thirty arrest warrants. Bren said they were keeping her out of the office all week, but I have to tell you that we went bowling there tonight.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Yeah, and her boss was there. The Brock guy. He watched her the whole night.”

  “What?” Channing’s tone was low, and tight.

  “He was watching all of us, like we weren’t a surprise to him. He was studying us.”

  “Studying you?”

  “Yeah.”

  Channing was quiet again. “They kept her out of the office all week?”

  “They get money if they bring in any of those arrests, right?”

  “Yeah. Fuck.” It was low and quiet again. It was getting tighter too. “You wouldn’t be the one calling me unless there’s more. Just tell me.”

  I leaned forward in my chair. “Let’s say there’s a situation where we hypothetically stole one of the employee’s key card.”

  “What? Wait. Bren didn’t have one?”

  “They never gave her a card.”

  “Shit. That’s weird.”

  I shrugged. “Doesn’t matter because hypothetically maybe a few things aligned where I was able to find a room that had—”

  “What did you do?” He bit out, “Was my sister there?”

  I was silent.

  He groaned. “Fuuuuck, Cross!”

  More silence from me.

  He growled. “Just tell me what you found. Hypothetically–”

  “A room with your pictures on the wall.”

  “What?”

  “Your dad’s picture. Bren’s picture. My picture. Yours. Everyone in your life. Maxwell Raith on another wall. I’m assuming pictures of other Red Demons.”

  He was quiet again, then clipped out, “How many others?”

  “There were three walls. Your dad. Maxwell Raith. Another guy’s.”

  “Who was the other guy?”

  “I don’t know, but I took pictures of the pictures.”

  “Good. I want them. All of them.”

  “They’re on my phone.”

  “Get a computer. Download them into a password-protected drive, and email that to me. Not via text. I want the drive password protected. You can do that?”

  “Sure.” That wasn’t a problem. “But I’ll only do that if you loop us in.”

  More silence. From him. From his end.

  “What?”

  I stood. I hadn’t known I was going to take this stand, but here I was. Standing, literally, for Bren. I kept the phone pressed to my ear as I glanced at the house. The inside was all dark. A light from down the hall was lit up. Bren was in that room, waiting.

  “You’ve benched your sister enough with this stuff.”

  “She’s not old—”

  “She’s here. She’s living with her boyfriend—”

  “I’d think you’d want to ingratiate yourself with me on this one?”

  “She’s taking a serious job and trying to figure her shit out. She’s not going to college. She’s not taking the extra four years to ‘find herself’ and figure out what theories and philosophers she thinks can blow smoke up someone’s ass. She’s in the work field. She’s figuring it out, and she’s doing that alone. Her job, people you sent her way, and yeah, only Bren thinks that that was all a coincidence, but a dumbass could see your move from a mile away—these people are icing her out. I don’t know why, but I know it’s affecting her. Staffing a bowling alley is decent work if that’s what she signed up for. She didn’t sign up for that, and that’s what they have her doing. You were updated from our end about Sweets. We’ve told you about Harper—”

  “Not that you beat the shit out of him. Yeah,” he bit into the phone, his voice savage. “You didn’t loop me in on that little detail.”

  Fine. I nodded, not that he could see me. “Just so you know, that was your sister’s handiwork. She worked him over because she’s the one who could stop before it went too far. The rest of us, fuck no.”

  “That kid—”

  “That kid admitted that he knew Tabatha was touching him against her will. He knew the whole time. He did nothing about it except take advantage of the situation.”

  I waited, my pulse picking up. Even thinking about Harper, hearing his admission, and I was gripping the phone so tight I was surprised it hadn’t shattered.

  “He did?”

  “He did. She went dark for us. She didn’t want to, but she did. So have her back.”

  “I’m not—”

  “I know, but we’re not kids anymore. Your sister’s certainly not. She’s not been a kid in forever, and last semester when you took care of the cop and Drake, she chose that. She wanted you to handle that, so she didn’t have to. She let you in, but she’s at a point in her life where she needs to be looped in. It’s what keeps her from going dark, man.”

  Quiet again.

  Another beat, and then Channing sighed. It was long and drawn-out. “Having our dad back is going to mess her up. I was worried. I didn’t think she was ready to deal with him.”

  “She’s not, but she’s letting us know when she’s ready and when she isn’t. I’m just saying, when it’s coming to this new stuff going on around him, because it’s affecting her job, you need to start thinking of her as an adult. It’s the only way she’s going to be able to handle whatever storm that’s coming. She has to see it first, then get prepared, so she can deal with the fallout.”

  “Yeah. Yeah. I hear you.”

  My hand flexed, almost dropping the phone. I caught it and rubbed a hand over my face.

  That’d been intense.

  Channing added, “Nothing’s happening on the Harper front. The girl is here. The kid got worked over, but as far as we know, he’s not said who did it. I don’t even know if Harper, Sr. knows about it, so a heads-up, when the kid talks, you might have another kind of storm heading your way. It’s not if, it’s when. Always when. Plan for the when.”

  “Got it.” Shit.

  “I just heard Heather get up for the bathroom so I’m going to go. Take care of my sister, and thank you for the call. Do the email immediately tomorrow.”

  I nodded again, then forgot he couldn’t see me. “Yeah. On it.”

  “Hey, Cross.”

  “Yeah?”

 
; “Watch Bren more than you think you should. She’s going to snap one of these days about our dad. It’s coming. I just know it.”

  A burn started to spread through me, but he wasn’t telling me anything I didn’t already know. Bren would snap, but Bren needed to snap. He wasn’t getting that part.

  “I will.”

  He hung up after that.

  I let the phone drop. Catching it in my palm, I pocketed it. Man. Channing wasn’t the only one tired. I felt as if a semi had sideswiped me, crushing my legs.

  I checked on the fire and noted everything had burned, then headed inside.

  Plan for the when, he said.

  A storm was coming. We needed to plan for it.

  FROM: Cross

  TO: Tazsters

  SUBJECT: Re: blank on purpose

  Love you. Miss you. I’ll call you later this weekend.

  —I’m always the best twin

  BREN

  Cross came to bed, but I didn’t want to hear about any of it. Not then. Not yet.

  I wanted to wait, hear it with the rest.

  He came in, took one look at me, and knew what I needed. After washing up, he came to bed, rose above me and we didn’t fall asleep until much later. I woke late in the morning, wrapped in his arms.

  Jordan and Zellman were already gone for classes, and Cross headed in for his twelve-thirty class. I had the house to myself, but it seemed weird to be here alone, so instead, I went for a drive.

  I grabbed food, coffee, and then it was like a need inside of me that I wasn’t fully comprehending until somehow, I found myself parking at the top of a hill. I was on the outskirts of Cain. Trees spread out in front of me. I double-checked, but none of this was private property. I’d have to look through the records, but I was betting this was still city land waiting to be developed.

  Packing my items in a bag, I started through the trees.

  There were walking trails on the ridge, and going down one, I kept watch until I found an opening closer to the edge and moved in.

  I hadn’t known I was coming here, I wasn’t even sure where exactly I was.

  I moved along, off the walking trail now, and headed farther west.