His poor hands. Three fingers of one hand were taped together, probably the broken ones he had referred to. Scabs crisscrossed the knuckles on both hands, black lines of stitches drawn across the hills and valleys in between. The burns, though, they were the worst, the skin of his palms looking like it had been peeled back. Raw and seeping flesh showed through the cracked and broken surface.
It looked like he had put them through a meat grinder, and she winced at the thought of him driving himself home, not wanting to take time for proper treatment so he could return to her. The man on the phone was clearly upset by his insistence on leaving right away and made her promise to take him to the clinic if she thought it was needed.
She pointed to a chair beside the table and said, “Sit.” With a grunt, he started to drag the chair out with the toe of his boot and she helped, adjusting it to give him room to seat himself. Frowning, she realized he wasn’t wearing his own pants. These were too big, held up by a belt, but bagging around his hips and thighs. “Where are your pants, Reu—Duck?” Barely catching herself, she changed her words at the last moment.
“Trashed,” he said, sitting with a huffed sigh. “Fuck me, I’m tired.” He paused, the corners of his mouth curling the slightest amount. “Home, though. Home feels good.” Tipping his head backwards, he rolled his neck with a groan, blowing out a heavy breath. “Feels like I could sleep a week.”
“Let me get your hands cleaned up,” she said and frowned when he shook his head.
“Doc got me before I left. Shot me up with antibiotics. Had to guess, but he smeared all kinds of shit on me to neutralize the compounds. Covered all the burns. I’m good, baby.” Eyes closed, he didn’t see her shock at his confirmation of what his wounds looked like. Chemical burns. He continued, “I’m just fucking tired, Bee. Made it home, my goal. Hadn’t thought past that, just wanted you. Wanted to be with you.” He lifted his head with a weary effort, eyelids opening halfway, gaze locked on her face. A crooked half-smile preceded his next words. “Wanted you.”
“Then let's get you to bed,” she said, reaching out to tug at his elbow. When he winced, she frowned. “Where are you hurt, Duck?”
“All over, baby,” he muttered, struggling to stand, swaying on his feet once he made it there. “Fucking everything hurts. My whole fucking body feels like one crispy, strained muscle. But, it’s worth everything to get Isabella back for her daddy, her family. Worth everything to get that girl out of the hole she was in. Worth anything.”
Her arm around his waist, they walked up the stairs. Once in the bedroom, he toed off his boots while she worked the buckle of his belt. She unfastened the unfamiliar pants, letting them sag to the floor, gasping again as it revealed even more damage to his body. He had what looked like the worst case of road rash she had ever seen. Skin raw and oozing from mid-thigh to mid-shin, front and sides. His flanks hadn’t avoided damage, with scrapes and burns on his hips and ass. “Jesus,” she whispered, squatting to pull his socks off, thankful his feet appeared to have escaped unscathed.
Grunting, he tried to unbutton his shirt, and she scowled up at him, silently rebuking until he dropped his arms to his sides, lifting his chin to give her easy access once she stood. Draping his leather vest on top of her dresser, she peeled the shirt off where it had plastered to his shoulders only to find more burns on his arms, elbows and forearms, and shoulders. Across his back burned down in places to what looked like the second layer of skin. “Duck,” she whispered, finally seeing the full breadth of the damage. “Baby. Jesus. What in the world happened to you?”
“Let me get into bed. Just…” He sighed, rolling his shoulders with a pained twist of his mouth. “I’ll tell you anything, baby. Answer any question. Just let me…” He turned and kicked his pants, uttering a groan and wincing at the jolt when he connected. “Got some pain pills in there. Can you get me a couple out? I was supposed to take ‘em hours ago, but couldn’t open the bottle.”
She rushed to get the pills, then back downstairs for water. He was seated on the edge of the bed when she returned, head bent far forward, exhaustion written in every line of his body. Shaking two of the purple tablets from the unmarked bottle, she put them in his mouth and then held the bottle of water for him so he didn’t have to try to grip it with his hands. “Jesus,” she whispered again.
“Looks worse than it is,” he tried to reassure her, but then groaned when the burns on his back stuck to the sheet as he tried to slide into bed.
“No, it’s bad, Duck. This is really bad, baby. I’m so sorry.” She laid down next to him, carefully not touching him, propped up on her bent elbow, gaze roaming his face.
“I’m not,” he said, staring at her. “No hesitation. Knowing the cost, I’d still do it again. No question.”
“I know you would, hero man.” She tried for levity and felt it fall flat, Duck’s eyes staring at her. “No, really. I know you would, Duck.” She swallowed, thinking of the voice of the man on the phone tonight, telling her Duck was coming home to her. That he was okay; he had saved the girl.
She thought of the care in Myron’s tone, his words claiming this man next to her in a way she barely understood. Calling him brother with a meaning running deep and rock-solid; the truth an anchor against the currents of the world that could unmoor a lesser bond and she said again, “I know you would.”
He nodded, his eyes never leaving hers as he raised a hand to her cheek, stroking her skin with the backs of his fingers. Then he began to talk, telling her what happened, and she listened, taking it in. In the end, she did understand the man on the phone, because this one in front of her—her man—Duck was worth everything. Worthy of the care and affection she felt for him, worth everything she had heard in Myron’s voice on the phone.
With what he had been taught as a child, the examples laid for him by his family, the fact he had turned into this strong, caring man was a miracle. That this man, after everything he had seen, all he had endured, that he had come out the other side with this kind of empathy and love for people… For her. That was amazing. He was amazing. My Duck, she thought, watching as his eyes gradually sagged closed, the pain medication finally dragging him down into sleep.
***
“Why you runnin’, bro?”
The voice echoed down the hallway, empty walls stretching off into the distance, space narrowing down small, sound growing large.
“Rue?”
Fresh echoes, red pain painting the walls this time, the voice uneasy.
“Reuben?”
Frightened.
“I never wanted this, bubba.”
Heavy footsteps pounding up the stairs, leather soles hissing, sibilant noise in their wake as they slid on the bare wood. Boots meant to be durable, delivering lessons lasting far longer. Deep grunts mixed with meaty thuds. Reuben’s body jerked sideways, slamming into the wall, the back of his head connecting with the bedroom doorframe.
“Goddamned kids.” Words bursting from his father’s lips as he breathed through his exertions. “Nose where it don’t belong. What’d you see?” Something gripped his shirt, lifting his torso from the floor as it twisted him, slamming him into the wall once, twice, three times, his head flopping loosely on his neck, warmth flowing down his back. “Shed is off limits, boy. You mind your beeswax.”
“Rue, I never meant to be his kind.”
I won’t be, he thought, finally recognizing his baby brother’s voice.
“I couldn’t let him hurt you. Not anymore.”
Crusted eyes opening, he squinted down the long hallway, fifty times its normal length, seeing a glow coming through the window at the end. Flickering lights, red and yellow, sound of sirens in the distance.
“I did it for you, bubba.”
You didn’t do anything for me. You were his, through and through.
“Not always.” Boots thundering down the stairs, shouting in the distance. “Not always, Rue.”
“Boy, you think that’ll stop me?” Dark muttering in the s
hadows, his father’s door opening and closing on a scream. “Burned down my play shed, think it’ll stop me?”
Not me, Reuben thought.
“Not him,” Ray said.
“Make you sorry, boy. Break everything that matters to you.” Shrill shouts from the bedroom, voice one he knew. The pretty math teacher who tutored him, told him he was smart, made him promise to make something of himself. Get out of Lamesa, see the world. “Break it all.”
Everything fuzzed out for a minute, then the lines of the hallway snapped back into place and he saw Ray standing there. “He hurt Lessa, bubba. Hurt her so bad she was gonna leave. Leave me. I didn’t know what to do. I lost Mica, lost you. She stayed, but he was there, always there. Forever in my head.”
You killed your wife, Ray. Killed Lessa dead, her carrying your baby.
“I didn’t know. Never knew. Only good thing came of it, killing the bloodline.” Ray’s laughter spiraled high, twisting in a wind suddenly rushing down the funnel created by the hallway, spilling out through the window, chilling and insane. Broken.
You killed our father.
“Had to. He was out of control. He’d go to El Paso, come home exhausted and covered in blood, bubba. Had to. I’d stuffed it into a box, closed the lid. The crazy. Boxed up tight. Put the box in a hole, covered it up. Tried to fake normal. Faked it hard. Kept the monster in the box. Taped, tied, chained…didn’t matter. He wanted me to go. Wanted to dig up that box.” Ray leaned close, lips barely moving as he told the secrets staining his soul. “Dug it up. Made me, bubba. Made. Me. Had to.”
You tried to kill Mica.
“She was the key. My key. My beacon. Started it all for me in earnest. If she was gone, I could put it back in the box. Stop. Stop being what I was. She was the start, and would be the end. She could be the new box.” Head tipped to the wall, Ray stared at the ceiling and Reuben stared at him, mesmerized by what was playing out in front of him.
“Tried to stop. Couldn’t. Every time I said it was the last. Promised myself. Then it would start to build again. It built and built. Swelling in me like a sick infection, you think I didn’t know it was sick? I did, Rue. It was sick, seeds planted by our old man. I couldn’t cut it out. That shit was too deep. Rooted inside me, all I knew. So fucking deep. Infested.
“So I’d lance it, let the pus leak out. Find relief. Things would be better so I’d let that hole heal up, seal over. But it didn’t work. I needed a box because the stinking shit would start to build again, festering inside me. She was the first who made it better. In between times, I mean. She made it better, made it not so hard.” He brought his chin down, staring at Reuben seated on the hallway floor. “That’s how it lasted so long with her. Because in between, she made it better. She was the strongest I found, the strongest box. I wanted that back. She wouldn’t give it back to me, Rue. I couldn’t find it again, and I looked. God, how I looked. Went through a hundred boxes, none of them her. So she would have been the end.”
Ray, so fucking sorry.
“Me, too, bro.” Ray raised a hand, bringing an enormous pistol to his head, the barrel and grip painted black and white, and Reuben could see the outline of a skull in the lines of color. The Rebel patch made into a weapon. Destruction in an emblem of honor. “Mason fixed it, though. Ended it for good. Put it all in the box in the end.”
Reuben surged to his feet, lifting his hands to grab at the gun, hearing the tendons in his brother’s hands creak as they tightened, applying pressure to the metal bar underneath his forefinger. There was a blast, so loud it flung him violently backwards against the wall and he groaned as the pain exploded in his body, not able to hear his own voice over the ringing in his head.
***
Brenda jerked awake at Duck’s shouted, “NO!” She twisted off the bed, standing beside it, knees and thighs pressed against the mattress as it bucked and pitched with his movements. It looked like he was fighting the very air around him, sheets winding around his arms as they stuck to the salve covering his wounds.
“Baby,” she called, “be still. You’re going to hurt yourself.” Leaning in, she rested her hand at the base of his throat, sucking in a shocked breath when he snatched at her wrist, flinging her hand away as if the touch burned. “Duck.” Using a firm tone, trying to break through what was an obvious nightmare, she said, “Stop it. Duck, stop it.”
“NO!” His shout this time was garbled and she realized he had begun sobbing in his sleep, tears streaming from his closed eyes, lips slanted downward. “Don’t let him win.” Those words were another shout, and she stared at him for a moment, finally making a decision.
Reaching towards the nightstand, she grabbed her phone, going straight to her recent calls and dialing the number Myron told her to save into her contacts, one he said would ring directly to him. She had texted after Duck got home, received back a single word, Good. Now she would call him, because he had assured her he was available to her or Duck twenty-four/seven. Had even said so, verbalizing the slash. One ring later, she found he was truthful when he answered the call, “Brenda, what’s wrong?”
“He’s…” She trailed off because her chest seized tight, holding her breath hostage and suddenly she wasn’t sure what to say or even why she had called this man. A stranger who was sitting somewhere in the dark, a thousand miles away. What did she expect him to do? It wasn’t like he could drive across the road and help her hold Duck down.
“Is he having trouble? Brenda, talk to me.” Myron’s voice was low, deliberately calming, and it worked because she sucked in a breath, then another, convincing her body it was able to breathe again.
“He’s having a nightmare. I can’t wake him up.” She knew she was whispering when she said, “He’s shouting.”
“NO!” Duck twisted in the bed, nearly rolling off the edge and she rushed to stand where she could brace him if he started to fall, knowing she couldn’t catch him, but only make it easier when he hit the floor. “Don’t do it, brother.”
Myron spoke in her ear, asking, “He take the pain pills?”
She nodded, knowing he couldn’t see her but unable to stop the movement. “Uh, yeah. But, not until he got here. He couldn’t open the bottle—“
She hadn’t finished talking when Myron broke in with a guttural, “Fuck. Didn’t think of that.”
He continued, “He seem coherent when he got there? Making sense when he talked?”
“Uh…yeah. He talked for a while, told me what happened. Myron,”—she pulled in a slow breath, trying hard to stay calm as Duck shouted again—“he’s…the burns are bad.”
“I know, honey. I saw pictures, talked to him on video before he climbed in that truck to get back to you.” Back to me? The thought struck her with wonder, because it sounded like something she would do, want to get back to Duck if she were in a strange city and hurt. “He eat before he take the pills?”
“No, he was so tired. I got him undressed and in bed, got the pills down him and then let him talk himself to sleep. Shit, I should have known he shouldn’t take them on an empty stomach. Shit.” Teeth clenched, her hand tightened around the phone in anger at herself.
“Okay. Makes sense, honey. He’s drugged, so his dreams are going to be jacked up, and because he is, he’s gonna be harder to wake. I suspect in twenty or thirty minutes, he’ll slide back into a deeper sleep, and your house will quieten down again.” Myron’s voice dropped to a soothing, calm tone, and she drew strength from his certainty. “He just needs to know you’re there, and that you’re okay. After what he saw today, that’s going to be his worst fear, the chance something happened to you. Just let him know you’re okay.”
He stayed on the phone with her until Duck began to settle down, then a little longer until she had reassured Myron she was okay, too. They finally disconnected, and she crawled back into bed beside Duck, where she watched over him until he woke, ensuring his remaining sleep was deep and dreamless. The few times he stirred, she quickly lulled him back to sleep as she murmur
ed to him how much she loved him.
Twisted justice
“Tommy said that to him?” Brenda’s voice was small and sad, breaking on the words. Last night they laid in bed, him talking for hours before falling asleep out of exhaustion. Each time he woke from his dreams, she was there, her presence in the room soothing and letting him rest. He was where he belonged, where he wanted to be. With her. Duck had slept most of the day away, too, rousing to eat food Brenda brought to him before collapsing back into the rest his body demanded.
Now it was nighttime again, and they lay side-by-side, his gaze trained on her face as he finally shared what Eli had confessed. Unshaven, the stubble on his jaw scratched against the pillowcase as he nodded. “He’d carried it for a while, Bee. Our boy trusted me, and I’m glad he did. Glad he trusted me enough to let it go, to let me help him bear it.”
“God, I hate Tommy more now than I thought possible,” she cried, rolling to her back and covering her face with both palms. “If he knew, then why wouldn’t he talk to me? Why would he do something so heinous? Dump it on a child like that. He knew how Eli idolized him.”
“Idolized might be a bit much, Bee.” The tension he carried transferred to his voice, and he knew this when she turned her head to look at him, an agonized question on her face.
“He came to me that morning because he was worried. Wanted to know if I had fixed things with you. Boy lookin’ out for his mama, but he did it in a way which told me it wasn’t the first time he tried to look out for you, baby.” No secrets in this bed, Little Bee, he thought, forging ahead. “What he said suggested perhaps things between you and Tommy weren’t always as good behind closed doors as they might seem from the outside.”
Immediately, she shut down, features freezing into an impassive, neutral expression that was so automatic, it told him exactly how often she had to wear it over the years. “What do you mean?”
“I promised Eli I’d cut my tongue out before I hurt you like that again.” His frank admission drew a hissing gasp from her, and he watched as realization tore through her that her son knew how much pain she’d suffered during the fracture in their relationship. “You thought you shielded him from that, but Eli’s smart and he’s got a good eye. He sees a lot. He saw what I did to you. Knew when I fixed it…when we fixed it.” Duck wished his hands weren’t still so tender; he wanted to hold her close, but he made do with a gentle brush of the back of his hand across her cheek. “He knew what kind of man Tommy was, knew it by his friendship with Ray.”
Duck (Rebel Wayfarers MC Book 8) Page 23