“I know.” He nodded. “Fucked up, huh?”
“So, things have happened, now you’re back and you and Liam have worked out your friendship. You and Roni are working on your relationship. She’s just admitted to you that she had to have an abortion because of her own father and you’ve just admitted that her nephew, Liam’s son, is knee-deep in a steroid ring at the high school. Am I following this all?” She blew out a breath and ran a hand through her hair.
“You got it,” he told her, running his hands along his jeans.
“God, and here I thought Layne was fucked up. I’m gonna need a drink after you two leave here.” She shook her head.
“Just help us, help us deal with everything we need to so that we can have a normal relationship, I want that more than anything,” Roni told her.
Doc Jones took a couple of minutes to compose herself and make a few more notes on her notepad. “Okay, here’s what we’re going to do. Rooster, you have to tell Liam about Drew. Roni’s right. He wouldn’t have asked you to take a look into it if he didn’t want you to be honest with whatever you find. If you’re not honest, you’re doing your newfound friendship with him a disservice. He needs to know what his son is doing, not to mention the potential fallout once you find the source of the drugs.”
“I kinda knew that’s what you were going to say, and in my heart I knew that’s what I should do, but damn, it sucks,” he sighed. “Out of all the years I was with the sheriff’s office and how many people I took in or had to tell their parents that they were doing drugs, this hurts.”
“It’s because you’re so close to the situation, and if it didn’t hurt, I would worry about you,” Doc Jones assured him. “Now, Roni, my God, girl. How you haven’t had a nervous breakdown before now is a miracle to me.”
“I thought I was going to a few times.” She said it off-handedly but everyone in the room knew that she was telling the truth.
“How do you feel now that you’ve said the words out loud and you’ve told Rooster your secret?”
She was quiet for a moment, searching for the right word to convey what she did feel. “Relieved. This has been hanging over my head for so long—it was something that William could hang over my head, I don’t know what life is like without it. I feel like the weight of the world has been lifted off my shoulders.”
“That’s good, that’s a start.” Doc Jones made more notes in her yellow pad. “Rooster, how do you feel?”
“Shocked and angry, but not at Roni. I’m pissed at William. I knew he was a grade-A asshole. He showed a whole bunch of true colors once we got him behind bars. Things that I’d rather not discuss because it has no bearing on any of this, but suffice it to say, if I were still wearing a badge—he’d be a dead motherfucker.”
In the back of the room, an alarm went off, and Doc Jones got up to turn it off. “I hate to do this to you two, but I worked you in and I have another appointment in ten minutes.”
“I appreciate you doing what you could to get us in,” Roni told her, as she got up from the couch.
“I want to go ahead and make another appointment with both of you. If you feel like it, until then, I want the two of you to talk about the things you’ve told me here today. Not talking about it is what started this to begin with you. It’s time y’all have the hard talks, it’s time you put the effort into the relationship.” She leveled them with a stare. “If you find something come up that you can’t handle, here’s my card, it’s got my number on it. I’ll work you in again if I need to, but let’s go ahead and make a plan to meet at this time next week.”
“Sounds good,” Rooster said as he got up too and stood behind Roni, his hand resting on her hip.
They turned to leave as Doc Jones watched. She hoped they could make this work. They were facing a hard battle, but if they listened to one another and cared about what each other thought, then she knew they could make it. They weren’t young kids, they were adults now, and she hoped she hadn’t misread the looks between the two of them. They wanted this to work, and if they wanted it to work, she had no doubt that they would make it happen.
Chapter Nineteen
They sat in his truck, silence blanketing them for long minutes. They both fidgeted in their seats, neither one sure of what to say or how to put into words the feelings that coursed through their hearts. If either one of them were honest, they were probably in shock about the bombshells they’d both dropped. Roni finally spoke.
“I know the two of us have a lot to talk about. I know I handed you a blow in there, there’s not been time for either of us to process the emotions we’re both feeling, but right now, we have a bigger issue that needs our attention.”
He glanced at her, nodding his head. “Drew.”
“That’s right.” She blew out a deep breath and glanced out the window. “We’ve got to see what we can do to help get him out of this situation. Right now, he’s not over the edge. He’s on the brink, and we’ve got to make sure we pull him back before he does some incredibly stupid shit. I don’t want him to ruin his life before he even gets it started.”
Rooster agreed with her. “So we need to go talk to Liam?”
It was the last thing she wanted to do after opening up such an emotional wound. What she really wanted to do was go home and cry for a week, maybe eat some ice cream and take stock of her life, but it had to be done. If she had been able to be a mom to the child she had carried, she would want to know these things about her child, and it wouldn’t matter about the time table. Even if it was 3 a.m. and someone was calling her, she would want to know. She couldn’t keep this from Liam and Denise. They had a right to know, and while Rooster had been too scared to say anything to her brother—she wasn’t. Honesty was the best policy, and they needed to start practicing that shit. Keeping it to themselves and keeping it in the dark wasn’t helping anyone. They needed to get to Drew before he developed a serious problem. “We do. You take us over there, and I’ll go ahead and give him a call, let him know we’re on our way. I’ll text Tyler too; I think we’ll need him. I don’t think Drew is going to go quietly with this.”
He had a feeling that she was right and they were putting themselves right in the middle of it. That seemed to be what both of them did. They were fixers, always had been, it kept them from their own shit.
Before she could make the call, Rooster’s cell phone rang and he answered, beating his hand on the steering wheel as he listened to what the person on the other end of the phone had to say.
Roni watched as he hung up, throwing the phone down in the cup holder. When he faced her, his was a mask of irritation and frustration.
“I’m dropping you off at the shop.” He pulled the truck into a driveway and turned them around, going the opposite direction so that they could head towards the shop. “I gotta go help Liam with something. Drew got into a fight at football practice. It seems like he couldn’t wait a few hours for us to have a talk with his parents. He had to go ahead and make this ten times harder.”
Her stomach dropped, and the sense of foreboding was palpable between the two of them. Quickly, this was getting worse and worse. They pulled up to the shop, and she noticed that Tyler watched the road, a worried expression on his face. “Please come and get me when you have something figured out. If nothing else, I can take one of the shop cars out to the house or have Tyler bring me when he goes.”
“Will do, but I just want to let you know, I’m worried.” He gripped the steering wheel tightly, and she could see the stiffening of his jaw. He’d seen this many times in his previous life—seen the signs that said it was getting worse. “If he’s fighting, then he’s escalating.”
She reached over and kissed him on the cheek, that small sign of affection was something they both needed. Worry set in as she got out of the truck and watched him turn in the direction that would take him to the school.
Roni kept a close eye on the drive as she sat in the office waiting for Liam or Rooster to come back. Her phone beep
ed beside her and her heart sped up when she saw that it was Liam.
I need you and Tyler out at the house.
That wasn’t good, couldn’t be good. She immediately saved the file she was working on and went out into the garage to get Tyler. She wouldn’t make her brother wait, not like the way she’d been made to wait when he and Rooster were picked up for the death of the man that she’d killed. This felt all too similar to her, and maybe that was her imagination, but she didn’t have a great feeling about this. She was pulling onto Porter Pike when her phone rang. Seeing Rooster’s name on the ID was all she needed to see to press the accept button on the steering wheel of the shop car.
“How is he?” she asked quickly, not even bothering with niceties.
“It’s not him I’m worried about. He fucked the other kid up,” Rooster told her in a low tone, sighing.
Roni could hear that he was pacing, and she worried that he was taking this too hard. She wondered if he was near Drew and the family. “Are you in the house?”
“No, I’m outside, I just…” He exhaled a deep breath. “I didn’t know Drew had it in him. I don’t know what was said. Drew’s sitting facing down Liam like a stone cold killer. It’s unnerving. This is the shit I saw when I’d bring kids into juvie. I don’t like this,” Rooster told her, his voice still quiet. The words sounded like they had been ripped from his throat. This was hard on him. He’d come to love these people as his own family in such a short amount of time.
Those words sank into her stomach like a stone. “I’m on my way,” she told him, disconnecting the call.
This shit was bringing back all kinds of memories she had hoped were long buried. Buried so far deep that she would never have to unearth them. As she pulled into the drive, she looked behind her and realized for the first time that Tyler was right there. He must have followed her from the shop when she’d gotten him, but it hadn’t even registered in her brain. Driving past the clubhouse, she saw a bunch of cars there and knew they were waiting to hear what was going on with the member of their family. Pulling up to her brother’s house, she saw Rooster sitting on the porch, his head in his hands.
Tyler was gone by the time she got out of the car, and she was happy for that; maybe by the time she got into the house they would know where Drew’s head was at or what happened. Rooster’s head shot up as he heard her car door slam. His eyes followed her as she slowly made her way up the drive and towards the steps.
“What’s going on with him?” She nodded her head towards the house.
“No idea.” Rooster ran his hand over his stubble-covered chin. “When we got there, he wasn’t talking, and none of the other players said they knew what happened. Apparently Drew and this other kid were coming onto the field, walking with each other. They were two of the last ones, and some of them heard some commotion, looked over, and Drew had him on the ground, whaling on him.”
“Is the kid hurt bad?” she asked, almost afraid to hear the answer.
He nodded. “They had to call an ambulance.”
“Shit,” she breathed. It was then that she heard raised voices inside the house. She and Rooster hurried inside, and when she got there, it broke her heart.
“You’re not a man, Drew,” Liam was telling the teenager. “You can’t make fucking adult decisions like putting other teenagers in the hospital. This shit follows you around for the rest of your life. Be honest with us and tell us what the fuck is going on!” He roared.
Roni took in the scene before her. Mandy stood in the corner with Denise, tears streaming down both their faces; she wasn’t sure where Tatum was. Tyler stood in the other corner; she couldn’t tell what he was feeling. His face was expressionless with the mask he used to keep his emotions tucked away. But it was Liam that killed her. She saw the memories etched in the pain on his face. Stepping forward, she wanted to be the person who kept some sense and perhaps provided calm to the situation.
“Please.” She kneeled down so that she was at eye level with him. When he wouldn’t meet her eyes, she grabbed his chin and forced him to. “Mandy tried to tell me the other day that something was up with you, but I ignored her. If Mandy knows, then you realize it’s only a matter of time before the rest of us find out. Be honest with us and let us help with whatever’s going on.” His eyes finally met hers, and she was surprised by the anger she saw there.
“Y’all think you’ve got it all figured out, right? There must be something wrong with me because I’m being a dick.”
“Stop it right now,” Denise told him from where she stood. She’d found her voice and it was hard and full of authority. “I didn’t raise you to be a punk and I didn’t raise you to talk back. Things have been different the past couple of years, and we should be thankful. Don’t you dare show your ass like this. You need to tell us what’s going on.”
He swallowed roughly, his face softening slightly. “Can I talk to Tyler and Rooster?”
Those two names couldn’t have surprised the rest of them if they’d tried.
“Whoever you need to talk to,” Roni was quick to assure him. If there was anything he needed, it was reassurance, and however he wanted to play this, she would make sure he got to play it. She wasn’t going to fail him the way she’d failed her brother and the man she’d loved for half of her life.
Chapter Twenty
Rooster felt awkward walking up to a teenage boy’s bedroom with Tyler following close behind. If this had been a year ago, he’d think that Drew was luring him in for a beat down. Bad analogy, he knew, but he had to do something to keep from thinking too heavily about the situation at hand. The three of them made their way inside. Rooster stood with his back to the door while Tyler had a seat next to Drew on the bed. The silence was deafening as they waited for him to tell them why he had called them in on this and not his parents.
“You’re gonna need to give us something here,” Tyler told him quietly. “What the fuck is going on?”
Rooster tried to look at this subjectively. Back when all this had happened with him and Liam, they were almost a full two years older than the boy who sat before them. But he couldn’t deny the fact that Drew had grown up on them. His face had thinned out the last couple of months, losing the baby fat that had made him look boyish. He’d had a growth spurt and now stood almost as tall as Liam; his voice had deepened and the beginnings of a beard were starting to appear on his face. He’d be sixteen in less than a month, he had what appeared to be a girlfriend and ninety-nine other problems judging by the talk they were having with him right now. He was no longer the kid that had accompanied his mom into an MC.
“My friend, Dalton, and I were down at Parks and Rec working out in May,” he started.
Tyler and Rooster exchanged glances. Dalton Morrison’s uncle worked at one of the parts shops in town that Walker’s Wheels frequently bought parts from. His home life left a lot to be desired, and Liam had been known to take Dalton and his older brother, Deacon, food when it got tough for them. It was something that the club didn’t publicize, but they didn’t like to see the boys go hungry. Dalton was a wild child, constantly acting out. Rooster had managed to have a couple of run-ins with him while with the sheriff’s office.
“We were minding our own business when some older guys came over and told us that they could help us get bigger and stronger in less the time. They’re on our football team, so we listened to them.” He took a moment and swallowed loudly.
Tyler cursed. “Please tell me that you didn’t do it, Drew. The hard work will show the results.”
“I need to be bigger,” he argued. “I’m tall, and I need muscle mass to keep playing football the way I do.”
“Give it to me.” Rooster stepped forward and held out his hand. He used the authoritative voice he’d used when he did a traffic stop. It was the one that told the person he spoke to that he meant business.
They watched as Drew stood up and walked over to his bedside table. Once there, he leaned down and tapped the bottom, revealing
a hidden compartment. Tyler groaned when he pulled out a bag that contained syringes and vials.
“What the fuck were you thinking?” Tyler asked him, not able to keep his irritation at bay any longer. “Do you not realize what the fuck you could have done to yourself?”
Rooster could see that Drew was trying to keep himself in check, trying to be a man about this, when really he was a scared kid. “Have you been having side effects?” he asked. “How long have you been taking them?”
“A few months, and I can’t control my anger,” he whispered. “That’s why I hurt that kid. He said some things about Mandy and Charity, and I couldn’t take it. I went off.”
“Charity?” Tyler asked, raising his eyebrows. “Jasmine’s daughter?”
Drew nodded. “Yeah.”
Rooster sighed. Now everyone was going to know about him and the stripper’s daughter. At least Drew was taking care of revealing all of his secrets. “You need to let us talk to your parents, and then we need to figure out what to do with you. You’re going to go through withdrawal, and it’s not going to be pretty. We need to get you a medical clearance, and you need to tell me where hell you got this shit, and don’t be saying the boys on your football team. This is high grade. I’ve heard things about the football coach,” he hedged.
“Why don’t you go down and talk to them.” Tyler nodded towards the stairs. “I’d like to talk to him for a few minutes alone, if that’s okay.”
Rooster knew that if Drew was going to say anything, it would be to his friend. Quickly, he made an exit, shaking his head as he went back downstairs.
Tyler had a seat on the bed, his body language deceptively relaxed when he was anything but. “You’ve got to be honest with me, Drew. I know that you know more than you’re telling me. This involves not only you but Rooster, B, because she teaches at the school, Jagger, and your parents. Be honest with me and we’ll fix it.”
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