by Kristy Marie
I hear the sliding glass door click closed, and I can’t even find it in me to relish the win. I need a distraction—another game, perhaps. Lately, though, the competition has been laughable. A trip deep into the city maybe? I check my watch. I have time. I could make it to Gigi’s and catch a real game.
My fingers twitch.
No.
I dial another number instead.
“I swear to God you’re worse than a girlfriend about these late-night cuddle calls.”
I bark out a laugh, pouring out the rest of my beer. “What the hell is a cuddle call?”
“You know,” his voice goes all high-pitched, “you wanna talk before bed? Tell me how your day went and all that shit.”
The laughter feels good—distracting even. “Why don’t you want to talk to your girlfriend at night?” Clearly, he gets this statement a lot.
Shuffling sounds on the phone. “Who the fuck do I look like? Dr. Phil?” His tone is incredulous. “If I wanted to spend two hours on the phone listening to drama, I’d ask Pops how his day was. Phone calls with girlfriends should be restricted to phone sex only.”
“Agreed. So how often do you do it?”
He groans. “All the damn time. Why does pussy have to be so good?”
Even though my brother’s tone is whiny, he’s serious.
“Because something had to make us lose our sanity.”
Pussy has never been enough for me to lose focus, though.
“Yeah, yeah. So, what’s up? You lose tonight?”
My brother has never been someone to beat around the bush.
I shrug to no one, looking out into the night air.
“I just called to see how it went today.”
I start laughing before he adds, “Fucking cuddle calling.”
“I’m serious,” I add soberly. “You had that big game today.”
The hesitation and crunching in the background tell me I interrupted him mid-chew. Is he just now eating dinner?
“Decent. My bat was cold. I couldn’t get anything out of the infield.”
“Your arm still sore? You’ve been icing it like I told you?”
He groans. “Yes, Dad. I’m just distracted, that’s all.”
My brother is such a little shit, but I guess we both are. It comes with the last name.
A familiar ache tickles beneath my ribs. “Scouts not coming to games?”
He pauses, the crunching subsiding for a moment. “No, but it’s fine. Carter and I were talking about working for his dad doing landscape once we graduate. I could try out when they hold open tryouts. I don’t need to go to college to get into the Major Leagues.”
True but. . . “It’s the best way. You’d get better offers, and you’d have a degree to fall back on if you end up with a career-ending injury. It’s a solid plan, Coop. Don’t give up on it just yet.”
My brother scoffs into the phone. He’s never been set on going to college. He wants to go straight to the Major Leagues—arrogant little fucker. “I’m not giving up, Mav. I’m realistic. Kingston High hasn’t seen a trophy in two decades. Scouts have no reason to come here. Maybe Dad was right. A professional athlete is only a loser’s dream.”
Michael Lexington is a fucking idiot. Greed and power are his motivation in life. If he can’t buy or sell it, he doesn’t bother with it. Example: my brother and me. When my mother was diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis and could no longer be the beautiful wife on his arm, he bought another. Candi is her name. She’s ninety-five pounds and my age.
And when my mother died at the young age of forty-five from pneumonia, he dumped my brother and me off at my pops’s for the summer and never returned. I was fifteen, my brother thirteen. In a matter of months, we went from a family of four to a family of two. Motherless and fatherless all in a summer’s break.
Again, contracts. My mother’s was up, and so was ours.
Pops is cool, though. With a plush apartment in Atlanta, he took us in, let us sleep in his bed while he took the couch, and looked for a bigger place. He moved us out of the city after that first year, moving us into a subdivision with other kids, complete with a cul-de-sac. We lived a good life. Pops worked from home, hiring a vice president for his brokerage firm so he could spend more time with us.
Everything was looking great until my freshman year at college. Pops suffered a stroke that left him with left sided weakness and neurological deficits. He thinks he’s perfectly fine and doesn’t need us boys looking after him, but it’s not true.
I know my brother is tired, and instead of spending his days partying with his senior friends, he’s watching Jeopardy and tying the old man’s shoes. I wanted to move back home and help, but Cooper wouldn’t hear of it. He insists he’s fine and Pops is no trouble. I’m not sure if I believe it, but the guilt as the older brother gnaws at me daily.
“Everything out of Dad’s mouth is garbage. You’re better off asking your Magic 8-Ball for advice. It’s probably more accurate.”
Both of us chuckle for a second, lightening the mood.
“How’s the old man?” I ask like I do in every conversation.
“Still senile and full of shit.” My brother laughs good-naturedly. “He told me last night that I should join FarmersOnly.com and meet a nice girl.”
A real smile finally emerges. “Caught you with another girl again?”
My brother might stay home and take care of Pops, but his bed stays warm. “Hell yeah. Damn old man busted in yelling he was looking for mongrels.”
I laugh a deep belly laugh. “Mongrels? Had he been drinking?”
“No, dude. Fucking Melissa was scratching the headboard with her goddamned bracelets. Pops thought I had rats in my room.”
“Dude.” I grin, leaning back against the chair. “You have got to clean your room occasionally. Maybe then he’ll stop thinking it’s a shithole that attracts vermin.”
No joke. Last time I was there for Christmas, Pops told me he had to wear a mask to walk in and wake Coop up for school.
“It’s fine. I’m a teenage boy. If it were clean, he would think I was sick.”
True. He probably would.
“So,” I go for a subject change. “You dating Melissa? I’ve heard you mention her a few times now.” Fuck, I’m turning into my mom keeping tabs on my little brother’s love life. But it helps knowing he’s happy and doing normal teenage things since I’m gone and can’t look after him like I used to.
During my entire high school years, I devoted myself to becoming my little brother’s keeper. It was a hard change when Pops pushed me out the door, paid my first-year tuition, and told me I was not allowed to come back home until the break.
I knew Pops was pushing me for my good. He knew I wouldn’t leave them, but I couldn’t bear my little brother thinking that I too had left him. Pops has been an exceptional stand-in as a father, and his sarcastic personality is a lot like our mother’s. Life with Pops was good. Normal even. But I would have held off on college for a few years until Cooper graduated, but Pops wouldn’t hear of any delays in my education.
“I don’t know.” He sighs into the phone, answering my earlier question about his status with Melissa. “She’s moving to Boston when she graduates. There’s no need to get involved. As soon as we graduate, we’ll be over.”
That means he likes her, right?
“It won’t matter when you can afford a flight every weekend. Or get drafted to Boston. They have an outstanding team, you know.”
I’m not usually such an optimist, but I don’t want Cooper to give up his dream of playing professional baseball. It was something he and my mother always bonded over. It wasn’t my father who taught him how to throw a ball. It was my crazy supportive mom whom I caught awake late one night watching how-to videos. She was the one who, when he was four, signed him up for tee-ball and ran the bases with him when he wanted to run from first base to home and bypass the remaining plates. She was his biggest fan, and I know that deep down, making it to the Majo
r Leagues is not only for him but for her too.
She would be proud of him either way, but ever since she died, he’s thrown himself into the sport. It went from a backyard hobby to total obsession. Cooper let baseball consume him, and I think, in some way, heal him. He’s not giving up now. Not if I can help it. I don’t care how many poker games I need to win. Cooper is going to get his shot at the major leagues. The boy deserves a chance to see if he has what it takes.
“We’ll see,” he tells me somberly.
Yeah, we’ll see.
I need the pieces to align soon.
“Don’t worry about it yet. You have time. Do you and Pops need anything? I looked at the accounts last night, and they looked good.” Enough. They looked good enough. Income hasn’t been steady for Pops since he isn’t able to manage the company on his own. I’ve been sending him and Coop money when I can, hoping to lessen the strain of the company finances since Laurant—his VP—quit last year and the market took a complete shit.
“Yeah, yeah. We’re fine. What about you? You doing okay?”
I nod, fighting the fatigue. “Yeah. I’m good. I’ve been winning.”
He pauses. I know that pause. It’s the same conversation we have whenever he thinks I’m getting in too deep. “Be careful, Mav. Gambling is addictive. You could lose it all.”
Poker is a necessity—a job. The only way I can help the man who gave up his whole life for Cooper and me. It’s the least I can do to keep what little family I have left, safe.
“I got it handled, Coop. Don’t worry about me.” And it’s the truth. I do have it handled. Maybe not well but handled nevertheless.
“All right, dude. Whatever you say. Just know Pops will kill you if you get caught up in owing some bookie hundreds of thousands.”
I grin. “You’ve been watching too much TV, little brother.”
“Maybe so, but take care of yourself, Mav. You’re only one person.”
Don’t I feel that every single day.
“I know. Take care of Pops. I’ll see you guys soon.”
“Yeah. Yeah. Later, bro.”
“Later.”
I end the call and blow out a big breath of anxiety. My legs are heavy as I stand and shut the sliding door. I’m exhausted as I bypass the pile of cash on the table, leaving the lights on and heading to the bedroom where I drop to the mattress in one exaggerated move.
My eyes close.
I just need sleep and a way out.
Rumor has it she was arrested.
The sun rises, and I’m wide awake. Not from the most refreshing sleep ever but from being up two-thirds of the night praying every noise wasn’t the next Ted Bundy coming to offer me his back seat. Or truck. Wait. He was the one who took them on dates first, right? That might not have been too bad. At least then I could have squeezed a shower and food out of him before he killed me.
A night in the back seat of a car is no freaking joke, let me tell you. Who knew the middle seat that everyone’s ass cheeks hang off of could be the devil incarnate? I mean, really. Why can’t the entire back seat be one level? Did carmakers think, “Hey! Let’s be sure to make this back seat unsleepable just in case the owner gets desperate?” I think they did. My ribs will show you the beating they took from the hump and seat belt buckle—let’s not forget those lifesavers.
Needless to say, although today is a new beginning, it is not a pleasant one. I stink, I’m exhausted, and I’m alone. And . . . I might have been a little scared. Okay, I was a lot scared, but what drove my fright to nuclear levels was the brutal banging on my window that sent me shooting upright and knocking my head on the ceiling about five seconds ago.
“I thought you had a friend you could call!” An angry man growls through the closed window.
Bostic.
I told you he was a kind soul. And for that, I’ll forgive him for stopping my heart this early in the morning.
I roll down the window, mindful of my breath. “I did,” I say, grinning at a freshly shaven face. “Her name is Jane Honda. She offered me her back seat in exchange for filling her tank up with gas—a real giver, she is.”
He doesn’t look amused. The twitching lip and the narrowing of his eyes give it away. Clearly, Bostic needs more coffee, and if I’m honest, I could use a cup or three, like yesterday.
“You’ve been out here all night?” His voice is stern, like a parent. My mom would be super proud of his glare. But we are never mentioning this to her, ever. She doesn’t deal well with stressful situations. It was already hard enough convincing her to let me leave the proverbial nest and live on my own. Granted, I haven’t done such a bang-up job thus far, but I have potential.
I sigh, noting the hard edge of his words. This can go down one of two ways. I could lie, or I could evade the truth, but there will be no complete honesty. Bostic came back here out of suspicion, so deep down, he doesn’t expect the whole truth from me right now. He knew I wasn’t wholly forthcoming last night, so we can check being smart on his list of good attributes.
“Yep.” I let the P pop a little like it was no big deal for me to sleep in my car. “It wasn’t as bad as I thought. I mean, I could have used a little lavender to settle my nerves, but all in all, it wasn’t terrible.” It was brutal is what it was, but there’s no sense in dwelling in the past. It was a unique experience, and hopefully, I’ll never need to repeat it.
“Come on, get out.” He wiggles the door handle impatiently.
I narrow my eyes. “Are you turning me over to the police?” It’s possible. I’m not giving him trusting vibes here.
His chest expands, and he looks at the sky. “No. We’re going to get your things.”
Right. Of course he isn’t turning me in. It was a candle accident, after all.
“Oh.” I eye the steps into the complex. “Maybe we should wait until they leave for class?” He knows I’m referring to the cheating trolls upstairs.
Bostic shakes his head and wiggles the handle once again. “No. We’re getting your things now. Then you’re going to follow me to the firehouse for a shower and some breakfast.”
Oh. Well, that sounds lovely. “Okay.” I agree quickly and roll up my window, grabbing my purse.
Shit.
“Uh, can you turn around for a minute?” Bostic’s eyes do this fearful jump thing, but he turns around, albeit slowly. I hurry and pull my arms through the sleeves of my shirt. There was no way I was sleeping with an underwire and a seat belt buckle jabbing into my ribs. I’m no masochist.
When I’ve got the girls all under wraps, I sweep my hair up into a ponytail and check for drool marks. “Okay, I’m ready,” I announce, tossing my flip-flops on the ground and sliding my feet in.
Bostic eyes my choice of footwear.
“I don’t have clean socks, and the flip-flops were in my car.” I shrug. Desperate times call for desperate measures.
He grunts but doesn’t comment. I’m pretty sure he isn’t judgy. Instead, he’s assessing the general hot mess that I am. “Lead the way,” I tell him with a sweep of my hand. I’m sure as hell not going first. Frank isn’t the forgiving type, and well, I feel much safer standing behind two hundred and fifty pounds of muscle.
“How did you know I was here?” I ask, out of breath. If there is one thing I’ve learned about Bostic in a short amount of time is that he does not walk. For a big guy, he freaking hustles.
“I just knew.”
Oh, well, that’s not evasive at all. Maybe he’s like a guardian angel. I saw this show once about this clumsy girl who kept avoiding death because her guardian angel stepped in and saved her time after time. Or wait, was that Final Destination where she kept avoiding death? Ugh. Now I can’t remember. Anyway. “So you just knew, huh?”
Bostic raps on the apartment door, and I fail to swallow my nerves when I hear footsteps.
“Stay behind me and keep quiet,” says my guardian angel—or Devon Sawa—either one is fine at this point.
I smile and make a zipping motion
across my lips just as Tucker’s assface opens the door.
“Can I help you?” he has the nerve to ask.
Punch him right in the face, Bostic! Do it for me. Do it for his future girlfriends!
“Get out of my way,” Bostic growls out instead.
It wasn’t punching him in the face, but it was still satisfying seeing Tucker rear back at his malicious tone.
“We’re here for her things.”
That’s right, bitch. Move!
It occurs to me that Bostic doesn’t even know my name. Or maybe he does. It’s likely someone told him for his report. Do firefighters do reports, or is that just the police? Well, shit. Now I’m getting confused again. This lack of sleep is really messing with my head, or maybe being with Tucker made me stupid. Can that happen? Can guys make you stupid? I’m going with: possibly.
Tucker tries to peer around, but Bostic takes a step toward him. “Are we going to have a problem?”
Please have a problem, Tucker. I would so love to see you get your ass beat right now.
Tucker takes a step back. I should have known he would always look out for himself. Tucker has never really been a fighter. Not that I look for guys to fight, but you have to admit it’s super sexy when they unleash the beast with all that grunting and sweating. Whew. I’ve never appreciated a grunt as much as I have when I watch a UFC fight.
“By all means,” Tucker says, motioning for Bostic and me to come in. I try not to look around. I really, really do. I mean, do I need to see if they’d resumed their fuckfest on the floor? No, I do not. But I look anyway. And thankfully, it’s all gone, and our once sparse living room is back to normal. Not ours. Theirs. As in, not mine anymore.
I push my way past Bostic to my room, where I start throwing everything I can into my suitcase without hesitation. No need to stay here any longer than I have to.