Kane (Alexander Shifter Brothers Book 1)

by Selina Coffey

  “Huh?”

  Jenn looked guilty. “Okay, I didn’t tell anyone this, but a couple of days ago — hmm, let’s see, I think it was Wednesday — Steve actually visited me here.”

  “Jenn!” Kenzie turned to look at her in utter shock. “Why did you say that? You don’t owe him anything!”

  “I know, I know. I just thought I should see him, knowing what I do now,” she said, referring to her new prognosis. “It was kind of cute: he brought me this little rubber duck as a gift, to remind me of our first date when we walked in the park and fed the ducks. That was kind of nice.” Seeing the skeptical looks on both Andrew’s and Kenzie’s faces, she rushed on. “I know what he’s done has been horrible, but it was nice to see him, as a human being for once.

  “Anyway, he came in looking really nervous and upset, and we talked for a while, but then he broke down and started crying and apologized for everything. He wished things had been different with us and he hoped that I could forgive him.”

  “What did you say?” Andrew asked. He couldn’t see how Jenn could ever forgive any of the hospital staff for the things she went through.

  Jenn shrugged. “Nothing. I couldn’t say anything; it was such a shock. It was weird, though. He didn’t stay long, but before he left he told me he’d just wanted to see me before it was too late. I didn’t say anything about me, so I didn’t know if he knew or what he meant by that. But now it all makes sense.”

  A pregnant silence fell upon the trio. To Jenn, hearing about Steve’s death was the bookend of the entire ordeal she had been through. He had been there through the worst of it — as part of the worst of it— and now, he was gone. She didn’t know what to feel; her emotions were so conflicted lately that everything was overwhelming.

  Jenn went to bed early that night, asking Andrew and Kenzie to leave her alone until the morning. They both understood; she needed some time alone with her thoughts. Before he left, Andrew told her he had a surprise for her in the morning, so not to stay up too late.

  Sure enough, at 9:00 a.m. sharp, the door slowly creaked open. Jenn was awake, clean and fed, and although she was still reeling with the news from yesterday, she was excited to know what Andrew had in store for her. But when the door opened all the way, it wasn’t Andrew standing there; it was her parents. Jenn opened her arms wide to accept them into an embrace.

  When they parted, her mother spoke up. “Jenn, it’s time to come home.”

  “Huh?”

  Her mother smiled sadly. “You’ve been in the hospital long enough. We’ve spoken to the doctors and they all agree it’s time. We’ll bring you hospice care at our house, but we don’t want you to stay here anymore. Is that okay?”

  Jenn, surprised by the news, but she agreed. She nodded quickly. “Yes. Sure, I think it’s time, too.” She packed up her meager belongings and gingerly hopped off her bed; her mother was quick to support her tiny body. “Before we go, though,” her father added, “we have to stop somewhere first.”

  Okay... Jenn thought, confused. Andrew, is this your surprise? Because it’s not a very good one.

  Jenn’s parents told her to close her eyes as they put her in the car, asking her not to open them until they said. She rode in near-blindness, the shadows from the sunlight outside dancing across her closed eyelids. She tried to follow the corner’s the car turned to guess where she was, but she was stumped. She would just have to wait and see.

  Then the car stopped. Jenn lurched forward for a moment as the vehicle came to a stop, and she waited for her mother to come around to the back and let her out. Carefully, her mother guided her out of the car, onto the curb and up the sidewalk a few feet. Her eyes still closed tightly, Jenn tried to listen intently for what was going on, but all she could hear was the soft tapping of her own shoes on the concrete and the wind blowing past her ears.

  “Okay,” her mother said, “open your eyes.”

  The light hit Jenn’s eyes abruptly and she couldn’t see anything at first. But then, when they adjusted —

  “Surprise!” A crowd of at least 30 people stood in front of her in a big group, her parents, Kenzie and Andrew at the front of it, all smiling, and clapping when Jenn arrived. Behind them was the St. Benedict hospital, bright and shiny as always, with its name on the sign covered by some large cloth. For a moment, Jenn was crestfallen — why had everyone wanted her to come here of all places?

  Then Andrew rushed up to her. “I told you I had a surprise for you. Watch.” As Andrew stood next to Jenn, his arm around her waist, two members of the crowd reached up to the ropes from which the banner hung, gave it one firm tug, and the banner came floating down on the sidewalk.

  Jenn didn’t even register what she saw at first. When the banner came down, Jenn gasped: on the front of the hospital were now the words “Jenn A. Walsh Memorial Hospital.” She clapped her hand over her mouth and burst into tears. Next to her, Andrew grinned and pulled her close to him, uniting their lips into the most passionate kiss. Everyone cheered and applauded.

  The End

  Part IV

  Fight For Love

  Romantic Comedy

  Chapter 1

  By the time Jasmine stormed into Gentleman Jackson’s Boxing Club, she’d had a full forty-five minutes for her anger to pick up steam, and she was in no mood to do anything other than cry her eyes out over a glass of wine. She was exhausted. She had just spent ten hours at the hospital, and hadn’t even had the chance to change out of her scrubs before Emma peeked out of her bedroom and announced that Michael had gone off somewhere to do boxing, of all things.

  Boxing? Jasmine knew what that meant. It meant bruises, scrapes, violence, and concussions…if this was, in fact, boxing and not just some makeshift fighting ring someone had set up in an alleyway. It took her ten minutes to find out from Michael’s friends where he went, and another half hour to take the requisite busses. Now that she was here, she was far from amused by the pretentious name of the boxing club. The mortified look on Michael’s face only partially made up for it all.

  “Michael.” Her voice was a hiss.

  “Um…” Michael, sixteen and unusually thin—some people had all the luck—looked like he wanted to melt through the floor at being confronted by his older sister, in front of all of his boxing buddies.

  Jasmine would have thought that was funny, but she cringed at the thought of what they were all seeing. Her wild mess of curls was only partially held back with a headband and an elastic, she was still wearing scrubs with God only knew what on them, and there wasn’t a scrap of makeup on her face. In clubs, in the right light, with makeup and jewelry, she looked almost okay. Right now, she was just chubby and disheveled. She swallowed, trying to decide whether to cut and run.

  Like hell she was going to be shamed by a bunch of sixteen year olds. They could be polite to her, or she would teach them a thing or two about boxing. She swept her eyes over the group and was pleased to see that all of them quailed.

  Or…all but one of them.

  “May I help you?” The voice was a drawl. When her head jerked around, she saw him. He was leaning against the wall, arms crossed. A banner over his head proclaimed an upcoming tournament, and he was smiling at her. He had the bluest eyes she’d ever seen.

  “Yes,” Jasmine said promptly, scowling. Those blue eyes were set above chiseled cheekbones, a mouth far too full and sensual for a man’s face, and a jaw just as chiseled as the cheekbones. His nose might have the slight irregularity that came from having been broken more than once, but looking at the self-satisfied smile on the man’s face, all Jasmine could think was that he must have deserved it. “What is going on here?”

  “You must be Michael’s older sister.” He gave a smile and looked out over the crowd of boys. “Pushups and sit-ups, everyone. You too, Michael.”

  “No, he’s coming home with—”

  He ushered her over to the side wall. “What seems to be the problem?”

  “The problem?” Jasmine glared at him. �
��Okay. The problem is that my younger brother is not at home doing his homework and waiting for dinner, he is here, getting beaten up so that he can come home covered in bruises, with a concussion, start fighting all the time at school, worry our mother, and probably drop out before he can apply to a college.”

  “That’s a lot to assume from the fact that he’s trying MMA.” The man didn’t look exactly pleased. His white tee-shirt stretched snugly over bulging biceps as he folded his arms and stared her down.

  “What the hell is MMA?”

  “Mixed Martial Arts,” he explained tiredly. “It’s a fighting style that combines Muay Thai with Jiu-Jitsu, boxing, some Tae Kwon—”

  “So, fighting.” Jasmine crossed her own arms. “You’re teaching him to fight.”

  “You have a problem with that?”

  “Of course I have a problem with it!” She was going to punch him if he kept smiling at her like that. He was a pretty-boy, used to getting everything he wanted when he flashed those blue eyes, and she was sure as hell not going to fall for that. She pointed one finger over at the boys doing sit-ups and pushups, and leaned closer to hiss at the instructor. “Michael is smart. He might be a sixteen-year-old, but he’s a good kid. He doesn’t fight in school. He gets good grades. I’m not going to let him mess that up.”

  The man sighed and leaned his head forward, running one hand over the back of his scalp. When he looked up, his eyes were more direct, and grave, than she expected.

  “Look. I grew up in Detroit, okay? So I’m not just…some rich guy coming here to tell you how to behave. You know how hard it is for kids like your brother. I’m not making him violent, I’m giving him an outlet—the same outlet that saved me. Look over there. They’re not doing drugs, they’re not joining gangs—well, most of them. I’m working on it. These are good kids. They’re doing something physical, something good for their bodies, and they’re getting out a lot of the anger they can’t get rid of any other good way.”

  “This isn’t a good way!”

  “Why not? Did you hear a word I just said?” He shook his head, looking away. “Maybe you don’t get it, but I do. I needed this when I was younger, just like they need it now. It kept me out of way worse things. It taught me to push for something. It gave me something to achieve. That saved my life.”

  “Well, maybe it saved your life, but Michael has things to push for. He’s going to be more than just a boxer.”

  “What’s wrong with being a boxer?”

  “He’s going to spend half his life beat up! When he gets older, he’s going to start forgetting things.”

  “Most people do.”

  “You know what I mean!” Her shout echoed, and the boys looked over. Jasmine clenched her hands.

  “Hey. I’m not going to let him be harmed.” His voice was unexpectedly gentle. “I have rules about that. No head strikes in sparring here. I don’t do any of the crazier Muay Thai stuff.”

  “Oh, yeah? He’s covered in bruises.”

  “Bruises heal.” He shrugged his shoulders.

  “I don’t want his teachers thinking he’s turning into one of those boys.” Her voice was rising again.

  “Lady, what is your problem?”

  “What’s my problem?” She clenched one hand in her hair. “Are you serious? Okay. Well, here’s something. Our dad died of cancer eight years ago.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “I’m not finished. We never got out from under that debt. You know how much we owe now? Three hundred thousand dollars. You know how we’re going to pay that off? We aren’t. My mom works three jobs, and she’s too sick to be working at all. The chemicals she works with at the cleaning job are ruining her. She thinks I don’t know that she’s dying, but I do.” Jasmine could hear the tears building up in her voice and she knew she should just walk away, but she couldn’t seem to stop talking. “I graduated a year early so I could go to nursing school. It’s steady work, okay? And for the past four years, I have been trying as hard as I can to get my brother and sister through school so they can get the hell out of here. So they don’t end up working cleaning jobs. So they don’t get stuck here for the rest of their damned lives, paying off someone else’s debt! And I was doing fine, by the way.” She felt tears escape her eyes and dashed them away angrily. “I told you Michael’s smart. Well, he’s scientist smart. He looks at math and he just gets it. He’s too smart to be stuck around here, and even if he wasn’t I’d try to get him out. And Sarah? She’s got the prettiest voice, but she’s studying up to get her nursing degree, too. They’re smart. They’re pulling their weight. They’re going to get out.” She glared at this man, this smug man who’d come in to tell her how fighting wasn’t going to ruin her brother. “I’m not going to let you mess this up for him. Because you know what? Losing him would actually kill my mom.”

  She turned on her heel and marched away before he could say anything else. She knew Michael’s bag and so she snatched it up from the side.

  “Come on. We’re going.”

  “But—”

  “Now.”

  At least he didn’t contradict her. He hung his head as he pulled on his tee-shirt, and he followed her humbly out into the cold.

  “Where’s your coat?”

  “I didn’t bring one.”

  “Are you entirely stupid?” Jasmine rounded on him, and felt the tears start again. She squeezed her eyes shut. “I didn’t mean that, I’m sorry. Michael…what are you doing? What is this?”

  “I just…like it.” He shrugged his shoulders. “It’s hard not to get angry sometimes. It isn’t fair that dad died. It isn’t fair that—” He shook his head. “But when I’m here, I can forget about it—and then sometimes I feel better for hours. Days. I’m still getting As, Jazzy.”

  “That guy?” Jasmine jerked her head at the gym. “He’s bad news.”

  “No, he’s really nice. He—”

  “He’s bad news,” Jasmine repeated. “And I don’t want you going back there.”

  Chapter 2

  There was a silence as the door slammed shut behind the two of them, the woman ushered her younger brother out into the evening dark and all of the other boys stared after them. Then someone started laughing.

  “Mike got in trouble!”

  They were all joining in, shoving each other and shouting jokes over the noise, until Tyler pounded on the wall for them to be quiet. He had been so consumed in staring after her that he’d let the joking go on far too long. Those eyes, those lips…

  They stared at him, and he tried to remember how to speak.

  “All that talk means people aren’t working hard enough!” He let his eyes sweep over all of them, and then pointed to the back wall. “Sprints. Come on.”

  “This is boxing, not running!”

  “This is MMA, not boxing—and go on, just try to get in the ring without being fit, huh?” Tyler let his genuine amusement show in his face. “You’ll be on YouTube forever.”

  With a grumble, they set off, sprinting back and forth between the two walls with increasingly pleading looks that Tyler ignored until he saw their pace slow to a legitimate jog. He didn’t let himself smile this time, although he wanted to. These were good kids, with a lot of energy and a lot of drive. That was one thing he’d found since he moved here. These kids wanted to win at something, but even more, they wanted to be part of a team. It warmed a part of his heart that he hadn’t known existed.

  He took the time to talk to each of them as they got ready to go home, crouching down to ask about siblings or parents, remind them about gear, ask how things were going. He’d learned, over the past few months, that when someone did particularly well in class, there was often something they needed to work out. Back in Detroit, his friends had been richer and he’d been the odd one out—here, he was learning that there were other people who acted just the way he had in high school.

  It was James he talked to last, when nearly all the other boys had gone. James was smart, smarter than almos
t any of the others; Michael was the only one who rivaled him. But lately, the kid had lost focus. His endurance wasn’t what it had been, and he wasn’t as light on his feet. It would be easy to chalk that up to home life or normal teenage mood swings, but Tyler had a sinking feeling that he knew just what was going on.

  He knew far, far too well.

  “How you doing?” He sat on the bench next to James.

  “Well.” James didn’t look over.

  “You’ve been a little—”

  “It’s fine.”

  “Is it?” Tyler deliberately looked away. “Because it seems like maybe school hasn’t been going well, too.”

  James said nothing, but his hands slowed as he put away his gear.

  “And you’re too smart for that.”

  “Maybe high school is bullshit.”

  “Nah, high school is definitely bullshit.” Tyler gave him a grin. “No maybe about it.”

  James smiled unwillingly.

  “Just tell me, dude. If I went through your bag, what would I find?” Tyler looked over at him.

  “What do you mean?”

  “It means I’m guessing pot, but I don’t know. I pray to God not heroin.”

  “Jesus, it’s pot, get off my case. Pot’s fine.”

  “Maybe for some people.” Tyler lifted his shoulder. “Most people, really, except for one thing…”

  “What’s that?” James stood, hoisting the bag over his shoulder.

  “Take it from someone who knows: if you do drugs to get away from something…you’re never gonna stop using them.”

  “What are you, a DARE commercial or something?”

  “I used to be one of the top fighters in the world,” Tyler told him brutally. “Now I teach. You know why?”

  “Drugs?” James clearly didn’t believe him.

  “It wasn’t the drugs, it was why I took them. But trust me, they did nothing but help me on my way down.”

  Now the kid paused, intrigued and not wanting to be. “So why’d you take them?”