Grayson: Wordsmith Chronicles Book 3

by Christopher Harlan

  I don’t really want to go, but my body is telling me that it’s either that or getting thrown out of this fine establishment for peeing on their floor. I guess in that case the alley is the better choice. I throw enough cash on the table to cover whatever the bill is and we step into the alley. Rowan is right. It’s dark, no one’s around, and that brick wall is looking as good as any toilet right now. “No peeking.” I turn and face the wall. I feel like any second some unlucky employee is going to come out to throw away the trash and get a free show of me pissing on their wall, so I try to go as fast as my body will allow. “You promise not to peek?”

  “Oh just pee already,” she says, laughing. “I’ll turn away, don’t worry. Hell, I’ll even cover my eyes, okay?”

  “Good.” I look at her as I unzip and see she’s literally covering her eyes. I turn back to the wall, and in seconds the sound that I hear most prominently is that sound of my own peeing against the wall, along with the normal sounds of people walking around in the area. It feels like such a relief that I stop noticing anything else around me except the feeling in my body. As I finish and zip up my eyes are fixed on the wall in front of me, and I really hope that no one saw me just do that.

  I don’t hear anything behind me before I feel my face smashing into the wall. I’m on the floor, the searing pain of the blow slowly winning out over the shock of whatever just happened. I start to feel the sensation of my face, like a deep burning, and I feel the warm trickle of blood coming down my face. I’m disoriented. Hurt. Not even sure where I am for a second. And then I hear it—the sound of Rowan screaming. It’s sharp and blood curdling. She’s not just screaming, she’s screaming my name. “Grayson!”

  I see two sets of feet standing over me, and when I look up there’s two of the Brotherhood standing over me. I look behind them, to Rowan, who’s being held by Johnathan. She’s struggling to get free as he holds her arms from behind. I look back to the men standing over me—it’s KL and Roland, and they’re smiling as I bleed on the ground. Roland takes a step forward. “How does your face feel, you piece of fucking shit? That feel good?” I’m just getting my bearings back. My face is killing me, and the blood is coming out faster from my nose. But I don’t care about me. The sounds of Rowan yelling and struggling is what really has my attention.

  They’re yelling at me and gloating. I don’t bother to fight back, yet. I don’t ask what’s going on. All I do is reach into my pocket. I pretend to be doubled over in pain, but what I’m really doing is sending the fastest text I’ve ever sent in my entire life. I write to Colt. “Brotherhood jumping me in alley. Help.” I hit send. I don’t wait for a reply. I don’t care if anyone else is coming. I’m just biding my time, pretending to be more hurt than I am, but really all I’m doing is saving up enough energy for what’s about to happen. I listen to them, letting each word help build the anger inside of me.

  “You thought it was funny, embarrassing us at that pizza place, huh? Where are your biker friends now, asshole.” It’s KL this time. I’d recognize his weird voice anywhere. I let him talk. Let him gloat and think he’s gotten the better of me. And then, once he steps in to hit me again. . .

  I grab a single leg as he goes to kick and connect my hands. I twist and throw him to the ground. I turn immediately to Roland, who hits me with a punch in the side of my head. It hurts but there’s no power behind. I step back and get my bearing, ready to fight. “Roland, don’t this, this is dumb. . .” He doesn’t listen to me. Instead he steps forward haphazardly, swinging with his right as hard as he can. My body goes into complete muscle memory from Jiu Jitsu. It’s an art that’s all about self-defense, and using an opponents strength and aggression against them, and at the moment these guys are giving me all the aggression I can handle. But the good thing is they don’t know how to fight—not really. They’re attacking in predictable ways, which means that I’ve see those looks in training.

  I duck under his right punch and grab onto his torso, locking my hands around his chest and pressing my head into him. As soon as I have a grip I put one of my legs behind his and push my weight forward, causing him to hit the ground on his back. I have him tied up and helpless, but as I try to disengage I feel a kick from behind me. It’s KL, who’s gotten up from the throw I gave him. I turn to him and repeat the same move I just did, only now Johnathan lets go of Rowan, who’s screaming for help, and comes over to help his friends. I’m a decent white belt, but taking on three angry guys by myself is out of my depth. My survival instinct kicks in, big time, and every time one of them lounges at me I do my best to fight them off. I feel a kick to my knees, and I fall to the ground as they go to pounce on me. I’m defending the blows as best as I can, trying not to take too much damage or get knocked out, but it’s three on one. Pussies.

  One of the their punches gets through my guard, and it knocks me silly. I’m doing my best to cover up, but I can’t hold them back much longer. I’m balling up as much as I can, trying to protect my head, then suddenly I feel the blows stop, and I hear a familiar voice.

  Chapter 25

  North

  I only called Roland’s name to get his attention so that my fist would land right where I want it to. It works perfectly. I feel three knuckles get buried in his eye socket, and he covers up right away like the little bitch he is. Colton’s with me, and now we have ourselves a fair fight. Roland goes to grab for my leg, and I smash my elbow down into his shoulder, and he yells out in pain. I don’t say anything else to him.

  I let my fists do the talking.

  Colton is dealing with KL pretty handily, so he doesn’t need my help there. Roland won’t be getting up any time soon, so I turn my attention to the sound of Rowan yelling again. Johnathan is holding her from behind and it looks like he has a weapon in his hand. I just stand there—the death look coming out of my eyes. He’s lucky he’s holding onto her, because I’d kill that motherfucker with my bare hands if he wasn’t. As long as he has her he’s safe from me. But when she gets away? It’s over for poor old Johnathan.

  “Stay back, North. Stay the fuck back!”

  He looks panicked. Johnathan’s always been the follower in the group—the quiet one who may have been a nice guy once, but he’s just too impressionable and fell in with the wrong group of individuals. It’s a damn shame. That isn’t going to save him right now, but at least I know the psychology I’m dealing with.

  “You don’t want to do this, Johnathan. I promise you that. I know you’re not like the other two. Right now this is just a fight between men. But if you go and do something stupid it’s going to escalate into something none of us want to happen. Put the knife down.”

  “Fuck you. Fuck all of you. You treat us like shit, all of you. Making fun of us, thinking your shit doesn’t stink. Thinking you’re the only good romance writers around. We’re sick of it.”

  “And this is your solution? Holding a knife to a defenseless woman? Johnathan, listen to yourself. You don’t like how your career is going, so you become a criminal? Stop with the bullshit. Maybe I’m wrong about you, after all. Maybe you are just like those pathetic pieces of shit you call friends. You might be worse.”

  He holds the knife to her throat tighter when I say that, and she gasps. I’m hiding my fear, but I’ve seen shit like this before. Johnathan’s a coward, I can see it in his eyes. He’s a coward and a follower, but sometimes cowards are the most dangerous people in the world. He’s desperate, and he’d do anything to save face and feel like the tough guy. I decide to back off a little.

  “If you really believe all that, why don’t we settle this— just you and I. You’re not a killer, Johnathan, I can see that. You’re better than all that. Let her go. She’s got nothing to do with this beef of yours.” I’m just stalling now. Johnathan is facing me, and he can’t see what’s going on behind him. Slowly and quietly Grayson is crawling his way up. I make it a point not to look so that I won’t give him away. I keep my stare intensely on Johnathan and keep trying to talk him down
so that he’ll let his guard down. “Is this really how you want this to go down? Come on, John, you’re better than this.”

  My taking is doing something, because he lowers his right hand—the knife hand—just enough to give Grayson the opening he needs. Gray grabs that arm with both of his and pulls it around so that Johnathan’s whole body spins. The knife falls to the floor in the process, and I run over and kick it aside. Rowan looks shaken so I run up to her and hold on to her while she cries. Grayson has Johnathan on the ground now, and he’s making him pay for everything. He’s on top of him, punches raining down one after the other. Johnathan is trying to defend himself but he doesn’t know how to fight. I let it go on for about ten seconds until I fear that Grayson might actually kill him.

  “Are you alright?” I ask Rowan, still holding her as tightly as my arms will allow. She’s trembling.

  “Yeah.” She says, so I let go of her and grab Grayson before he does too much damage. Once he feels me pulling him off he stops and falls to the side. Johnathan is covering up. There’s blood everywhere. Colton left KL pretty messed up also. He runs over to help Grayson.

  “Gray, are you okay?” He asks.

  “Been better. Nice timing, though. You saved my ass.”

  “Not me, dude. It was North. I was in the bathroom and I left my phone on the table. North saw your text and practically ripped me away from the urinal to come here.”

  “It was nothing,” I say. “I thought we could avoid something like this, but there was a reckoning coming with these guys. Too bad.”

  “I called the cops.” Colt says.

  “Shit, why’d you go and do that?” I ask. It isn’t that I don’t like the police. I have nothing but respect for those who do such a tough job, but my relationship with law enforcement is complicated at best. I spent some time in jail for a crime that I didn’t commit, so I’m always having to answer for a bullshit criminal record. On top of that I don’t exactly look like everyone else. With the shaved head, the tattoos, and the general look of ‘fuck you’ on my face at all times, I scream criminal to most cops.

  “Not the regular cops. My cops.”

  “Huh?” I ask.

  “I called Calem—he’s a detective I know, long story. But he called his ex partner, Jesse, who’s still on the job. He’s headed over here with some cops who already know the situation. We don’t have to worry.”

  “Alright, Colt, I trust you. Cause this shit looks bad.”

  “It is,” Gray says. “What the fuck? I got jumped while I was taking a piss.”

  “Did you at least get to put your dick away before they got you?”

  Leave it to Colton to go there. “Yeah, man, dick’s all secure. Where’s. . .”

  Gray jumps up and runs to Rowan. They grab onto each other give each other a kiss before they both start crying. She must have been terrified. He’s a good man—Grayson. For few people in this world will I put up my hands anymore. He’s one of them. Him, Knight, and Colton. I hear the sirens in the distance. Colton’s friends are on their way. What a strange turn of events. I just hope we can get this all cleared up before tomorrow’s signing. The sounds of sirens are getting closer, so before the cops show up I have one more message for our friends on the floor. I go over, individually, and whisper sweet nothings in each of their ears.

  When I’m done Colton comes to stand next to me and wait. Grayson and Rowan are still embracing. I don’t blame them. If someone held a knife to my wife’s throat I’d. . .well, come to think of it, I guess I did that one time. Story for another day. As the sirens get louder and louder Colton looks at me. “Thanks for helping.”

  “Don’t thank me, Colt. That’s what family does. We protect one another. You’d do the same for me and mine.”

  “Absolutely. You know I would. Hey, what’d you say to them just now?”

  I smile my smart-ass, punk rock smile. “Who them?” I ask coyly. “Eh, just a friendly reminder that if they get out of jail, eventually, to never come anywhere near you guys again.”

  “A friendly reminder?”

  “Yeah. I told them that if I ever saw any of their ugly asses again, that I’d rip their teeth out, one by one, with my rustiest pair of pliers, and then I’d let all the boys in my MC take turns skull fucking them, while I put a hot iron to their balls. Friendly reminder.”

  “Shit,” Colton says. I can see that I shocked him a little. “Remind me never to get on your bad side, North.”

  “Never, Colton. Never.”

  The sirens are here. It’s time to put this incident behind us.

  Chapter 26

  Grayson

  “If I had to lie to one more reader I was going to die.”

  “Don’t worry, Gray,” Mike says on the other end of the phone. “You did the right thing even though you lied. You couldn’t have told them how you really got that black eye and fucked up nose.”

  “Yeah, I know, but still.”

  I really do feel bad, and not just cause I look like I just contested for a UFC title. The signing went off without a hitch despite the horror show the night before. It’s a small miracle. But I’m the only one who came out of our little scrap with visible damage on his face, and every single reader I met asked me about it. I couldn’t really tell them that we got into a brawl with the Brotherhood, so I made up some lie about us playing basketball and me taking an elbow from North. I don’t know if people bought it or not, but no one said anything more to me afterwards. I get off the phone with Mike. Our ebook dropped today, and so far it’s climbing the anthology charts on Amazon nicely, but I don’t want to jinx anything.

  Beside me having to answer for my face, everything was as smooth as the first signing—maybe even better. There were more people, they all brought friends, and we met a lot of new readers. It was the boost we all needed. Not only did we sell out of the anthology—again—but we sold out of the collaboration we did. It’s dropping on Amazon tomorrow, and we all have our fingers crossed about the sales. More than the paperbacks we sold was the amazing bump in ebook sales that we all saw from our readers and new fans uploading all the pics with us. We got so many likes, comments, and shares on those posts that I spent most of the morning trying to reply to them all. I swear we have the best fans in the world.

  I hear a knock on the door. I’m not expecting anyone. When I open it Rowan’s standing there. The smile on her face makes me forget the soreness in mine. It’s the most pleasant surprise I’ve had in a long time. “Hey there.”

  “Wow, you look like shit, what happened?”

  “Ha Ha. Very funny. Come in.”

  “Thanks,” she says, and comes to sit on my couch. “How are you?”

  “Sore as hell. I should probably have gone to the hospital, but I would have missed the signing.”

  “Jesus, Gray, you didn’t ever go to the doctor?” I shake my head. “Why not?”

  “It’s just a few blows, nothing I haven’t experienced before. If I’d gotten knocked out, or cut I would have gone, but a beating? I can handle it.”

  “You’re like a caveman sometimes.” She jokes.

  “All men are. They stereotypes are true. We don’t like going to the doctor. But I’m not stupid. If I thought I was really hurt I would have gone. I’m not gonna set my own bones or give myself a blood transfusion. But I can deal with some scraps and sore muscles. That’s why they invented Tylenol and Advil. But forget me, how are you doing?”

  She takes a deep breath. “Not gonna lie, I’m a little shook up still. Witnessing a fight is one thing, and that’s bad enough. But having some deranged author hold a knife to me? I might take some time to recover from that one.”

  I reach over and pull her into my arms, even though my whole body feels like one giant bruise. “I know. That scared me more than whatever I thought was going to happen to me. I was terrified that you’d get hurt.”

  “I didn’t,” she says. “At least not physically. That’s cause you saved me.”

  “Barely. North saved u
s all.”

  “Bullshit,” she says. “Stop doing that. Take credit when you deserve it. It was three on one. You’re not Bruce Lee, Grayson, that was always going to end with you on the ground. There’s no shame in that. You fought back like a champion as hard as you could. Sure, North and Colt evened things out, but it was you who saved me from that monster, and it was you who beat his ass.”

  I lean over and kiss her. “I don’t need credit,” I tell her. “I just need you to be okay. That’s all that matters. And I was happy to pound on that scum for a few seconds before the guys pulled me off.”

  “You need to buy Colton a gift or something. It’s a small miracle every one of you didn’t end up in jail.”

  “That cop—Jesse—what a cool guy? He trains also, apparently. He got the situation right away and kept everything quiet. What a great dude. But yeah, you’re right, I owe Colton a case of beer or a hot pastrami sandwich or something.”

  “That’s random.”

  “It’s not, trust me. We all worship at the alter of a hot pastrami sandwich.”

  “Whatever you say.” She smiles and giggles at that one a little. “Get the man a hot sandwich, then. I’m just glad it’s over. What happened to them?”

  “The Brotherhood?” She shakes her head. “I don’t think they exist. One of their PA’s took their reader group down. I can’t find them on social media, either. They all got arrested. KL was already in legal trouble cause of Mike’s stolen laptop, so he’s straight fucked. The other two are facing assault charges and worse—Johnathan could easily get charged with attempted murder. Their careers are over, but that’s the least of their worries.”

  “Damn. It almost makes you feel. . .”

  “Don’t say sorry for them. Whatever you do don’t say that.”

  “I wasn’t. I was going to say it makes you feel happy that there’s justice in the world sometimes. Real justice, where people get exactly what they deserve.”