by Cora Brent
I kept my voice controlled. “I’m ready.”
“My friend, you ought to know this match is getting a lot of interest.” He laughed. “This is widely considered a treat, you see. It’s not too often we can locate two big white boys up to the task of thrashing the sheer hell out of each other.”
“Is that a fact?” I felt sick.
“It is,” he answered cheerfully. “You know, you could take away thirty grand from this.”
“Does Jester always kill his opponents?”
Gabe let out a hiss. “Of course not. Hell, that was just unfortunate. An accident. Shit happens.”
“Shit happens?” I snarled. “A man loses his life and all you can say is ‘shit happens’?”
Gabe’s easy tone gained an edge. “Careful, Creedence. This is not a discussion you want to have.”
Go fuck yourself you slimy little pimp.
“Let’s cut the shit. Where and when, Gabe?”
He laughed and gave me another downtown address. The time was nine pm, three days from now. I repeated the details to make sure I had it straight.
His final words were cold. “You be there, Creed. I know you’re pretty fucking far from a coward but I’m just letting you know that if we have to come looking for you for any reason, it’ll hurt. And keep in mind, you won’t be the one hurting.”
I switched the phone off. Then I threw it against the wall. It bounced and hit Saylor in the arm.
“How long have you been there?” I snarled.
“Long enough,” she whispered, her face ashen.
She was rubbing her arm where the phone had ricocheted. I pointed. “Did I hurt you?”
“No. Who lost his life, Creed?”
I looked her straight in the eye. I couldn’t risk her running off at the mouth to god knows who. “You listen to me, Saylor. Don’t you go fucking repeating that.”
She shrank back a little at my tone. Then her eyes narrowed defiantly. “To who? I assume Cord’s in on the secret since you guys know everything about each other. You don’t want me to tell Truly? Is that it?” She gave a disgusted laugh. “You still think there’s nothing on earth like the Gentry boys, an island alone. No one else invited.” Her voice rose and she opened her arms. “Why the hell are you doing this? Just walk away! Cord can’t always pull you back from the abyss. It’s not fair to him. And what about Truly? Have you been straight with her? Dammit, do you even know how?”
She needed to shut up. I didn’t know what the law was doing about Emilio’s death but I would stake my soul on the fact that they didn’t know the truth. If Saylor McCann started blabbing to Truly or to Brayden or to anyone else who crossed her path then bad shit could follow. I had to make her understand that.
Saylor took an unsteady step backwards when I came at her. A look of fear flashed in her eyes and it made me want to scream. What the hell did she think she needed to be scared of me for? She was my brother’s girl and for that alone I would stand in front of a moving truck for her. Still, I needed to make her afraid of something. She was against the wall and I put a hand on either side of her head.
“You listen, sweetheart. You are not to breathe a fucking word about whatever it is you think you might have heard. There are bad people involved here. People who can do terrible things when they feel they might be exposed.”
There were tears in her eyes but she jerked her chin up, glaring at me. “What things, Creed?”
“They could fucking well kick that kid right out of your belly for starters.”
She gasped and her hands flew to her stomach. Then her head bent forward and she let out a frightened sob. I backed off, hating myself. I left her there like that, slouched against the wall and crying. As I ran blindly out of the apartment I felt like I might cry too.
I didn’t go to the gym. I wandered. Somehow I found myself on the Arizona State campus. I sat on a bench near a fountain and watched people walk by. They all had a purpose; they were all on their way somewhere. When I grew hungry I walked into a large building and bought a hamburger from the food court. Except for a few girls who brazenly smiled at me no one seemed to notice my presence. They didn’t realize that I didn’t belong there.
When I reached into my pocket to grab my phone I remembered that it was still in the apartment. I remembered throwing it at the wall and the way it hit Saylor on the arm. In my head I kept hearing my own words to her. They horrified me. I should have found a way to get my point across without scaring the living shit out of her. Then I realized she had likely already told Cord what I’d said and I felt worse.
It wasn’t until the big clock on the wall read half past five that I remembered Truly was off today and I was supposed to call her when I got back from the gym. Since I didn’t have my phone anymore I just walked to her apartment.
“Have you been straight with her?”
No, I hadn’t. Not really. If I was any kind of a man I would tell her the risks I was up against and let her make up her own mind about whether she wanted to keep lying down with me every night. She’d asked me once in a heartbreaking voice not to mess her up. I had no right to let her fall so hard.
Truly opened the door with a brilliant smile. She looked amazing. She always looked amazing. She wrapped me in her soft arms before I could get a word out. I closed my eyes and held her body against mine. All the shit in my head was gone. I was just a man who was in the arms of his woman.
She squealed when I lifted her. I carried her straight into the bedroom, stripped off both our clothes and buried myself in her. I would never get tired of this girl. In between bursts of sex we talked. I asked her questions about places she’d been and she gave me long answers. I said nothing of the fight and she didn’t ask. In fact, for a while, it wasn’t even on my mind.
In the morning I told her I needed to go to the gym. I breathed in the sweet scent of her skin and promised I would see her later. She kissed me goodbye before I headed out.
I took my time walking back. I went the long way, each step a little smaller than the last one. By the time I reached my apartment door I was nervous. In my mind I kept picturing Cord waiting on the other side, ready to throw me against the wall for scaring the hell out of Saylor. I deserved it. If he wanted to swing away I wouldn’t even try to stop him.
Cord wasn’t waiting though. Saylor was. She was sitting at the kitchen table with a glass of orange juice.
“Hi,” she said softly.
I swallowed. “Hey.”
She flicked my phone across the surface of the table. “It’s not broken.”
“Oh. Good.”
She paused. “I didn’t tell him about yesterday. He’s asleep.”
I said nothing. I picked up my phone and put it in my pocket.
“You shouldn’t tell him either.”
I shrugged. “Why’s that?”
“Because it will upset him.”
I leaned over the back of a chair and looked at her. “I didn’t mean it.”
She turned her head away and gave a bitter little laugh. “You know Creedence, you say that to me a lot.”
“Saylor.”
She stood and shouldered her purse. “I’ve got to go. When Cord wakes up, please just tell him I went to go run a few errands. I’ll be back later.” She walked a few steps, then stopped to stare at me. “Can you do that?”
“Yeah Say, I can do that.”
She nodded and left.
I sat on the couch and did nothing. The sound of Chase’s snoring reached me, or maybe it was Cord. I couldn’t tell the difference. After a while I picked up my guitar, thinking of the awful night when Cord and I went out for revenge. Normally the thought of hurting someone else made me ill. But not then. I wanted the blood of the men who had nearly killed Chasyn. I almost had it too. Cordero stopped me in a valiant gesture that I didn’t appreciate until later. He did something else too. He begged me to put away the rage and play some music instead. I’d hugged my brother and let him take me back to the hospital where we stood
in a small room and sang for Chase and for anyone else who wanted to listen. It was one of the best moments of my life.
As I strummed the guitar in our shabby living room I let my mind sort through some of the other best moments. They were tied to Truly Lee.
CHAPTER TWENTY THREE
Truly
Saylor gave me directions. We were headed southeast, miles outside of the valley. For most of the drive we passed endless brown stucco housing subdivisions that appeared to be little more than clones of one another. Finally the stucco civilizations began to thin out. I’d never been to this part of the state before. It was flat and dusty. It must have been what the Phoenix area looked like before people went wild with building stuff all over it. We left the gloomy San Tan Mountains behind and kept going.
“Only five more miles,” Saylor promised.
“What are we here for?”
She twisted her hands in her lap. “I need to find someone who might be able to help. I tried to get Cord to call him but he wouldn’t.”
I had to ask her. “Say? How bad is this shit Creed’s wrapped up in?”
I could hear the pain in her voice. It matched the ache inside of me. “It’s bad, Truly. The last guy who hit the ground in one of these fights? He didn’t get up again. He died later the same night. I pieced that much together from hearing the guys whispering and also listening to Creed on the phone. Cord doesn’t know that I know.” She let out a low moan and rested her head against the passenger window. “God, I love him. I love him so much. This is killing him.”
Now that I knew more it was killing me too. I just couldn’t be as honest about it as Saylor was.
She touched my hand anyway, a gesture of comfort. Then she turned her head to look at the passing scenery. She wrinkled her nose.
“I hate coming back here.”
“Your folks still local?”
She laughed hoarsely. “Yeah. Think we’ll skip the reunion this time. My mom will never get used to the idea of her daughter mixed up with the Gentrys. I think in that case she’d rather not have a daughter. She especially hates Cord.”
I tried to pick my words carefully. “Because of what happened when you guys were kids?”
She shrugged. “It’s all right. You can say it out loud. Cord screwed me as a dirty bet he made with his brothers. He did it knowing it was my first time. Believe me when I tell you, when that story got around town there was no place I could hide.” Her pretty face had a far away look as she relived old agonies. “I know there are plenty of people who couldn’t understand why I forgave him at all after that, let alone fell in love with him years later.”
I bit my lip. “I know. I think I was one of them.”
She smiled. “I think you were too.” The she grimaced. “In a little while you’ll get a good look at where those boys came from. It really is shit. More than that, it’s terrifying. They were abused, neglected, and everyone in town thought they were garbage. And yet they’re decent men, all three of them.” She laughed to herself. “Even Creed, no matter how he tries to hide it. But they’ve had to do a lot of climbing to get there.”
Saylor touched my arm. Her expression was earnest. She wanted me to understand the Gentry boys the way she understood them. “I don’t have the right to pardon them for everything. And it doesn’t mean they’re without flaws. But god dammit, who is?”
“Not me, Say. Definitely not me.”
She nodded. “I knew you’d get it.”
I really did get it. That didn’t mean I believed every offense should be forgiven. Some things were inexcusable. But if you scoff at the very idea of forgiveness, then who the hell will be willing to let you go free if the time comes? Would you even be able to forgive yourself?
Saylor pointed. “Turn here.”
We’d already passed the ugly outline of the prison. The town itself appeared pleasant enough but we were driving away from the center of it, deep into the desert. Here and there I glimpsed homes set far back from the road. Some were well kept houses. Others were dilapidated trailers. The road was narrow this far out and there were no street lights.
“Must be dark as the belly of hell at night,” I commented.
She nodded. “It is.”
Saylor was getting edgy. She sat up straight in her seat and scanned the passing scenery. “See that ramshackle monstrosity in the distance? Don’t get too close to it.”
The trailer she was pointing to looked as if it had been abandoned for a decade. “That thing? Someone lives there?”
Saylor spoke through clenched teeth. “Yes. Someone lives there.”
I stared at the sorry dwelling. I’d actually lived in places nearly as rundown and known folks who lived even worse. But there was a rotten quality to the sprawling mess in front of me that I couldn’t quite put my finger on. It was more than poverty. It made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up.
I came to a rolling stop. “Saylor? Is that where the boys grew up?”
“Yeah.” She looked around nervously. “Look, I’m not shitting you. This is not a place we want to be hanging out.”
She was frightened of something. Or someone.
“Sometimes fathers turn out to be evil sons of bitches.”
Creed had told me that. The reason why he’d said it had something to do with whatever lived out here.
“That’s the place we’re looking for,” Saylor said, pointing to a small trailer a few hundred yards in the distance. There was a canvas awning stretched over the right edge, likely designed to offer a bit of outdoor shade to the unlucky resident. A gleaming black motorcycle sat out front. I eased the car in that direction over the unpaved desert floor. When I came to a stop a few feet away from the door Saylor glanced around again quickly. She offered me an anxious smile before opening the door.
“Come on,” she said, motioning for me to follow.
Though she knocked lightly on the thin trailer door, the sound reverberated, echoing in the empty stillness. Wild creosote and twisted cacti dotted the landscape far and wide. The heat seemed more prickly out here. It felt as if there couldn’t possibly be a cool spot within twenty miles.
Saylor sighed and knocked on the door more insistently.
“Quit it,” rumbled a low voice.
We hadn’t seen the man, though he must have been sitting in the shadows under the canvas awning. He came around to the front and stood there, crossing his arms. He was solidly muscled and his brown skin was heavily tattooed. His black hair came down around his ears and if I had to guess his age I would have placed him in his late twenties. When he smiled at us I could swear I’d seen him before.
“Declan?” Saylor ventured with some uncertainty.
Now I knew. This was Declan Gentry. I’d heard his name before. He was a cousin to Creed, Chase, and Cord. I didn’t know why we had driven all the way out here to talk to him.
“Saylor,” he answered in a mild voice.
She grinned uneasily. “You remember me.”
He snorted and leaned against the surface of the trailer, though it must have been blistering hot. “Shit girl, I’m not feeble minded.” He pushed his hair out of his eyes. “How’s Cordero?”
“He’s fine.”
“Yeah? Well, I’ll assume you weren’t just touring the neighborhood so how about you tell me who isn’t fine?”
Saylor grimaced. “Everyone else. But it’s Creedence I’m most worried about.”
Declan was paying close attention. “Why?”
“He got in the middle of something bad.”
“Something bad,” Declan repeated. “Well that could be anything from a knocked up cheerleader to homicide. So stop making me guess.”
“He’s committed to a fight. It’s one he might not be able to walk away from if he loses.”
Declan’s eyes narrowed. “With who?”
“I don’t know exactly. But he already killed one man. I heard Cord say the name Jester.”
“Jester,” Declan muttered. I could tell from the
sudden tension in his posture that the name meant something to him. “When?”
“A few days I think. Deck, Cord has always said that you know everyone and they’re universally scared shitless by the mere mention of your name. Is there anything you can do?”
“You’re asking for my help?”
“Yes.”
Declan smiled and his eyes suddenly shifted in my direction. His gaze worked me over real well. “And I see you brought a treat along to bribe me with.”
Saylor put her hands on her hips. “Don’t be a pervert. This is my friend, Truly.”
“Hello Truly.”
“Hello Declan.”
He had a fluid way of moving. It was nearly hypnotic. Declan Gentry stood mere inches from me and ran a finger lightly over my arm.
“You got a man, Truly? Or are you looking for one?”
I met his gaze without flinching. “I’m with Creedence.”
“Ah.” Declan dropped his hand and then shot me a regretful grin. “That’s too bad. My cousins seem to have a knack for finding the best women before I can.”
“So will you help?” Saylor asked. I heard the desperation in her voice.
Declan dropped his tough guy act. He seemed sad. “I don’t know if there’s much I can do, honey. I know the kind of fights you’re talking about and there’s no calling in sick.”
“The last guy who hit the ground in one of these fights? He didn’t get up again. He died later the same night.”
It was too horrible to contemplate.
“Please,” I whispered.
Saylor glanced at me and her face crumbled when she saw that I was crying. The tears had simply arrived without warning. I was afraid they might never stop.
Declan stared. “Don’t you go showin’ him that shit,” he said a little sharply. “It’ll fuck with his head.” He looked out in the direction of the ghastly trailer we’d passed before finding our way here.
“I’ll get my ass up there today,” he said quietly. He gave me a hard look and I saw the same stoic resolve I’d seen so often in Creed. “Those boys are my blood and I’ll do what I can for them.”
“Thank you,” Saylor breathed.