“I fucked up,” Katie said, her voice hoarse, and I wished I could’ve turned on the light to the living room to try and figure out how to help her, based on whatever emotion currently ruled her face.
“I fucked up, too,” I said.
“How in God’s name could you have possibly fucked up?” she demanded. “You were just doing your job, then trying to live your life. I’m the one who accused you of being a murderer.”
“You should know that I feel responsible for Joe’s death.”
“Why in the world would you? He was a piece of shit.”
“Katie…”
“He was. I had no idea the kind of shit he was into, and he brought it on himself.”
“That’s what Cora said.”
“Cora Slade. Your former supervisor. I spoke with her.”
“You did?”
“And I got the video cleaned up, the one I found from the security camera,” she said. “The portion I’d been able to make out just showed you standing over Joe as he bled out. But I saw everything, once the static and the mess was cleaned up by a tech guy I used to know. It happened like you said.”
“It wouldn’t have happened at all if I had been better.”
“You couldn’t control what Joe was doing. And if you’d tried to stop your contact, your case would’ve been blown. All that hard work, all the time, would’ve meant nothing. And maybe your life would’ve been put in danger, too.”
“I still feel responsible.”
“I feel responsible, too.”
I scoffed. “You shouldn’t.”
“I didn’t trust you, and I should have.”
I sighed. “Everyone makes mistakes, Katie. Don’t beat yourself up over it.”
She laughed. “You don’t. I don’t know… Maybe you do. Ever since Joe died, I hated the idea of wasting time. Because everything could be taken away from you at any moment. Life is so short, and we’re so stupid if we waste ours. And now that I know just what kind of person Joe was, it doesn’t make sense to have that belief anymore. But I wasted a lot of time with you, regardless of what I believe, and I hate that.”
I cupped her cheek with my hand, drawing my thumb across the bottom of her eye to ward off the tear that I knew threatened to fall.
“Just what, exactly, do you think we wasted?” I asked.
“I was so sure you’d killed Joe,” she said, pressing her face into the palm of my hand. “That’s what I’d seen on the video, what I thought I believed. I came here intent on making you pay for a crime you didn’t commit. I was awful to you because I was horrified at myself for falling in love with you.”
“Let’s just agree to stop wasting time, then.”
“What?”
“If we love each other, what else is there to worry about?”
“But I”
“Do you still love me, Katie?”
“Well, yes, but”
“Then that’s all we need to worry about, right? That we love each other?”
“Ace, I thought you killed Joe. I really did. I blamed you for everything, didn’t believe you when you told me that you didn’t. I seriously doubt that you could ever love me, after that.”
“Katie?”
“Yes?”
I leaned forward, smoothed the line of her jaw with my hand, and kissed her, long and hard, trying to convey what I might not have been able to say in the contact. I loved her so much. My life had lost its joy, its color, without her here. I needed her to know that, even if I wasn’t sure how to say it.
“I’m glad you’re back,” I said. “Do you think you can stay?”
“Stay? Here in Rio Seco?” Her lips curved upward against mine. “What in the world am I going to do here?”
“I could think of one or two things.” I coupled that suggestive statement with a few suggestive gestures, and Katie laughed.
“I have a couple of things I could add to that,” she said, kissing my jaw line. “God, I missed you.”
“I missed you more.” We shifted on the couch until she was curled up in my lap, nuzzling my beard beneath my chin. “What about your job?”
“I left it.”
“I’m sorry.”
“I’m not. I wasn’t happy, and Joe really fucked things up for me. When I came back, internal affairs investigated me, too, just because they were wondering if the corruption had rubbed off on me.”
“I’m sure we can find something for you here in Rio Seco.”
“I found you here in Rio Seco.”
“Yes, you did.” I held on to her tight, sure that there was nothing in the world that would get me to let go of her now.
We didn’t so much as make love as we sank into each other, relearning each other now that there was nothing to hide. My hands and mouth mapped the planes of her body, each curve and crevice, and I found places I was familiar with, landmarks I knew, locations I loved.
“I love you,” I panted to her, not caring whether it was an appropriate time to say something like that, my body buried in hers, both of us linked together.
“Even after everything?” Katie had her legs wrapped around my middle, and she looked up at me, blinking away beads of sweat, or maybe tears.
“Especially after everything.”
“Why? Why would you still love me after all of that?”
I smiled at her. “Because if we got the worst fight we’ll ever had out of the way at the beginning of the relationship, then it’ll be smooth sailing from here on out.”
Katie paused for a moment, then threw her head back and laughed, and it was the best feeling in the world.
Epilogue
“Congratulations!” Ace boomed, catching Katie around the middle and swinging her around. She laughed and threw her head back, launching the cap she’d been wearing to the floor.
Jack picked it up and examined it. “Oh, no. No, no. We can’t have you around here anymore.”
“Jack Ryder, you just implied that your club’s bar is engaging in illegal actions,” Katie said, an overly stern expression plastered across her face. “I might have to take a look around here to make sure everything’s kosher.”
“That’s the health inspector’s job, not the county police,” Brody pointed out. “And we already pay off the health inspector, so…”
“Really, really did not want to hear that,” Katie said, putting her hands over her ears as Ace retrieved her hat from Jack and replaced it on her head.
“Brody’s lying,” I said. “Haley and Ace work their fingers to the bone keeping this place clean.”
“Thanks, Chuck,” Haley said, winking at me and blowing me a kiss from across the bar. Damn, if she knew the things even a simple action like that did to my insides, she maybe wouldn’t do it.
It was past closing time, though Katie had stopped by to let everyone know the good news: the short-staffed county police force had gladly hired her after she applied to work there, cementing her presence in Rio Seco. I knew that Ace had tried to convince her just to take a break. She’d been through a lot when she worked in Albuquerque, and I understood intimately just how much police work could wear on a person’s soul. I was part of that group of alumni, after all, alongside Jack and Katie, even if Katie had decided that she could stomach the work if it was located in a different part of the state.
“So, want to take bets for what kind of call will be Katie’s first?” Sloan asked, reaching for his wallet. “My money is on escaped farm animals.”
Katie spluttered a laugh. “Seriously? You’re betting on me, and that’s what you’re going with?”
“My money’s on speeding ticket,” Jack said, then fluttered a look at Katie. “You’re not going to enforce the speed limit on any of us, are you?”
“I will be applying the law fairly to all citizens of the county,” she said, fighting to keep a straight face.
“We’ll figure something out to bend you to our nefarious wills,” Jack said. “What about free drinks at Horizon for life?”
&
nbsp; “That’s what Ace is for,” Katie said smoothly, hooking her arm around Ace’s waist. “Let me know when you come up with something I could really use.”
“I think your first call will be a dispute between neighbors,” Brody said.
“Interesting, interesting,” she said, nodding. “Haley, do you have any guesses?”
Haley held her hands up. “I am going to show you the spreadsheet on my phone of all the bets I’ve declined to take part in with these fools, and you are going to be shocked with the amount of money I’ve saved.”
“All you have to do is win a couple times to really get hooked,” I said sadly, holding out my twenty-dollar bill. “I think your first call will be a mistaken 9-1-1 call.”
“Ooh, good one,” Ace said, nodding.
“Is that what I’m getting myself in to?” Katie asked. “A life of boredom with the county police department?”
“Hey, if you think rounding up escaped farm animals is boring, I’ll trade places with you in a heartbeat,” Sloan said. “Ace? You’re the last one out.”
“Okay.” Ace waved his twenty around. “I’m betting on a call for public indecency.”
Katie laughed. “You better not do anything to influence that call. If I find you wandering around outside the bar naked, you will be in big trouble.”
“No influencing the call,” Jack said, snatching Ace’s money. “That’s a rule.”
“Are we still on for tomorrow?” Ace asked, looking at the room at large.
“What’s tomorrow?” Jack asked.
“Our club ride, oh club founder and president,” Ace said sweetly.
I jerked with recognition, then dread. “I’d forgotten about that, too.”
“Well, the rest of us didn’t,” Brody said. “Bright and early. I want to see the sunrise.”
“Maybe we should reschedule,” I said, uneasy. “If you guys have plans you’d rather be doing…”
“Come on, Chuck,” Ace said, slinging an arm around my neck. “Let’s ride tomorrow. Don’t be a party pooper.”
They had no idea what tomorrow was. I’d forgotten its significance, too, for the last couple of days, and the guilt that created in me was painful and immense.
“I’ll see what I can do for tomorrow,” I said, to general groans. “Got to head out now, though.”
“You okay?” Haley asked, her eyes filled with concern.
“Just tired,” I lied. I doubted I would be able to sleep at all tonight. “See you.”
My house was on the outskirts of town, but I kind of liked the privacy except for nights like this, where I wished there actually were people around. Maybe I should’ve sucked it up and stayed at the bar longer, if only to be around my friends. But my mood was only going to spiral further downward, so it was good to try and resolve it on my own.
Well, me and my friend bourbon would see what we could do about it.
The next thing I remembered was waking up, a terrible little hangover keeping me cozy from where I’d finally given it up, on the couch. God, what had I oh.
I staggered into the bedroom and collapsed onto the bed, and escaped confronting today for a couple of more hours.
I tried to convince myself, when my eyes finally opened and my room came slowly into focus, that it was just another day another day, just like any other. An ordinary day.
It was probably a bad sign when I couldn’t convince myself to believe the simplest lie.
Because I knew it wasn’t just another day. It was the day…the very worst day out of all 365 of them.
“Come on, Chuck,” I coached myself, not caring if anyone overheard me talking to myself. There wasn’t anyone in my place to judge me. Just myself. Myself and my own fucked-up brain. “You can do this. You got this. Getting out of bed would be…that would be a good start. Right?”
Maybe I could just focus on the basics. I had spent this particular day in bed before, thinking that the simple comforts of a soft mattress and fluffy pillows might distract me a little from my heartache, but it had backfired. Without anything else to do but lounge around, my brain had replayed the details of my horror over and over again, in increasing detail, detail that surprised me. I had no idea, until that terrible incident, that I even had a memory for such things.
Like the way her hands had looked, curled softly, like they used to be when she was asleep, ready to punch out a nightmare, or the morning, or anyone who dared to wake her up.
She could’ve been asleep. I’d toyed with that idea far too much, and far too often. In another universe, another plane of being, she could’ve been asleep.
I’d let myself believe it, that year I spent this day in bed, let myself believe that she was only asleep, that maybe I could dial her number and she’d pick up this time, instead of it going to voicemail. I’d even dialed it, the number memorized, the line active even after everything, paid for on time, every month, and I’d let myself believe that she would pick it up, pretended that her prank voicemail message was her picking up.
Yes, staying in bed was the worst decision. Staying in bed on this day, no matter how tempting it was, had the worst consequences. There were no distractions in bed, nothing to distract my mind, and the consequences on that day were very bad.
It was better to get out of bed. Find something to distract myself.
I assigned myself little tasks, simple tasks. Task one: Get out of bed.
“Get out of bed, Chuck,” I suggested. Getting out of bed entailed sitting up, swinging my legs over to the side of the bed, stepping on the floor. Little tasks. Simple tasks.
Getting out of bed, check. Bathroom, check. Shower, check. Getting dressed, check. If I could fill my day with ongoing tasks, no break in between, just dogged adherence to the present, I could maybe forget the past, forget the significance of this day in history, forget about Chelsea.
I choked on the sudden appearance of her name in my mind, somewhere in between swallowing hot coffee and putting the mug down on the table, and I coughed, the liquid splashing everywhere.
Forgetting Chelsea wasn’t something I could do. I could never forget her.
I could do some things to give it a try, though. To at least dull the sharp points of her inside my head and my chest, threatening to pierce my skin.
Gagging, trying my hardest not to throw up, I grabbed for the fifth of bourbon on the kitchen counter and nearly missed, the bottle tipping and knocking around the hard surface with a grating ringing. At least it didn’t shatter. At least there was that.
With shaking hands, I unscrewed the cap and dumped more than I should’ve in the mug on top of what remained of the coffee. I topped that with some more of the brew from the carafe, and mixed it, perfunctorily, with a swirling motion, the cocktail slopping over the sides of the mug, burning my fingers, dripping to the floor.
It was a mess I could take care of. Steps fortaking care of the mess: set mug down gently and securely on the countertop. Tear a paper towel from the roll. Bend down. Mop up mixture of coffee and bourbon. Straighten up. Throw soiled paper towel in the garbage. Take a sip
I spluttered. There was more bourbon than coffee in the mug, but that was okay. That would make it all the easier to dull the edges of this day, of Chelsea.
“To you, Chelsea,” I said, my words ringing hollow in the empty kitchen as I hoisted up my mug. I could’ve imagined her, if I was drunker, grinning at me, a mug of her own to clink against mine. We looked alike, as much as a man and woman could look alike, and I always wondered what she would’ve looked like, now, even if it had only been three years. Maybe she would’ve shaved her head, like me, just to be contrary, or maybe she would’ve continued to grow her hair out long, natural, and it would float out and frame her face in a halo.
A better halo than the caricatured angelic one someone once made the mistake of suggesting to me that she had, now.
Three years without half of my heart.
It should’ve gotten…well, if not better, then somehow more bearable
. But the pain of this day had, if possible, continued to get worse and worse the longer it had been. It was starting to feel like there weren’t enough small tasks or whiskey in the world to help me get through today.
The anniversary of Chelsea’s death.
“Cheers,” I muttered, the word sticking in my throat.
Three years without my twin sister.
Book 2
Chapter 1
“Chuck?”
“We know you’re in there.”
“Open the goddam door, Chuck.”
“Your bike is outside. You’re not fooling anyone.”
“Come on, Chuck.”
“Let us in, at least, if you’re not going to come out.”
I breathed deep and slow, trying to stem off the rise of panic inside my chest, fully dressed, sitting on the couch in my living room. It wasn’t much of a living room, really. When there was bad weather, I’d even throw down some old cardboard and newspapers and wheel my motorcycle inside to protect it from the elements. Wasn’t that what a living room was for? Living? That was what my living room was a couple of places to sit down and unwind instead of a stuffy room with over-the-top drapery and uncomfortable furniture that no one was ever encouraged to use.
“Chuck!”
The knocking resumed on my door and I put my face in my hands. I’d done good, up until this point. I’d made it out of bed, gotten myself dressed, and tried to get a little coffee in me, but that was where things had unspooled. It had been so, so easy to dump a little bourboninto the coffee, just to take the edge off what today represented. It didn’t matter what I knew to be true that the second the buzz set in, it was a swift spiral down to despair. If I could just keep chasing that notion of being okay, just another pour, until the coffee became superfluous and there was only bourbon in the mug, and I was drunk and unable to leave my home on a day when I needed all the distraction I could get.
“Chuck, just tell us what’s going on.”
HORIZON MC Page 16