I’m hopping off the machine when I feel her presence by the door. I snap my head in her direction. “I did need that hug,” she says, eyes lowered to avoid seeing my smile. And then, just like that, she’s off to find her reckless sister.
“Freaking twins,” I mutter and plop onto the ground, watching the clothes go round and round, just like my insides.
Chapter Forty-Three
Red
I have no idea where she is, but when I find her, I am going to murder the little girl—my hard-headed sister. I mean, who sneaks out of a room after being firmly told she’s basically grounded, or at the very least, not crashing Porsches, after drunkenly getting in a car wreck, knocking herself unconscious? The girl looks like a damn Dalmatian but with bruises on her face instead of black dots. She doesn’t ever listen to me, and one of these days, she’s gonna regret being a dumbass.
I roam around our small town square for maybe an hour. The sun is bleak now, darker than the last ten minutes, and I have absolutely no clue where she could have gone. I try my best to visit more times than warranted, which were when I painstakingly left Noah months ago in a desperate but failed attempt to create some distance, to save him from the grenade that I was. But he still faced casualties, and it kills me every day that I couldn’t help him…
Anyway, back to my bratty little sister.
I dial her one more time like she’s going to answer after I’ve tried nine times previously. When I get her clogged voicemail, I groan and slip my phone in my back pocket. A couple passing eyes me oddly, and I snap and give them the middle finger. They speed walk, and I roll my eyes and hold my face. Instead of cursing at bubbly strangers, I need to think: where the hell would Harley Erin Sylvetti jet off to in such a rush?
I feel like a dumbass when it hits me. “Paulie,” I mutter and begin running in the direction of the local bar. She began going when Grandma and Grandpa started going to bingo at the YMCA almost every night. The girl was thirteen fucking years old and hanging out at the bar, but instead of being the concerned big sister I am now, I semi-allowed it, as long as she didn’t come back drunk or high.
I was a piece of shit then. Don’t get me wrong, I still am to this day…but, since I’ve met Noah, I’ve become a little less of a piece of shit and a little more of a compassionate human being who looks out for her little sister. It is my life’s mission to set her ass straight; she isn’t becoming a second version of me. I will not allow it.
The bar still reeks of stale cigarettes, sweaty bikers, and Axe cologne. Memories of doing lines of shots after getting released from jail for a misdemeanor and fucking random guys in the handicap stall in the bathroom cross my mind, and my stomach rumbles like the washing machine I left Noah on.
Noah.
The thought of him, of his gorgeous smile and his freaking halo hanging over his beautiful feathery brown hair, makes it hard to breathe but so much easier at the same time. But I can’t think of him and how I’ve left him in the dark on so many thing I want to shed light on. I have to find my sister and sign her up for Scared Straight—she will not end up like me, well, Pre-Noah, cold and alone and just fucking fucked up.
I find her at the end of the bar chatting up some preppy guy who probably goes to the local college. I flick at his backward baseball cap, shudder upon imagining Noah dressed like this—well, he did wear khaki’s once upon a time…gross—and grab Harley’s upper arm.
“Which would you rather? This girl, or the same amount in jail? Fifteen is a good amount of time to build up those leg muscles you skipped, don’t you think?” I sneer with a sinisterly charming smile.
His icy-blue eyes widen in fear, either at landing behind bars or having to work out those pesky little legs of his. I don’t know nor care enough to find out, because with one look at my little sister, he is out of the creaky front door.
“Get off of me!” Harley growls. “You are such a bitch.” She gestures to Paulie, the owner of the bar. He begins to waddle over on his prosthetic leg, but I hold up a hand, and he nods but still slides over a can of Dr. Pepper.
“Your favorite,” he croaks in the cigarette voice he’s built up over the years; my grandpa used to come here, and Grandma would send me over to get him when he took too long to come home after work. Pointing to Harley, he says, “Never once gave you anything. I may be old, but I ain’t stupid.”
I turn to her. “Did you enjoy your faux whiskey over the years? Careful now, one more and you might get your ‘rotten’ liver yanked out of your tummy.”
She holds up a middle finger and ignores the cold can of soda, so I take it. “You can leave now. You found me, and I’m fine. I don’t need you watching over me.”
“Oh, but it’s my job, Harls.” I pop open the can, and she watches with narrowed eyes.
“No, it isn’t. You aren’t here anymore. You can’t just pop up every once in a while and think you have the role of my mother. You are not my fucking mother, so stop acting like it!” she seethes and jumps off her stool. I put down my can and slowly stand up. Somehow, somewhere inside of me, her words punctured my lung, making it hard to breathe.
“Hey!” I’m running now, pushing the door. I look right, then left, and spot her crossing the street. She’s headed toward the park. I quickly cross the street and chase after her then grab her arm.
“What do you want from me, Red?” she screams so loud, it makes me drop her arm and watch her wordlessly. For once, I am speechless, vulnerably hurt. I hold up my hands, make fists, then drop them to my side.
“I want you to turn out right, Harley.” She rolls her eyes and looks at the stream, but I continue on. She needs to hear this. “I want the freaking world for you. I want you to graduate and go to college and get a job and live happily ever after, without you feeling the shit I felt around your age. I want you—I want you to be better than me.”
“Would you just stop?” she exclaims but doesn’t necessarily shout it. “This is my life and mine alone. You cannot decide what I do with it. Ever. No one but me.” She thumbs her chest with glossy blue eyes. “So what if I want to drive drunk? So what if I want to be drunk? So fucking what if I get arrested? You did it. You turned out all right. I mean, you’re at this fucking top school and you have a hot boyfriend and you have a fancy job and you have it all, Red.”
“I have nothing, Harley,” I say breathlessly, tearing up myself. “I have nothing but secrets I keep from him, and the guilt it comes with, and this—this darkness in me. I don’t know if it’s because of Mom or…or if I was born with it, but it won’t let up. It haunts me every damn second. And I’m just fucked up. I’m painfully bad…but you can be good.” I cup her flushed face and watch her close her eyes, shielding herself from me. “I see it in you, and I—I hate that you do this to yourself.”
Her eyelashes are fluttering, and she’s licking away the tears on her mouth. I know what she’s thinking of; she’s plastered on my mind too, although her view of her is from pictures and videos. For me, it’s as real as flesh.
It’s her sweet smile when I came home from school. It’s our crappy apartment smelling like chocolate chip cookies. It’s her laugh when she finds me with her red lipstick all over my mouth and in her wedding shoes. It’s her telling me stories before bed, of her and my father who died a few months after Harley was conceived. I don’t remember him, just her. Always her.
“No,” Harley utters softly.
“Harls—” I begin just as softly.
“No!” She pushes away from me and drops to her butt in front of the stream. She shoves her face in her palms, blonde hair acting as a curtain to shield her away from me. But I sit down beside her and push her hair away. No more hiding; we’ve done enough of that for the past sixteen years.
“You just left me,” she sobs into her hands.
I rub her back, guilty. “I know, but I had to go to college. The one in town was shit…but please believe me when I say I didn’t want to go. I wanted to stay and be there for you. I really did, Harls.�
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Her head shakes frantically, and she sniffles and looks at me. “Before that.”
What?
“You fucking shut me out, Red,” she accuses. “The arrests, the gang shit—everything. I wasn’t even in your goddamn periphery when you jetted off to college. You were hurting, but I was hurting too. I may not have known her at all…but I was hurting too, and you just—you just left me to deal with this shit.” She pats her chest and cries. “I have a darkness in me too, and. You. Just. Left.”
I’m holding her tightly before she can even finish croaking out her sentence. I am way past being the biggest piece of shit—I am the worst sister. She’s right, I did lash out growing up. I grew up without my loving mother, and I adapted to the inkiness, the pain that latched around my heart, succumbed to it and let it seep in. And I left her, my sweet sister, by herself. I should have paid more attention, should have let her in with me. Maybe I wouldn’t have turned out to be this horrible human being.
As she cries in my neck and I cry in hers, I promise the galaxy, God, anyone who is willing to listen, to be a good person. I’m wiping the slate clean, and I am not letting anyone else I love stay in a cold, black space of nothingness.
So when we’re walking through the front door of my childhood home, my feet carry me to the third door on the left—my old bedroom.
Noah is lying on his back, staring up at the ceiling when I walk in. He doesn’t look sad or anything, but he doesn’t look happy. He looks conflicted, and I feel so fucking bad because I just know it’s my doing. But he shouldn’t ever be puzzled or left in the dark. He’s my only light, the only one in this godforsaken world, and I can’t let him slip into that place.
“He was my step-father,” I say and close the door behind me. When I turn back around, he’s sitting up against the headboard with an even more puzzled expression. I sit beside him and take his hands. He lets me and stares at our hands then at me like he’s trying to solve the problems of the world.
“What?” He shakes his head.
I take a deep breath. I’m going to need it if I’m going to say the next part. “Eddie Manson…he was my step-father.”
“Was.” He picks up on that part and frowns like the good guy he is. “Did he and your mother split up before she died or…?”
I shake my head and swallow thickly. “No, he—he’s dead.”
His face doesn’t change because he remembers I told him he used to abuse my mother and me. “And? Why did you hurt Rachel because of she mentioned him? And why did you look like a ghost when I brought him up earlier, at the police station in Maryland?”
“Because…” I swallow again, and my heart is beating too wildly. I can’t breathe. I look away and take my hands with me. I cup my face, wonder if he’ll even stay with me when I say it. He won’t. He may be the best person in this world, but he has morals, and he will find this sin to be too much and cast me out of his life. He’s the chosen Noah, to build his ark and flee me, the ruination of the Earth.
“Red,” he says softly, large hands working my shoulders gently. Comfortingly. I lean into him without meaning to. I cry, and I cry loud. It’s ugly and wet, and I can’t stop it. He coos gentle whispers and kisses my hair. I feel calmer with each tender, loving kiss, but then I feel like crap for liking it, and I cry even more. “Red, please tell me what’s wrong.”
I blurt it out without any filter, and it’s mingled with my thick tears and my idiotic blubbering. I wipe at my face and cup my palms over my mouth, close my eyes tightly. I don’t want to repeat it, but he asks, and he deserves to know. I promised to shed him light, guide him out of the shadow lurking behind him, so I take deep breaths and stare at my feet as I speak again, only a lot clearer.
“I k-killed him,” I whisper so soft, even I don’t hear me. But he does, clear as day, each and every syllable, because he pulls me onto his lap, and I wrap my arms around his neck.
“So many questions, so many…” He trails off, and I frantically search for disappointment, fear, or any indication that he wants to condemn me to hell in his voice, but I find nothing but pure, burning curiosity.
“Link’s gang originated here, but he moved when I left for college. He and I were in a…sort of…r-relationship.” I feel him suck in a sharp, livid breath, but he doesn’t comment. I close my eyes tighter and jump to the point. “He had Ian, Tanner, and me do a—a job. The local gas station was supposed to be an easy target to get some cash since his other business errands were taking too long. So—so we went to the one that was usually almost dead at night.”
“Ian and Tanner?” he says.
I nod, clutch his back. “T-they followed me too, Tanner especially. Ian didn’t care for college, but he thought why not follow me too.” I lick my lips and really jump to the point. “It all—the robbery—it all went wrong. One of the guys made too much of a fuss, and I was in the car, my car, when I heard the gunshot.” I stop to catch my breath. “They ran out and yelled at me to go. But before I could, I—I saw him.” I can’t even say it, so I bite my tongue and cry into his warm neck.
“Eddie,” he says breathlessly.
“He was bleeding so bad, s-so bad, Noah.” It hurts to breathe. “They didn’t see him. They were too focused on yelling and talking about what they’d spend their cut on. And he stumbled out…God, bleeding so much. I could have called the cops, helped him, he had time…but I floored it and didn’t look back. I bought a celebratory drink at Paulie’s—a bar. Idiots didn’t look for a camera, so we all got booked and sent to juvie.”
I burst into a fresh set of tears, and Noah comforts me. His halo is scratchy as I hold him tighter; it nags me and says I shouldn’t even be this close to him. It complains and says I’ll dirty it, ruin him, and I know I should listen and let go, catapult him into the brightest of lights…but I can’t help but be selfish for hugging him even tighter.
“I don’t even know why I’m crying or upset. The motherfucker abused my mother and me, and he would have done the same to Harley the second she could walk on her own,” I gripe.
That’s the part that I hate. That I feel bad. I shouldn’t. I should be happy the motherfucker is dead and rotting in his unmarked grave since his own family hated the piece of shit too. Yet I’m crying my fucking eyes out. Is it because I feel guilty as a human being overall or because of something else?
“You’re a human being, Red,” Noah says. “We come with compassion as a trait—it’s default. Implanted in every person on this planet.” He pats my back. “You are supposed to feel bad…but then, you shouldn’t,” he shocks me by adding.
I immediately draw back and look into his hard eyes, feel his hands grip my waist. I gasp, but it’s so tiny, I doubt he even heard it. The look in his gaze is too intense to maintain…I do anyway, because I can’t get enough of him.
“I would have killed him my damn self.” He continues the shock streak of the night, gently caressing my cheek. “He hurt you…and your mother. You said he would have hurt your baby sister too. I don’t believe in wishing death or harm upon anyone, but he’s lucky I wasn’t around.”
I laugh with a stuffed throat. “What could a six-year-old have done?”
“Throw rocks at his head.” He smirks, but his mouth is too curvy, eyes too dazzling for it to look menacing—he just looks cute. I laugh, and he watches me like I’m holding the sun in my palms, caressing him and whispering sweet nothings. That’s what he does as he cups the back of my neck and pulls me close. “I’m serious.”
His breath is warm against my open lips, and I tongue my lip ring. He watches with rich, dark eyes, then slowly scrolls them up to meet mine. The tingles igniting goosebumps up my arms and down my toes are too overwhelming. I latch my hands on his broad shoulders.
“Nothing and no one will ever hurt you now that I’m here,” he promises, and I flutter my eyes shut as he presses his forehead against mine. “I promise until my last dying breath, mi Rossa…”
Chapter Forty-Four
Noah
I don’t know how or when it happens, but we fall asleep on the queen bed. Sleeping in her bed was fine, but the fact that she slept here all her life makes my sleep transcendent, heavenly even. I feel let in the tiny door she kept shut at all times—she’s finally let me in.
There are still a few things lingering around that need to be brought to light, though, her not-so-secret meeting with my father being one. I keep running back what I heard and get even more confused and wonder if I do have some sort of secret. I don’t have any babies out in the world; I know that for sure. I may have been ambitious when I traveled, but that didn’t make me an idiot that doesn’t use protection. Nor did I stop in Las Vegas and randomly marry anyone…so what the hell is the secret?
I turn to Red to ask her in her sleep. Maybe she’s so exhausted and loopy she won’t even know she’s answering me until it’s too late. But one glance at her face bats away my burning curiosity like a home-run. I run a fingertip along the straight curve of her nose and touch the tip of her soft cupid’s bow. Her mouth is full and pursed, eliciting funny snores.
Before my staring could get too creepy, I get up, grab my backpack, and pad into the bathroom across the hall. After using the bathroom, I shower for twenty minutes then slip on a gray t-shirt with the bolded word FRESH on the front, light faded jeans, and my favorite red Converse. I slide a gray beanie on my mostly fingered hair and exit the bathroom. I peek in on Red, only to find her knocked out, but this time she’s spread out like a butterfly and, with each rumbling snore, the curly tendrils over her mouth hovers in the air.
Laughing at how peacefully broad she’s sleeping, I sneak downstairs. Despite it being six in the morning, I find Harley and who I can only assume is her grandfather in the kitchen. They’re so focused on flipping pancakes that they don’t notice me leaning against the wall adjacent to the fridge. Luckily to save me from being a peeping tom, Harley looks over her shoulder and smirks.
Red: Fiery Finale (Spectrum Series Book 8) Page 31