Losing Streak (The Lane)

by Kristine Wyllys

  The sound of the front door opening had me jumping from the futon and crossing the room before Brandon had barely cleared the threshold. He squinted at me in the dim light that spilled across the floor from the hallway. A hollow, aching place in my gut made itself known as soon as I heard his voice.

  “How’d you get in?”

  “Old bank card,” I replied, barely recognizing my own voice.

  “Ah. Yeah.” His brows knitted together in a frown made darker by the shadows that covered his face. “Meant to have a key made for you. Had it all planned in my head. Was gonna get down on one knee and ask you to move in. Figured you’d either kick my ass for it or laugh.”

  “Probably both.” Something was burning in my throat, causing everything there to draw in toward it. I wanted to cry. I wanted to scream. I wanted to stand perfectly still and do nothing because we were standing in a patch of light, and as long as that light existed, as long as we stayed in it, nothing could touch us.

  From somewhere down the hall a muffled voice called out suddenly and Brandon winced before he reached back and shut the door, plunging us back into the darkness I’d known before he came in.

  “Talked to Joshua,” I said after a minute, not quite wanting to, but not wanting to prolong it any further.

  “Yeah? Me too.” He laughed, bitter and dark, and I closed my eyes against it. “I didn’t want this, Rose.”

  I nodded, not sure if his eyes had adjusted enough for him to see it. “Which is why I’m not pissed.”

  “You should be. Fuck. I am.” The look he gave me was desperate and searching. “It seemed so fucking sure, you know? Never lost before. Not once. And I’d been smart. I picked the best damn fighter out there. Everyone told me so. Turner never lost. First fucking time. Damn it. He picked a hell of a time to end both of our winning streaks.”

  I didn’t know what to say to that. So instead, I replied, “I’m Joshua’s new assistant.”

  He rubbed at the back of his neck roughly. “Yeah? Not too bad, I guess. Could be worse anyway. Not that I’ll sleep any better.”

  “We might still run into each other.”

  “Doubt it. Canada’s a drive from here.”

  I stared at him, face screwed up in confusion, and he sighed.

  “I’m taking over a stash house up there.”

  “Shit.”

  “Is one of the words of the day,” he agreed.

  “When do you leave?” I wanted to reach out and fix the hair that was falling into his eyes. Hair that I hadn’t messed up personally. It offended me, that hair. But he was already so far away. He was standing right in front of me, close enough to touch, and yet the inches between us could have spanned miles.

  “The morning. Somebody is supposed to meet me with a GPS at the edge of town. Can you believe that? Those were his exact words. ‘The edge of town, Mr. Williams.’ Fuck. I can’t...” He trailed off, looking around almost frantically at everything but me. Then he shook his head and shoved that offending piece of hair back. “I’m supposed to make a little money. I don’t know how much or how often. To live on, I guess. I’ll send every dime I can back.”

  “You don’t have to do that.”

  His eyes flashed to mine, a hard edge in them as he nodded slowly. “Right. Of course. Jesus.” His hands clenched and unclenched stiffly at his side. “I wouldn’t want shit from me either.”

  “What?” I took a step forward only to pull up short when he held up a hand.

  “You’re splitting. I don’t blame you. The shit I just got us into? I’d run. I want to run.” For one second, hope flirted with his features, only to be quickly wiped away. “Not that we can, huh?”

  “No,” I said quietly. I didn’t need to say anything further. I couldn’t go anywhere without Mama, who wouldn’t go without Jackson, who wouldn’t leave without Bri. I was bound by my people. My responsibilities to them were chains that held me in place.

  Love was dangerous that way.

  “Yeah. Figured as much.”

  It was almost physically painful to say my next words. “You can, though. You should.”

  “You think I’d do that to you?” The look he shot me was both hurt and heated. “It’d come down on you. King already made that one clear.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me about him?” I asked, careful to keep the accusation out of my voice. It didn’t matter. Not anymore.

  “Didn’t know until today who was in charge. Never thought to ask before. God. The list of how fucking stupid I am just keeps getting longer, huh?”

  He tipped his head back, jaw clenched, and I found myself staring at it. Helplessness welled up in me, so thick it was hard to take a breath around. I wanted to grab his shirt and yank him toward me. I wanted to fix all of this, erase it, because that was what I always did. I fixed everything, even if that meant paying in flesh and blood.

  But I couldn’t do that now. I couldn’t make it better. Everything was broken and all we could do was stand in the wreckage and bleed separately.

  Except for tonight. Tonight we could bleed together.

  I dove forward so quickly I caught myself by surprise. Brandon opened his mouth but before a sound had a chance to escape I shoved mine against it. My hands were jerky and desperate as I fumbled with his belt. I was terrified, even as his lips moved just as frantically against mine, he’d attempt to stop me or make me slow down. I was afraid for the first time he’d want things to be different. Gentler. Sweeter. He’d want to make love, whatever that even meant, and I didn’t want that. I wanted fast and hard. I wanted to burn and I wanted him to burn. I wanted our skin to blacken from the heat and when morning came, I wanted us to part marked deep enough from this night that we would have no choice but to remember in the empty nights ahead.

  With a growl, he shoved my pants down, then we were falling onto the floor, a tangle of limbs and random pieces of clothing and frenzy, and I let out a half moan, half wail when he thrust forward, filling me up in one swift movement.

  I scratched and clawed at exposed skin as he pounded into me, angry and scared and uncertain. I wasn’t a girl anymore. I wasn’t even the beast that howled somewhere inside of me, close to the surface. I was raw emotion. Naked, exposed nerve endings. I was everything all at once and I was nothing. I was the wound this beautiful, broken boy above me who’d slipped into my life and under my skin would leave behind when he was ripped away.

  And afterward, when we lay in a sweaty, shuddering heap, hands clutching and gripping too tight and we whispered shaky words about time and distance and waiting through them, I felt like I was already bleeding.

  Then, because it was cruel, the sun found us.

  Like a Colossus, and we petty men

  Walk under his huge legs and peep about

  To find ourselves dishonorable graves.

  Men at some time are masters of their fates.

  The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars

  But in ourselves, that we are underlings.

  —William Shakespeare

  Chapter Ten

  Thirty-three months later

  It was Tuesday, the middle of the work and school week, and yet it could have been a Friday night for how packed the Lane was. It was full to bursting, no room to breathe, let alone move. People were practically stepping over each other just to wait in the lines to be admitted to the Lane’s various bars.

  Drinking would always be the religion of choice here and there’d never be a shortage of devoted worshippers.

  I should have had to push my way through the crowd, as congested as it was, but it parted easily for me. It always did. They might not have recognized me, the people who hurried out of my way, but they could sense I was not just another one of them. I was somebody. Somebody worth clearing a path for. They were right. And they were smart to
recognize it.

  There were two things you didn’t do in this town. The first was never cross Joshua King. The second? Never, ever, cross his right hand.

  I wasn’t the only one who was being avoided tonight. Up ahead, about halfway down the street, was an obvious hole in the sea of bodies. I quickened my pace, eyes trained on that spot, only to pull up short once I was close enough to make out the two hulking figures posted by the doors to Molly’s Pub. I squinted, but I already knew. There was no mistaking that tight, clenched jawline that contrasted so sharply with the casual way one of them held himself. I balled my suddenly tingling hands into fists. He wasn’t supposed to be here. Not at Molly’s. Not on the Lane at all.

  “Shit.”

  It was little more than a whisper, a stunned breath that I could barely hear over the relentless pounding of my heart. No way they could have heard me, not with the distance still between us or the buzzing of the thick crowd we were standing in. Yet they both turned to look in my direction simultaneously with curious expressions. I quickly arranged my face in a careful mask and strode forward, focusing on the smaller of the two.

  “Is it empty?”

  Cameron Rice pulled down the ridiculous wraparound sunglasses he was wearing and gave me a nod. He didn’t elaborate beyond that douchey gesture. I spared Brandon a glance, the streetlights overhead washing his face in a warm glow, and my heart stuttered painfully. He hadn’t changed. Nothing about him had changed. Except, perhaps, the edge in his eyes that I didn’t remember being quite so hard and sharp.

  “It’s night and you’re wearing sunglasses,” I said, focusing on Rice once more. “You look like an ass. And where the hell is Jared?”

  Rice’s nearly handsome features twisted into a scowl as he jerked the glasses off his face. “Boss wanted him at Duke’s tonight. He sent us over instead.” He paused. “But you should’ve known that already. Since you know everything that goes on.”

  “I know the important stuff. Which you are clearly not included in,” I snapped before taking a deep breath and shoving every ounce of emotion I was feeling down deep. Then I drew myself up to the impressive five-ten height that my heels put me at and squared my shoulders. “I get an hour with him. A full hour. I don’t want you or anyone else barging in before that. Are we clear?”

  Rice nodded again quickly enough, but his dark brown gaze was hard and resentful, informing me just how he felt about being ordered around in general and by me in particular. I stared at him for a moment longer before I mirrored the movement. I didn’t trust him. I had absolutely no reason to trust him. Cameron Rice had proven in the past that he wasn’t afraid to fuck over anyone he felt got in his way. He was a yes-man, Joshua’s yes-man, to the power of ten, but I held rank here.

  I fought a hard war to keep myself from looking over at Brandon once more, who I could feel watching the entire exchange rather stoically. I imagined the worry that would be bracketing his downturned lips and I wanted to do something, anything really, to ease it. There was nothing, though. Not now. Not here on the Lane, with Rice and God only knew who else watching.

  Because what if I couldn’t look away again?

  Instead, I moved past them without another word, chest aching with every step, and pulled open the fogged-up glass door to Molly’s. It took my eyes a moment to adjust to the dim lighting, and they were drawn to the room’s only real source of illumination, a mounted TV in the back corner. The volume was turned too low to hear much of anything, but from what I could make out, it sounded as if the grim-faced reporter was criticizing the president on a recent speech. If it hadn’t been for Rice and Brandon outside, the choice in programming would be enough to drive most customers away. I shook my head, attempting to clear it and focus on the task at hand. Because depending on what happened tonight, it wouldn’t matter what channel they had their TV on. Their pub would stay this empty.

  A flash of movement on my left caused me to jerk my head in that direction. A nervous, twitchy-looking woman stood behind the bar watching me with dark, wary eyes. I could tell by the look on her face she knew who I was, or at least knew of me, and she didn’t know whether to be angry or worried.

  It was a familiar sight, those warring emotions. It wasn’t the first time I’d been met with them. The people I visited on Joshua’s orders were often both appalled and relieved to see my face. I was their angel of mercy as well as their harbinger. I wasn’t him, the king, and yet I came on his behalf. I was their last hope before he sent in his worst, and they both loved me for not being them and hated me knowing what could come after I left.

  “Mrs. MacBain,” I said by way of greeting as I made my way over to her. The sound of her name on my lips had her fisting the spotted rag in her hand. “I’m Rosemary Young.”

  “Aye. I know who ye are,” she replied in a quiet but firm voice, with just enough accent present to be noticeable.

  “Then you know I’m here to speak with your husband.”

  “Aye. We’ve been waiting for ye to show.”

  They always were. Being acknowledged, being seen and anticipated, even in an infamous sort of way, filled me with a deep, almost shameful, satisfaction.

  “Then you also know how important it is that I speak with him tonight. I’m on a time frame and it’s limited.”

  Slowly, deliberately, she set down the rag and leaned toward me, so close I could catch a faint whiff of baby powder on her. It reminded me of Mama. I didn’t pull back, as much as I wanted to.

  “My Charlie is a good man. What yer doing to him is wrong,” she said in a tone that managed to be both hard and soft, lyrical and jagged. I arched a brow. Not what I was expecting from this trembling creature. This was a woman with steel in her spine.

  “I’m not doing anything to him, ma’am. Except trying to save his endangered skin.”

  She studied me, eyes roaming over my face as if she was trying to memorize it. I gazed evenly back at her, waiting. The clock was ticking and she was wasting the precious minutes it was counting off.

  “Ye tell yerself that to help ye sleep at night. But, I wonder, does it work?”

  “I sleep fine,” I said. “I don’t believe in anything that jeopardizes that. But I’ll tell you I don’t sleep nearly as soundly as your husband will if we don’t get this resolved in a timely manner.”

  “And now it’s threats, is it? Ye have no shame.”

  I was losing my patience. I didn’t have a lot of it to start with.

  “Listen, I get it. I do. And there’s nothing you can say to me, no insult you can throw at me, that’s going to be worse than what I’ve heard before. So save your breath.”

  “Yer the devil.”

  “No, I’m not. I’m just the girl who works for him.”

  “Girl,” she scoffed. “No. You’re no more a girl than a wolf dressed in wool is a lamb.”

  “Okay. I’ll give it to you. That one was new.” I leaned across the bar myself, this time crowding into her space. I had to hand it to her. She didn’t so much as flinch. “My time is valuable, Mrs. MacBain, and you’re wasting it. So do us both a favor and go inform your husband that the bad wolf is here to see him.”

  Her eyes, a lovely shade of green, narrowed slightly. “I’ll tell him. But first I’ll tell ye this. Ye mighta convinced the others, paid ’em or scared ’em or whatever it is that ye did, but ye’ll not be getting the same from us. Ye might as well know that now.”

  “And you might as well know this. No matter what kind of man you believe your husband to be, Joshua King always gets his way. It’s only a matter of how.”

  I expected some kind of reaction, a scowl, a shake of the head, something other than the blank stare I was met with. This woman didn’t just possess a spine of steel, apparently her balls were made of the same stuff. I kinda respected her for it. Not many people were brave enough to stand up to Joshua King, whet
her directly or indirectly. I almost hated that she and her husband would end up as just another of his lackeys and all that testicular fortitude would be for nothing.

  Almost. Not quite enough to openly root for them. I had too much to gain with their submission and I still had people counting on me.

  “Anytime tonight would be appreciated, Mrs. MacBain.”

  Without another word, she turned on her heel and walked through the swinging door to the back.

  I let a sigh escape once I was sure I was alone, and rubbed at my forehead roughly, telling myself there was no way I was going to look toward the large window next to the front door. I’d barely finished the thought before I was glancing that way. Through the steamed glass I could just make out the shape of Rice and Brandon. The latter was angled in a way to watch me. Not obviously. Not so much that anyone watching him would know, but I did.

  I wanted to kick something. But it wasn’t the time, nor was it the place. Not to mention, my shoes were far too expensive to willfully abuse in such a way.

  I clenched my eyes shut and turned away with a low growl. I’d told Rice I knew the important shit and I did. Except this. I hadn’t known this. I hadn’t known that Brandon had come home, like the prodigal son, once more.

  It took a few minutes, minutes I spent growing less agitated by the presence of the boy outside and more aggravated with the man somewhere in the building. That emotion could be harnessed and used productively. And it was safer.

  Finally Mrs. MacBain reappeared, her expression stony.

  “He’ll be out in a minute. He said for ye to find a seat.”

  I nodded and thanked her, because while I was irked, Mama had raised me to be polite, and that meant not flat-out ignoring anyone. Though I’m sure when Mama taught me those manners she never envisioned me putting them to use in situations quite like this. I settled into a booth tucked into the corner to continue my wait, taking care to sit with my back to the window. But I could still feel Brandon’s presence, only a thin sheet of glass and the stretch of chipped wood flooring between us.