by Liz Crowe
Owen ducked behind another tent. His pulse raced, but his breathing was calm and steady. The guttural languages flew all around him as he focused on the four guys with the big bad asshole between them, scurrying into the darkness.
He followed them, grinning as his own men took on the various so-called guards behind him. He ran from tent to tent, keeping the group in his sights but not close enough to give himself away. When they reached the edge of the outer circle of tents, Owen cursed, noting the rusty van idling on the dirt road.
Now or never, Taylor. One less little-girl-raping-shithead-terrorist in the world. One more kill for Paul.
He rose quickly and aimed, getting off two quick blasts of auto fire and taking down a couple of the guards before the other two threw the old dude into the van and climbed in behind him.
“Oh no, you do not,” he yelled, breaking into a run, his gun at his shoulder. As he shot out the van’s tires, then aimed for its gas tank, his left foot sank deeper in the sand than his right. He looked down, and his brain dredged up some long-ago-learned factoid before he attempted to jump as far away as he could manage before the IED detonated.
In the space of a nanosecond, agony filled every one of his senses. It was a full-body pain like he’d never experienced before focused in his left leg, which he figured must be on fire.
Well, at least that means I’m not pink mist, he thought before he passed out.
Chapter Three
Pain.
All caps—P.A.I.N.
All the synonyms rolled through Owen’s aching brain over the course of the next few hours, days, and weeks.
Agony.
Torment.
Suffering.
And along with them … guilt, misery, despair.
The full fucking Monty.
As Owen lay staring up at the ceiling of the fourth hospital he’d been admitted to since the firefight—this one the VA in Lexington, near his hometown, post-millionth surgery to try to save his left leg—hot tears burned his still-healing face. Which pissed him off. Not only was he now an official amputee, but he was a crybaby on top of it all.
“Hey, I brought your favorite,” a deep, gravelly voice broke into his pity party. Owen swiped at his eyes, anger filling the places where sorrow had gouged deep, unfillable holes. Antony Love stood in the doorway, holding up a greasy brown bag. “The one and only barbecue pulled pork from the Love Pub kitchen. Slaw too.” He dropped the bag on Owen’s rolling table next to a full pitcher of water and an untouched plate of hospital slop that passed for lunch.
“Whatever,” Owen said. But his grumbling stomach gave him away. He watched as Antony set the food out for him, snagging several of the fried potatoes the Love Pub had perfected with a secret set of spices. Locals called them ‘crack fries’ and they had garnered national coverage in recent months, thanks to an article about ‘America’s Best Hidden Brewpubs’ in some fancy food magazine.
Owen picked up the sandwich and took a bite of the rich, tangy sauce combined with the warm, melt-in-your-mouth pork. He groaned in satisfaction even as the taste sent him hurtling back to his life before all this shit—before Paul got killed—when they’d eat this amazing food on a regular basis, usually sitting on beer kegs in the kitchen of the pub itself under the gaze of Lorenzo Love, Antony’s uncle who was in charge of the pub. When he regarded his empty hands, Owen was surprised that he’d eaten the thing so fast.
“I know, right?” Antony grinned at him and took another handful of crack fries. “I don’t know what we’d do without Susan. She’s turned that damn pub around in so many ways. You know, before she came on board, Daddy was ready to close the place down. But Uncle Lorenzo insisted that they re-invent it and appeal to the asshole hipsters that’ve overrun Lucasville, and he found himself the perfect chef.”
Owen grunted and devoured the rest of the fries before Antony could steal any more. “Wish I could have a beer,” he said, wiping his lips with a Love Pub labeled napkin. “But these pain meds …” He gestured toward the empty space in the bed where his lower left leg used to be.
Antony nodded but averted his eyes. “Rosie wants to visit and bring Jeff. That’s what she named her and Paul’s boy—Jeffrey Paul.”
Owen winced and tried to readjust his position in the bed. His ass was sore as hell from all the sitting around he’d been doing. “I’m not really in the mood for company, other than yours if you keep bringing me this kind of grub.” He closed the cardboard carton and tried to ignore how fast his pulse raced at the thought of seeing Rosie and Paul’s little boy in the flesh.
“Okay, maybe once you get your prosthetic, then.”
“Yeah. Okay. Whatever.” The thought of that particular torture made his gut churn and threaten to give back the delicious barbecue. The fittings and therapies had been exactly that—pure torture. He’d been fighting an infection at the time too, which hadn’t helped.
The darkness was closing in on him again. It had become a familiar theme. He’d spend a few hours each day feeling a modicum of hope that he might be able to live a normal life. Hell, they’d even said he could re-up once he’d adjusted to the fake leg. Then, out of the clear blue, depression would roll in like afternoon thunderheads, slow moving, ominous and pitch black. They kept trying to give him more medication for it—anti-anxiety, or anti-sadness, or some other anti—but he’d rejected them. He didn’t need any more chemical assistance. It was going to be hard enough weaning himself off the painkillers.
“Go on, beat it. I’m sure you have real work to do. I don’t need a fuckin’ babysitter.” He slumped down, closed his eyes, and ignored his friend until he was sure the man had left. Then the hot tears burned their way down his face once more.
His dreams were of beer, or more precisely, brewing beer. Something he’d spent years learning along with Dominic Love, one of Antony’s younger brothers. Antony and Dom’s father, Anton, had founded The Love Brothers Brewing Company with his brother well in advance of the craft beer craze that currently captured American fancy. He’d taught Dom and Owen both how to perfect batches of ales and lagers, how to refine strains of yeast, when to filter the final product, or not. Owen had adored the process, and he’d missed it these past years.
He jerked awake when he heard someone calling his name. Wiping the drool off his chin and trying to shake the vivid dream memories of water, malt, hops, and yeast, he rolled over and saw Rosie Norris, holding the hand of a solemn-looking little boy who was such the spitting image of his father, it made Owen shiver.
“Uh, I’m sorry. I’m not really at my best.”
Lindsay Love materialized in the doorway then, her familiar green eyes and freckled face like a balm to his rattled psyche. He sensed the darkness lurking on the periphery, but he fixed his eyes and concentration on Lindsay as she walked over and touched his face with one work-roughened hand.
“Oh, Owen. I’m so happy you’re home safe.”
He took in a ragged breath, ignoring Rosie and the kid for the moment. “Yeah. Thanks. Not so ‘sound’ though.” He touched his left knee. The lack of leg below it hurt. It hurt like a motherfucker, and that made him honestly believe he was insane. Even though phalanxes of doctor types had assured him that phantom pain was normal.
“Antony tells me you’re gonna have a prosthetic this time tomorrow, and they’re discharging you. I’m here to tell you that you should plan on staying with us for a while. Until you get yourself sorted out.”
He blinked. The concept of getting sorted out, of getting discharged after the long months he’d spent lying around in hospital beds, had not occurred to him. Anxiety gripped his throat. It must have shown on his face because Lindsay leaned in close and put her hand alongside his scruffy cheek. “It’s all right, honey. You’re home now, and everything will be all right.”
He squeezed his eyes shut, determined once and for all to stop the damn girlie weeping. But in the face of kindness from one of the two women in his life who’d shown him nothing but during his chao
tic growing-up years, he felt like he’d been shoved back to that life. Never knowing which, if either, of his shitty parents would be around. If they’d remember he needed to eat, and that he’d grown out of his clothes and required new ones.
“Thanks,” he croaked out. “I hadn’t really given much thought to next steps, I guess.”
“Well, then that’s settled.” Lindsay pressed her lips to his forehead, then stood up and shouldered her purse.
Of all the things he valued about her, his favorite was the matter-of-fact way she’d taken care of him. No big deal that he’d ended up sharing clothes with Antony and Kieran, Antony’s next closest younger brother. No problem at all adding a seventh mouth to feed three or four times a week. Paul’s mother Janice was no different. Between them, the two women more or less adopted him, treating him as if he were their own flesh and blood.
But his sense of being a stray, a mongrel runt puppy, never truly left him no matter how much energy Lindsay, and Anton through his non-commentary on the fact of a spare grungy kid at his dinner table, spent convincing him otherwise.
“Come on over here, Jeff, and let me introduce you to someone,” she said, startling him. Lindsay took the little boy’s hand and tugged him forward. Rosie stayed back, silently gnawing on the side of her fingernail, her eyes brimming with tears. The kid’s gaze was fixed on the empty spot in the bed where Owen’s left lower leg should be. Owen couldn’t tear his gaze away from Jeff’s mini-Paul face, complete with the cow-licked hair. The silence spun out longer than it should have.
“Where’d your leg go, mister?” Jeff demanded.
“Jeffrey Paul,” Rosie said, grabbing him and hiking him up to her hip. “You mind your manners.”
“No, it’s fine. It’s a good question.” Owen flipped the hospital sheet back to reveal the gauze covering the stump below his knee. “I’m not sure, little dude, but maybe a monster snatched it.”
Jeff gasped and wrapped his arms around his mother’s neck. But after a second or two, he leaned toward the bed, fascinated by the concept of a leg-eating monster. Brave little shit, Owen mused with a legit smile. Like his daddy.
“You can touch it,” he said when Rosie took a step away as Jeff leaned over farther as if he wanted to crawl into the bed with Owen to study the missing limb a little closer. The pain sensation lingered, but the kid was distracting him, so he smiled at the boy as he softly patted the gauze. “Wow,” Jeff said, leaning back against his mother’s neck.
“Yeah. That’s one way to put it.” Owen covered up his stump. “Good to see you, Rosie,” he said, his voice cracking a little. “I’m … I’m so sorry—”
Rosie shook her head. “You have nothing to be sorry about, so don’t apologize to me.” A single tear slid down her pretty face. She wiped it away, put Jeff on the floor, and then pulled her curly brown hair up in a ponytail. “I’m glad you’re okay. Someday, eventually, I’ll want to hear about … it. But not today.”
He nodded, his throat too tight for words. Antony appeared in the door, and Jeff ran up to him. “Let’s go fix a car!”
Antony chuckled and hoisted the kid up and onto his shoulders. For a moment, Owen was confused by the odd sight. Antony Love was the last man he’d figure for some little boy’s favorite uncle. He was gruff, a grumpy old man early in his life thanks to the blows he’d been dealt. Hell, he hadn’t been able to raise his own daughter after his wife’s fatal accident. Lindsay and Anton had taken her in, too.
Rosie patted his shoulder. “I’m fine. It’s fine. I mean, it sucks, but we’re …” She looked over her shoulder at her son on Antony’s shoulders, and her smile made Owen’s confusion take a turn toward the unhappy. “We’ll be all right. You get that leg all set, and we’ll see you at Missus Love’s tomorrow night for dinner. Antony said he’s picking you up.”
“Uh, yeah.” He plucked at his sheet. His confusion continued to morph into a strange kind of anger. The darkness took that as a high sign and began rolling across his horizon, booming and chuckling under its breath.
His chest tightened, and his heart pounded hard, echoing in his ears. When he looked up at them again, Rosie had moved to stand next to Antony, and he had an arm around her shoulders. Lindsay was standing and smiling at him as if whatever the hell was going on between her son and the wife of her son’s best friend wasn’t happening right under her nose.
He opened his mouth, but before something utterly ridiculous came out of it, a nurse bustled in. “We’ll go now,” Lindsay said. “I’m making your favorite dinner for tomorrow night, Owen. Meatloaf, mashed potatoes, green beans, and key lime pie for dessert.” Lindsay blew him a kiss. He blinked, still wrapping his clanging brain around the fact of Antony … with Rosalee Norris. What in the name of God was the man thinking?
He glared at his friend, who smiled at him and said, “See you at four tomorrow afternoon with your new hardware.”
Owen intensified his glare, but it didn’t faze Antony in the least. If he wasn’t mistaken, Rosie was leaning into Antony’s large torso, her face serene. Owen shut his eyes, willing them gone. When he opened them again, he had his wish. And the darkness had nearly smothered him once again.
Chapter Four
One Month Later
Owen kept his hands on his knees and his gaze on the windshield as Kieran Love drove him to yet another physical therapy session. The car’s interior was silent, and Owen didn’t care. He was exhausted in mind, body, and spirit after a solid month of endless therapies, medication withdrawals, and the bizarre realities that now inhabited his formerly familiar, small-town life.
For one thing, Kieran Love even being here, driving him anywhere. The guy had been a member of a Division One basketball team that won the NCAA tourney, not once but twice. After graduating, he’d played overseas a year and then landed a contract with the Miami Heat. But he’d shattered his knee in a sickening, freak accident on the court on live television in his rookie season. So, here he was, back home, flopping around, getting PT alongside Owen and feeling about as sorry for himself.
Owen glanced over Kieran’s profile. He’d inherited the coloring of his mother’s family—the Halloran Irish red hair, freckles, green eyes. But he was the tallest of the four brothers, and the most naturally talented athlete, although all of them played sports in high school and most of them met on Sundays for a pick-up basketball game after church and lunch.
“So,” Owen said, feeling a need to make something resembling conversation, “Cara gonna be there today?”
Kieran shot him a patented ‘fuck you and the horse you rode in on’ Love-family glare.
Owen grinned at him. The fact that Kieran’s high school sweetie had ended up back in Lucasville as a physical therapist after dumping him in college and moving for a while up to Michigan was a sore spot for him—to put it mildly. Unable to resist, since it distracted him from his own misery pit, Owen poked at it a bit more. “She looks good. Especially with that big fat rock of a diamond.”
Kieran slammed on the brakes, nearly pitching Owen into the dash headfirst. “You know what?” he said, his voice soft, which was a clear indication of his anger. Kieran didn’t fly off the handle like Antony or the wild-ass Dominic, but when he was pissed, you’d best cover your nuts. “You can shut the fuck up right about now.” He sat, white-knuckling the wheel. “And you can stop being so goddamned righteously outraged about Antony and Rosie too. It’s gettin’ old.”
Owen sucked in a breath and gathered the tattered remnants of his self-righteousness regarding Antony’s apparent relationship with their dead friend’s widow around him.
“Whatever,” he mumbled, sinking down into the seat, his still-unfamiliar metal leg-like thing smacking against the glove box.
“No, I mean it, Owen. You sit around and glare at them as if they were doing something wrong. They’re not. They leaned on each other, relied on each other to get through the last four and a half years, and you need to get the fuck over yourself. I mean, if you wanted Rosie, signing
on for a double tour then turning yourself into some kind of a fucked up, rogue soldier dumbass was a funny way of showing it.”
“I wasn’t a soldier. I was a Marine,” he huffed, hating the sound of his own voice. “I wanted…I needed to do something for Paul. So, I started killing the enemy as opposed to sitting around and waving at them across demarcation lines. So what?”
“Yeah, so what? And look where it got you.” Kieran stared down at the crazy device that passed for Owen’s lower left leg these days. “Mama told me you haven’t been going to your other therapies.”
Owen snorted. “I don’t need any head shrinker to make me talk about my shitty childhood. The only reason I didn’t die of starvation or worse was your own parents, and you know it. Why should I want to dig all that shit up? Fuck psychology. I’m fine.” He rapped on the metal where his tibia had once been. “Fine and fucking dandy.”
“Right,” Kieran said, pulling back into traffic. “Well, I will tell you this. If you bring up Cara Cooper and that big rock on her finger again, I’m shoving you out into the road and driving away. Got me?”
“No problem. I’m leaving soon anyway.”
“What? Why? Where are you going?” Kieran turned into the parking lot at the strip mall that housed their physical therapy location.
“Got a job,” Owen said, happy to get it out in the open. He simply couldn’t stand it here anymore. Lindsay and Janice’s hovering was making him insane. Dominic’s insistence that he come and ‘hang out’ at the brewery, where he’d been so happy once, made him want to punch holes in the wall. And the whole thing with Antony and Rosie made him physically ill—even though he couldn’t give a single logical reason why.
He had to leave all of it behind, once and for all.
“Oh,” Kieran said, putting the car in park and turning off the engine. “Probably for the best, then.” He stared at Owen. Owen stared back. Kieran was the peace-making brother in the family of rowdies and bold personalities. But his back was up over this Cara thing. Owen sighed.