by A. C. Bextor
Chase finally stands, albeit slowly. He doesn’t move quickly, holding his left side with care before taking one step and then another in my direction.
The light gives me a glimpse of his frame, and my stomach’s urgency to revolt becomes overwhelming. I clutch my purse tightly and look away from his heavily bruised and severely cut face. I close my eyes to fight against memorizing his beaten body.
“Wren?” he calls quietly, sensing my stress and tossing his joint to the floor before stepping on it. “Wren, I’m so sorry,” he says. “So, so sorry.”
Once gathering courage to face him again, I take in all that’s been done.
His right eye is gashed and swollen shut. A severe cut above it is leaking blood and pus. His cheek has already changed colors to slight mixes of bruising, and his bottom lip is split and spread open near its edge, a mix of old and new blood trickling down his chin. His shirt is torn at the neck and his jeans look as though he’s slept in mud.
When I start to approach, he tenses and takes a small step back. My hand reaches out to touch his wounds. Unsure how I can help, if I even want to help, I stop at his whimper in pain.
“Chase, what’s happening?” I question, my voice breathy and unsure.
“I fucked up,” he replies, his tone sad, scared, and sounding so alone.
Grabbing the top of his cap, I pull gently to remove it. It resists mid-pull and won’t come off. Chase hisses as the blood matted to the material sticks to his hair.
Stepping closer, he growls in pain once I’ve finally freed it. I can’t make out the full extent of his injuries because he straightens his pose. He doesn’t want me getting a closer look at any other damage he’s accrued.
“Tell me what happened,” I softly demand.
“I lost the game.”
“The game?”
“Yes. A fuckin’ card game, Wrennie. I lost.”
I clench my fists and my anger for all he’s ever done begins to erupt.
“You’re gambling again You said you wouldn’t. You said you learned your lesson. You said you didn’t want to lose ties to me completely.”
“I needed the money.”
All the hurt and anger I’ve felt at Chase’s hand comes forward. It doesn’t matter that he’s hurt. Beaten. Defeated.
I shove him as hard as I can, and Chase takes two steps back while stringing an utter of curses. “You don’t need the money that badly, and you don’t need it the way you’re trying to get it! You were doing okay, Chase.”
“Wren, I haven’t been okay since you left me.”
My heart jumps at his insinuation. Chase has never said anything along the lines of an apology for what happened between us. Now he’s attempting to place blame. If this is his play, he’s chosen not only the wrong time but the wrong girl.
“Saint’s wanted their money back. I didn’t have it, and well—”
“You’re an idiot.”
“Not now, Wren. I don’t need your shit.”
“How much did you borrow?”
Chase hesitates before whispering, “A couple grand.”
My stomach twists while I use all my energy to remain standing. Looking up into the eyes of repeated betrayal, I state, “I won’t ask Ed for help again. Chase, these men—”
“You don’t have to ask Ed for shit, Wren,” he snaps. “Saint’s said we were even.”
Releasing a breath of air, I repeat, “They said you were even?”
The threatening way those men spoke to me tells me I must be missing something.
Chase points to his face and sneers, though he has no right to be angry with me. “I paid with my blood, Wren. They called us even.”
Thank God!
My house is in shambles. My possessions have been destroyed. My life was threatened. And Chase was hurt. But thankfully, I won’t be taken as collateral for a man I can hardly stand the sight of.
Thank you, Jesus.
Now he needs to go.
Putting his head down, he grabs the hat from my hand and bends to quickly kiss my cheek. The warm trickles of his blood dot my skin. I feel those same marks simmer against my flesh as he backs away. Without another word, Chase reaches around me to shut off the light, leaving me in the dark.
I have no more energy to argue.
Standing alone in the blackened pit of my home, I’m hardly able to catch a breath. Sitting on the floor near the door, I snatch a broken picture frame that holds a now-tattered picture of Chase and me together. It was taken right after we first met.
So long ago.
“Someone better be dying or close to it if you’re calling me at this hour, Liam.” Mike’s voice is raspy with sleep.
Before offering a response, I take another drink from my tumbler of scotch. The burn it leaves doesn’t assuage the burn from hating the shadow of Chase Avery still in Wren’s life, along with spending yesterday afternoon with a man named Thanatos.
“No one’s dying. But I am calling because I need your help.”
I hear what sounds like Mike climbing out of the warm bed he shares with his wife. He fumbles around, cursing quietly. Moments pass before I hear Mary’s equally sleepy voice come through the line at a distance.
After soothingly hushing her worry, he comes back to prod, “What’s going on?”
“I need you to do something for me. This is a personal favor, and it’s important it’s done quietly.”
He smiles through his words as he jokingly promises, “Anything you need, but I’ll tell you, if this has anything to do with that family of yours, I’ll need a promise that I get to keep all my limbs. My legs work just fine as they are—unbroken.”
His point is valid, but I reassure, “The favor has nothing to do with Ciro. It has to do with the woman I mentioned last week.”
“By all means,” he revels, as I knew he would. “And you’re ready to tell me about her?”
“Mike,” I warn.
He chuckles. “Fine. What’s on your mind?”
Not giving him a chance to rib me further, I state the facts as I know them. “Wren Adler. She’s a waitress at Ed’s Diner. She’s twenty-three.”
“Adler,” he repeats. “The name doesn’t sound familiar.”
“Our relationship is new.” I hate the way it sounds. Wren and I aren’t new to each other, per se.
“You’re taking a lot of interest in a new relationship, Liam. You sure that’s all this is?”
“Yes,” I lie. “No,” I correct.
“You care about her. This is good. Did you call me at this hour to ask me to do a background check?”
Fuck. Looking up at the clock over the stove, he has a point. It’s nearly 4 a.m.
“It’s not really her I’m concerned about but the man she used to live with.”
“She has a crazy man in her life, doesn’t she?”
“They haven’t been together for a while, but he still contacts her often. And I’d like him gone. As in for good.”
“How often?”
“Too often. So, before pushing him to leave her alone, I’d like more information on who he is exactly.”
“You want leverage against him,” Mike assumes.
“Yes.”
“You think the woman needs help getting rid of him? Did she ask for that?”
“Yes and no.”
He sighs. I hear the door to his backyard open, then the flick of a lighter. “Think he hurt her at all?”
Wren’s fiery temper comes to mind. No way would she allow a man to harm her. Not without her fighting back until the death.
To keep it simple, I reply, “No.”
“She mention anything to you that would lead you to believe he’s no good?”
Mike’s flurry of pertinent questions I hadn’t asked myself makes me second-guess my reasons for doing this. Then I remember the crazed look in her man’s eyes when he came to the diner and how much I hated him for being so close to her in his unhealthy and unstable mental state.
“He uses.”
>
“A lot of people use drugs. Young and old. You’re a doctor, Liam. You see this shit every day, so you know the problem exists more than most.”
“Chase Avery,” I tell him, hoping like hell he hasn’t heard of him either.
The silence on his end, though, says more than his words.
“Mike? What is it?”
“Chase Avery is a punk, and fuck all if he’s not a punk trouble constantly follows.”
“I think I knew that,” I reply, still envisioning the way said punk treated Wren and how she accepted it as if she always had.
“I can make some calls this week and get back with you.”
“Anything you can do.”
“You’ll owe me,” he assures. “I mean, you’ll owe Myles an overnight stay with Uncle Liam. Time away with the wife would be good payback. It’s been a while.”
“Sure,” I halfheartedly agree. “I’ll take him to Ciro’s mansion. He can ride horses and—”
“Your jokes aren’t funny at this hour. But joking about your quack of an uncle is never funny.”
Letting the fear of my family go, I press, “Do you need Wren’s home address? I have it.”
“You have it on you?”
“I do,” I reply, pulling out the address Pete had given me. He’s taken Wren home from work a few times and told me her home wasn’t a safe place for her to be.
The back door of his house closes. A few seconds pass and I hear papers shuffling around him, then the scratch of his jaw.
“Let me have it. May not need it, but anything you give me will help.”
After I ramble off the address, he curses quietly.
“You know where she lives?” I question, wondering how bad this situation could be.
He sighs again, this time heavier and with meaning. “Yeah, I do. It’s a trailer court and not in a good area. It’s riddled with fuckin’ crime and drugs, Liam.”
“She’s lived there a long time. I’d like to know more,” I explain, hoping now he understands.
“You could always ask her,” he suggests.
“She doesn’t seem to mind him coming around, Mike. But I do.”
“It’s possible you’re overreacting. But in case not, I’ll make it a priority.”
“Thank you.”
“Liam.” He sighs before asking, “If I told you I didn’t like this, you getting involved in any of this, would you listen?”
“No.” I’m honest.
Her physical address means nothing. I knew that the first time I met her at the diner. She doesn’t belong in a trailer with unsteady doors paired with broken windows. There’s more to her life than what she’s accepting it to be.
“Shit, okay. I’ll ask around tomorrow.”
“Get some sleep. And apologize to Mary and Myles for me.”
Taking the phone from my ear, I hear his “fuck” before I disconnect the call without further debate.
Then I make my way back to bed.
Killian’s mind is heavy and his heart is torn.
Nearly a week has passed since his middle-of-the-night phone conversation with Ciro, then in turn his warning to Vlad. He’s weighed many decisions and tried to gather any other avenues to pursue than the one he’s facing now.
Erlina had returned from visiting her family in Dublin late last night. As it always does, her presence has eased some of this worry. But not all.
She stands, leaning her small hip against the kitchen counter wearing the worn-out red fleece robe she’s always loved and refuses to throw out.
Tilting her head to the side, she turns to him and observes, “You’re exhausted, Killian. Why don’t you go back to bed? I’ll bring breakfast to you when it’s ready.”
Killian shakes his head. “I’ve missed you, Lina. I’ll stay in here with you. I’m fine.”
She places the spoon she’d been holding on the countertop, and Killian watches his wife of forty-one years smile softly before walking to him with the same grace she’s always carried. Carefully. Soothingly. With understanding, practice, and ease.
“There’s something you’re not telling me. What is it?” she questions.
Internally, Killian begs her not to push. Protecting one another from troubling news has always been their way, family business or otherwise. The Irish king can’t imagine not having had her with him all these years. She’s always been his anchor, his rock to lean on during unsteady times such as this one.
Smoothing his wife’s long blonde but graying hair, Killian hesitates before admitting, “Ciro is up to something. He called while you were away.”
“Oh?” she probes, moving to sit on his lap. Another of her comforting ways.
“The conversation with him was disturbing. He’s asked for my support.”
Erlina says nothing, but her apparent disgust at hearing any allegiance to be paid to Ciro says more than she could anyway.
“I’m not sure I’m making the right decision, but I need to do something.”
“You know what needs done. Killian, love, we both do.”
Killian takes his gaze from his wife, knowing she’s right but also realizing once the call is made it threatens all he’s worked to prevent. Maybe this time death won’t touch their lives as it has before. They’ve nothing left to take, being that both sons have paid the price for these same kinds of decisions he’s been forced to make in the past. Now Killian is wiser and does all he can to live his life in quiet peace.
“If I do this, Erlina, I’ll have to send you back to Ireland. I won’t have you here if things—”
She rests her delicate finger against his lips. Instantly, Killian quiets. If only he could calm her aching soul for the family she lost years ago with the same gentle touch.
“I’ll do whatever you ask. We both know my family would be happy to have me home so soon again, but I must say….” She pauses, her eyes searching his. “But maybe it’s time we both find our way home, Killian. Dublin has changed so much since you last came with me for a visit.”
Killian admits to himself that if she’d have asked this of him before Ciro’s call, it would’ve felt like a welcome opportunity, not a cowardly escape. Throughout their golden years, he’s thought of doing just as she’s suggesting. But now that the dangerous doors to Ciro’s empire have been reopened, he can’t believe Erlina would truly want him to turn his back on those innocent people who are in line to suffer if he were to decide to turn tail and run.
Not to mention leaving Liam in the midst of it all.
“Call him,” she urges. “He’s been a friend to you. To us both.”
“He has, but it’s been years since we’ve last spoken. I’m sure my call will come as a surprise. I may no longer be welcome in his life.”
“Darling, that man has lived with his own personal loss because of Ciro, too. He’s suffered as we all have.”
Killian knows Erlina speaks the truth. Ciro’s thirst for supremacy has most assuredly taken from each family—namely from his own.
“You’re tired,” Erlina insists. “You should rest.”
Standing, she takes both his hands in hers and helps him from his chair. Killian bends to kiss her cheek first, then whispers the same gratitude she’s heard since the day they were married. “Thank you for the peace you give me.”
Erlina reaches over to grab his phone, then takes his hand. She places the phone in his palm before touching his cheek and carefully ordering, “Let me finish breakfast, and then we’ll talk about what to do next.”
Liam 8:34 p.m. Pack a bag. I promise I’ll make this up to you.
With Pete’s illness, my work schedule, and Liam’s, I’ve only seen him a couple of times and it’s been quick exchanges. A few calls, texts, and promises of another date have kept us looking at what’s to come. We were supposed to have one tonight, but because of work, he had to cancel.
However, starting tomorrow, Liam and I are both off for the entire weekend. We’re spending it at his place, and per his orders, we’re not leaving
. I didn’t complain; time alone with Liam, without any interruptions, sounds perfect.
“These are for you.” Georgia pushes the small brown paper bag adorned with a white rope handle at me. It’s from a well-known department store located in downtown Chicago. I’ve never shopped there, not because I wouldn’t but because my budget doesn’t have the room.
“What is this?”
Her big blue eyes smile. She pushes the bag further into my chests, claiming, “Ed insisted. He told me to pick something up for you while we were out shopping for the other kids. He preferred I buy you a coat, but we women need our luxuries more.”
We’re standing inside the door to my trailer. Georgia’s concerned eyes slowly move over each room one at a time, kitchen first. She doesn’t mask the worry wrinkle forming across her brow. After she takes in all that’s been broken, she sucks in her bottom lip.
I don’t want to explain what happened. If she knew what Chase has gotten himself into again, she’d find him before I could just to skin him alive. If that happens, I’ll miss my chance to do the same.
Her lips purse in obvious anger before her eyes roll back to mine. “I really don’t think you should stay here until you have that son of a bitch totally gone, Wren,” she insists. “It’s an icebox in here. Anyway, I bet Liam has a nice warm bed.”
“He does,” I assure, “but I want to talk to Chase. If he comes back to find everything gone, he’ll look for me. I don’t want him going to Liam or causing trouble with Ed.”
“Ed can handle himself. And if given the chance, he’d handle Chase once and for all.”
That’s what I’m afraid of.
“I’ll talk to Chase, and then it’ll be done.”
“Yes. You tell that little shit goodbye for good.”
“Georgia.”
“Fine, fine.” She pouts, lifting her arms in surrender. “I’ll shut up.”
“Thank you.”
“Where’d the rat run off to, anyway? He should be here helping you clean up the mess I’m sure he made.”