“Wherever you need me to be. Tell me where to go and you can explain while I’m on the way.”
I plug one ear so I can hear her over the crash of the waves. The sliding door opens, and Evan steps out, rumpled and so damn gorgeous, it takes my breath away. She’s wearing my t-shirt and a tiny pair of underwear, and even in the midst of Ithaca’s crisis, I feel a pull for her so strong it floors me.
Remy? she mouths in my direction, her face controlled and neutral, but I shake my head and mouth back, Ithaca.
She holds up one finger, her blue eyes wide, and whirls back into the house. I’m trying to listen to Ithaca’s jittery, broken story, told through a few rounds of disjointed sobs, but all I really care about is the address and getting there as fast as possible. My little sister never cries, and, as bad as any girl’s tears rip me up, hers are a swift kick to the back of my knees.
Evan runs back out with my wallet and her purse, her dress thrown on and my shirt shoved at me. She drops my shoes at my feet, and we run to the car. I feel a relief like I’ve never known.
Truth to be told, even though I’ve faced down hurking guys and beat the piss out of them, every single time my family gets into shit, I’m gripped with a fear I’m embarrassed to fess up to. I have no clue what’s going to happen when I get to Ithaca’s fancy-ass private school. The thought that I might find her hurt or helpless fills makes my heart arrest in my chest.
But, for the first time, I don’t have to face all this on my own. I have Evan, cool as a fucking cucumber, setting up the GPS and asking if she needs to make any calls for me.
“I don’t know.” I do a quick scan for early-bird cops, and decide to take my chances and floor it. She doesn’t bat a gorgeous eyelash. “Ithaca is at her school, but it’s early. I don’t think there are any teachers or anything. I have no fucking idea what’s going on. All I know is that she’s panicked and she needs me.”
Evan’s nod is quick and tight. “We’ll be there in no time. She’s gonna be okay.”
It may be a load of horseshit, but it’s all I need to hear. I focus on driving. Evan is silent, but when I glance over, her face is determined, and I love that. I love the fight in her.
I’m barely stopped in the fancy ass parking lot when Evan leaps out and we both run, instinctively, to the area behind the sports fields, where it’s slightly wooded and overgrown. It’s the only place that’s shielded from adult eyes, so the only place a bunch of kids would go and manage to get in trouble without being seen right away.
The sound of fists pounding into faces is familiar enough to close my throat down. I leap through the brush and find a small group of young, preppy guys beating the piss out of each other. My idiot sister keeps jumping into the fray, only to get pushed back out by one of the cursing, bruised fighters.
Evan immediately grabs Ithaca, hooks her arms around her elbows and drags her, crying and screaming, away from the fight.
I rip two of the guys apart and hold them at arm’s length. I could bench press the two of them together, but they’re full of raging testosterone and adrenaline, so I get punched in the shoulder and kicked in the shin pretty damn hard before I manage to calm either one down.
“What the hell is going on?” I yell.
Three guys back up to the side that one of the hulking, growling toughnuts is on. The other guy, quieter, his face badly bruised, not wearing a pretty uniform, wipes a long trickle of blood from under his nose.
The private school boy starts mouthing off immediately. “This fucking punk—”
I shake the little jerk by the scruff of his neck. “Watch your damn mouth. Start over, and this time put that fancy education to work and use real words.”
His dark eyes drop, some of the bravado gone from his whole act.
“Sorry, uh, sir.” It must occur to him that he could be in deep shit, because he starts to wise up and use his manners real quick. “This, eh, he…I caught this guy prowling around my house the other night. There’ve been a bunch of thefts in our neighborhood, then I saw him here. I confronted him, and he went nuts.”
“Liar!” Ithaca lunges out of Evan’s arms, her light skin splotchy and pink, her blond hair knotted and stuck to her cheeks. “You are a liar, Rick! You accused him and threatened him when he never did a single thing! And then you all attacked him!” Her chest rises and falls and she points a shaking finger at them, her lips trembling with rage. “All of you. Like a pack of wild dogs.”
She spits the last words out, then her shoulders crumple.
The quiet guy makes a motion toward her, but I grip his shoulder hard and shake my head. He nods, but I can tell by the look on his face that seeing my sister upset is killing him.
It may be biased, but my alliance falls heavily and immediately with this guy.
“Rick Wong?” I squint at the kid who gave me the phony story. A red flush creeps up his face, like he’s been caught with his pants down. “Your family lives across the street from us.” He nods, but avoids eye contact. “Your dad has three pit-bulls and a security system. I wouldn’t worry about your precious shit getting stolen. Trust me, it’s all insured anyway.” I toss him back to his friends, and he gives a hard stare to the ground. One he doesn’t dare level my way. “This guy…what’s your name?”
I turn to the quiet kid, his dark eyes glued on my sister and wild with worry.
“Andre. Sir.” He shifts a look at the Wong kid and scowls, not about to be outdone.
I can’t help it. I immediately like this Andre kid.
“This guy, Andre, he’s none of your concern, you got that?” I shake Wong by the shoulder. “Hey! Look at me when I talk to you.” He lifts his eyes and nods. “And next time you think someone is doing something shady, handle it like a man and leave your little brute squad behind. There’s no reason for four of you to jump a guy just because he’s hanging around near your damn house.”
“Yes, sir.”
My piss-ant neighbor squirms under my look, and I’m sure there’re a thousand things he wants to tell me to stick a thousand places. But he doesn’t.
“You mess with my man Andre again, I’ll beat the piss out of you. And your gang. And I don’t give a shit who your daddy is. Now get the hell out of my sight, and I better not hear a word about you being a little asshole again.”
I dismiss him with a shove, and they scuttle away, muttering shit under the breath and throwing looks over their shoulders when they’re far enough away that I can’t catch any of them.
“Dre!” my sister wails and flings herself at her beat-up hero.
His arms hang by his sides, his eyes fixed nervously on me. I let go of his arm and nudge him forward, feeling weird about seeing my baby sister wrapped around some hooligan.
And I know the kid’s a hooligan because it takes one to know one. The fact that I like him off the bat is a bad sign.
He runs a hand over my sister’s hair, untangling pieces and pushing them away from her face. “It’s okay, babe. It’s fine. I could have taken them.”
She raises one hand to his bloodied nose and cut lip, and chokes on a sob. I seriously have no idea what to think of this whole scene.
Evan walks over to me, the back of her hand brushing the back of mine. I thread my fingers through hers and hold tight. Her face turns toward mine, and she flashes a secret smile.
“Young love?” she asks lowly.
My sister is throwing herself at the kid, who’s gently pushing her back and eying me with an anxious look that, I’m sure, is his attempt to communicate that he doesn’t want any part of her PDA.
Not in front of me anyway.
“Too young. And that kid isn’t good enough for Ithaca.” I narrow my eyes and Andre puts both of his hands on my sister’s shoulders and speaks to her in low, urgent tones.
“Stop scaring him.” Evan chuckles. “Look at them. So in love. Do you remember your first love?”
She leans her head on my shoulder and I can smell the sweet burned candy smell.
I
pull her into my arms and look her in the eye. “Remember it? I’m living it right now.”
She jerks back and crushes her eyebrows together, like she doesn’t quite believe what I said.
“Your ex? The one your family talked about like you guys were engaged?”
“I’ve loved one girl. That’s you, Evan Lennox.”
She steps back, looking at the ground and shaking her head like she can’t put into words whatever it is that’s running through her head.
Andre clears his throat loudly. I look away from Evan and see that my sister is seriously pouting.
“Um, I think it would be a good idea if Ithaca went back to class. She’s worried about me making it home okay. Could I maybe get a ride with you guys?”
“I am not going to sit in class with those assholes. I’m telling my mother that I want to switch schools.” Ithaca wipes the last few tears from under her clear green eyes. “I want to go with you.”
Andre murmurs something to her, but she shakes her head and stamps her foot. “No! I’m tired of sneaking around, Andre! I don’t care anymore. I don’t.”
Evan looks at me with raised eyebrows, and I sigh. I was looking forward to a long day rolling around in bed with my gorgeous girlfriend. It figures the one time my brother manages to stay out of trouble, my baby sister jumps waist-high into some damn star-crossed love fiasco.
“Go to school,” I tell my sister. “I’ll take him home, make sure he’s got an icepack on his face and takes a few aspirin. He’ll be good as new before you can sneak out with him again.”
I nod at Andre, who looks a little anxious, but tries to brush it off and act tough in front of my sister.
“I’m not going.” Ithaca plants her feet and squares her chin, and I have to bite back the world’s biggest sigh. She’s a stubborn, spoiled brat, and she’s about to unloose all her aggravating mule-headed stupidity on me; I’m getting the beginnings of a migraine just thinking about how this will go down. “Why isn’t she in school?”
“She has a name,” I bite back, not about to let her little tantrum make Evan feel like shit.
My wildly rude sister backs down. “Sorry. Why isn’t Evan at school?”
“Mine and my girlfriend’s plans aren’t your business,” I counter. Ithaca kicks the toe of her dressy little shoe into the dirt with ferocious energy. “Look, you’re in hot water. You should be begging me not to tell Mama all this, and don’t even get me started on our old man. You know the rules.”
Her kick moves past ferocious and onto borderline criminally insane.
“I hate the rules! I hate them! I’m not marrying some stupid guy from Hungary Pop knows we can keep some dumb company in the family. I’m tired of all of our family’s idiotic rules.” Her eyes are wide open, rolling wildly, and her hands are balled into fists. “I love Andre. I love him and there’s nothing anyone can say about it.”
Andre looks like he’s ready for the ground to open up and suck him deep into it. I try not to freak out over hearing my little sister declare her love for this guy. It’s all dramatics, as usual with her, and I know the best thing I can do is just ignore it.
“Alright, alright.” I hold up a hand. “Go wash up. Get to class. You can drop out and run away with your boyfriend tomorrow, alright? I’ll take him home. He needs his rest after getting his ass handed to him.” He makes a protesting noise, but I cut him off with a look he realizes means business. “I’ll give you ten minutes. Exactly. In ten minutes, I expect you,” I point to Andre, “in my car and you,” I point to my sister, “better have your ass in class.” She opens her mouth, but I cut in before she can argue. “Your other option is me calling Mama and Andre’s parents. If he’s not in the car in ten minutes, I get on the phone.”
I grab Evan’s hand, and we walk slowly back to my car. She squeezes my hand tight.
“You’re a good brother.”
“Don’t count on that.” I look at her sidelong and feel a lump in my throat, because I have a feeling Evan isn’t going to like what I’m going to have to do to manage this situation. “She’s too attached to that kid already. I’m sure he’s a nice guy and all, but she’s not ready to be that serious. And he would never be accepted by my family.” Evan’s mouth swings open, but I push ahead, dragging her along. “I know it’s harsh. But I can see how this will all pan out. I gotta do what I do.”
“What is that again?” Her voice is low and accusatory.
She tries to pry her hand away, but I hold tighter.
“I do what needs to be done.”
I don’t want her to see what I’m about to do, because I know it’s going to look cruel, but in the end? In the end, it’s a quick, painless way to do away with something that would otherwise drag on to its inevitably bitter, painful end.
“What needs to be done?” She turns her head, her dark hair whipping into her face with the rising wind. “They’re two kids in love. What exactly needs to be done?”
“My family won’t approve. They’ll drive Andre away, and it will wind up a big, messy thing. Ithaca will wind up hurting more. Even if my family did approve, the girls in my family don’t date until the parents allow it. Ithaca has to focus on school and her future. Not this guy.”
Evan looks at me, her eyes bright with fury.
“This guy?” she repeats, throwing my words back at me. “So, if someone doesn’t meet the Youngblood standards, they just get thrown to the side?” Her voice shakes, and she twists hard to get away from me.
“Evan.” I pull her close, run a finger along her jaw and try to meet her eyes, but she keeps them to the side. Her nostrils flare from her deep, angry breaths. “This isn’t about me and you. I don’t care what they think of you, okay? We’re different, okay?”
She shakes her head, whipping her dark hair.
“No. Not okay. Not okay at all. How, exactly, am I different than Andre?” she asks, her voice a knife staking in my ribs over and over with every bitter word. “I mean, I’m a little older. A little more refined. Maybe I’m the right color?”
“It’s not like that,” I grind out. “Remy’s daughter is half African-American. We have no problems with that…”
“Oh, I’m sorry, I didn’t know,” she cuts in. “I didn’t get the Youngblood handbook. I have no idea what’s good enough for you and your family. I would assume I’m not. Andre’s not. Who meets your standards anyway? And who the hell are all of you to have these standards?”
I try to slow her down, quiet her, but she slaps my hands away and points a finger at me.
“No! No, I will not be quiet about this! Last night, I thought for a few minutes that we could be together in spite of your crazy family. That maybe we had a chance. But no one has a chance, do they? And I get it, okay, I get it! Andre and Ithaca are just kids in love. They’d probably break up in a few months over something dumb anyway. That isn’t my point.” She gasps a breath in and bites her lip. “That isn’t my point.” Her words come out shaky and sad. “What chance do we really have? Tell me the truth, Winch. Because I love you so much. I do. But is this just you dragging out the inevitable? Because if you know we won’t last anyway, tell me and we’ll end it now.”
She looks back at Ithaca and Andre, twisted around each other, kissing like it’s the last time they’ll ever see each other.
And I choke on that thought. Because I realize that my sister knows me. And she probably realizes, somewhere deep down, that this is the last time she’ll see this guy she thinks she loves so completely.
“Evan, you’re overreacting. You and me—”
“Is there?” she interrupts. “I thought there was. I think there is. And then there’s not. This entire time, you and me, we’ve always just been a pipedream, haven’t we, Winch? Tell me.” Her voice is thick and her eyes are full of tears.
“No.” I hold her at the shoulders hard. “We’re not. We’re different.”
She shakes her head. “Impossible.” She points back at my sister and her boyfriend. “Tell me. Tel
l me your super sensible plan for those kids.”
I swallow hard, ashamed again about what being me entails. About the decisions I have to make.
But I have to. I have to make these decisions, and they’re not easy, and I don’t always like to do any of it, but I have to.
“I’ll offer him a couple thousand, enough to make life easy on him for a while, and then tell him that he’s banned from seeing her again. He won’t want the money, cause he’s a good kid, but I’ll make him take it for his mom or grandma or whoever he cares about. He’ll feel guilty. He’ll be scared. If he comes around again, I’ll scare him off. He’ll leave her alone, and my parents will find someone who will make her happy in the long run.”
She’s shaking her head, her eyes squeezed shut.
I reach out to her, but she smacks my hand away.
“I know,” I plead, begging her to understand. “It seems harsh. It seems mean. It’s what’s best, Evan. It’s how my family does things.”
“It’s the most disgusting thing I’ve ever heard,” Evan says quietly, her head bowed, her arms crossed tight over her chest. “You’ve lived around it for so long, it’s the way you think now. You don’t even question it. But you justify an awful lot for them. There’s no way…” She looks up at me, her eyes brimming with tears that spear at my heart. “There’s no way you actually believe this is a good thing. Are you that brainwashed?”
I hate that Evan is quietly crying. I hate that my sister is looking across the field, her hand pressed to her mouth. I hate that Andre is walking towards me like a gladiator about to enter the arena, and I’m the monster he’s got to fight.
I hate that I have to do what I have to do.
I hate that they can’t see the situation for what it is. That they’re all blaming me for doing what’s expected of me, the job no one else will take. I hate that my family put me in this position.
We get into the car, Evan silent with fury, Andre silent with resignation, me silent with frustration. Evan speaks first.
“I understand that you’re going to do what you think is right, Winch. But I have to, too. Drop me at my grandparents’ house. I can’t be around you right now.”
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