Fight for Me: The Complete Collection

by Jackson, A. L.

  “I’m really proud of you, you know?”

  Light laughter escaped. “It’s about time, isn’t it? Here I am thirty and barely figuring out what I want to do with my life.”

  Funny how things were supposed to be coming together and every piece of me felt as if it were descending into disorder.

  The apartment.

  Brenna.

  The internship.

  And somehow staying with Ollie felt just as big as all of that.

  Maybe bigger.

  This was Ollie, we were talking about.

  My great big world.

  He had taken that world from me for so long, and now I felt as if I was stumbling through it in the darkness.

  I chose not to tell my sister any of those things. She didn’t need to be fretting over me when she had her family to care for. To worry for.

  The important things in life.

  She glanced over at me as she started to make gravy in a skillet. I wasn’t joking when I said I’d come around here diggin’ up dinner. My baby sister knew how to cook. “Mama is so happy you’re getting ready to graduate.”

  My chest tightened with a smidge of pride. “She’s always worrying about me. I think she keeps forgetting I’m thirty.”

  Sammie laughed under her breath. “That’s because Mama thinks she’s still thirty.”

  Standing at the stove, she looked back at me, concern in her eyes. “I’m worried about how she’s handling Gramma falling ill, moving in with her to be her full-time caretaker. That’s gotta be hard, seeing her own mama like that.”

  So many emotions raced through me at the thought, I didn’t know how to make sense of them.

  My grandma who’d always been so alive and strong.

  The summers we’d spent running in and out of her house, the screen door slamming shut as we came and went.

  “It has to be the hardest thing any of us ever go through, watching our mother’s fall ill. God, I can’t stand seeing it with Gramma. Every time I go over there, it breaks my heart a little more.”

  She nodded through the somberness of it. That cycle of life we’d give anything to stop but never could. It didn’t matter how old my gramma was, my mama, my sister. There’d never be a time when I didn’t want to cling to them forever.

  “At least Uncle Todd is back in town to help around the house. That will hopefully take away some of the stress,” I said.

  From behind, Sammie’s spine stiffened, and I could have sworn I saw her knees sway, losing balance.

  “Sammie . . . you okay?”

  She nodded. “Of course. Just . . . hate the thought of Gramma being sick.”

  Just then, the speaker on the baby monitor crackled. A tiny, rattling cry came through, and I slid off the counter. “Let me get her.”

  “That’d be nice,” Sammie said with a gracious smile, though I couldn’t shake the feeling something was suddenly off.

  I headed down the hall and eased open the door to Penelope’s room, which was adorable with its hearts and elephants everywhere.

  My chest filled.

  So full.

  Almost too full.

  The feeling only came stronger as I looked down at my niece, who was flailing one fist while trying to shove the other into her tiny mouth. Somehow, she had kicked free of the blanket and was wiggling around, making the sweetest sounds.

  I couldn’t help but echo them back. “Hey, Angel,” I whispered, scooping her into my arms. “How’s my sweet, sweet girl? Auntie Nik has been missing you.”

  I hugged her to my chest and kissed the top of her head, whispering against her crown. “So much.”

  She cooed, scratched her sharp little nails in my chin as she fisted at my skin.

  Was it wrong the little thing made me ache?

  It wasn’t like I was old. But I still felt that time slipping away. A piece of me missing that I’d always assumed would just be there one day.

  I could swill wine with my friends and laugh all my nights away. Give back the best I could, live and embrace who I was.

  I’d be happy.

  That didn’t mean something wouldn’t be missing.

  Maybe it only seemed fitting it was tucked right down in that place with all those pieces that’d gone missing long ago.

  “Nik?”

  I startled with my sister’s voice coming from behind me.

  I spun around to find her standing in the doorway. There was something mournful in her expression. As if she’d just heard every single one of my thoughts as if I’d said them aloud.

  Or maybe I just saw it projected back, her face like a picture of mine.

  I pasted on a thin smile. “She’s so beautiful, Sammie. If I were you, I’d want to sit and rock her all day, too.”

  Sammie gazed at her daughter. “It’s funny, just looking at her makes me believe the world could be a better place.”

  Hugging the tiny thing to me, I kissed her temple.

  And I believed it, too.

  * * *

  Outside of my sister’s house, I sat in the driver’s side seat of my car in the darkness, holding the card Seth had given me between my fingers. With a shaky hand, I dialed the number.

  Two rings later, a scratchy voice came on the line. “Hello?”

  “Seth . . . it’s Nikki.”

  “Are you okay?” he rushed.

  I sucked in a breath, eyes darting through the windows, searching the shadows.

  The feeling of being watched sent chills crawling across my skin.

  No question, I was being paranoid, but I couldn’t seem to stop the dread clinging to me.

  I just couldn’t take the risk.

  “Yeah. I’m fine. I just . . . I have something I need to tell you, but I need you to promise you won’t tell Ollie.”

  12

  Ollie

  I snapped open the door to my nineteen fifties turquoise-blue Chevy truck to the sticky summer air.

  Birds flitted across the sky that was painted a bright, brilliant blue, and the lush, towering trees rustled in the gentle breeze blowing through.

  I stepped out onto the sidewalk and shut the door to the old truck, which was basically my prized possession.

  When I found it, it’d been rotting at the back of this old guy’s land, swallowed by weeds and pretty much rusted down to the metal bones.

  It was kind of my thing. Taking the dilapidated—the neglected and the failing—and doing my own sort of restoration.

  It was where I found my joy.

  Taking something that had been left for ruin and giving it a new life. A second chance when I wasn’t ever going to get one for myself.

  A certain sort of retribution. Like I was desperate to find something good buried in the rubble.

  My first love was my bar. Taking it from the ruin it’d been and breathing a new life into it.

  I took just as much pride in the cars I had restored at a local shop, Roke’s restorations, a garage I’d invested some money into when it had been threatened with going under.

  Hell, I’d invested in a few failing businesses around Gingham Lakes, wanting to see something good rise out of the dust.

  But the cars . . .

  I loved watching them going from completely rotted to immaculate.

  From a heap of junk to a priceless treasure.

  Guessed it was a whole lot easier to fall for material things than things made up of flesh and blood and spirit.

  Safer.

  But sometimes not falling proved itself impossible.

  Which was precisely the reason I was there today, driving this specific truck when I had five others to choose from in my garage.

  Because . . . Evan.

  The first time Kale had brought him to my place, the little boy had run through that garage like he’d gotten a lifetime pass to Disneyland and couldn’t wait to visit it every day.

  His big ol’ bug eyes had been nothing but excitement behind his thick-rimmed glasses as he’d gone from car to car. His fingertips ha
d traced the metal, and he’d sat behind the steering wheel of each car, pretending like he was flying down a racetrack.

  Kale hadn’t even protested when I’d let Evan climb onto one of my motorcycles.

  But this truck?

  It was his favorite.

  He’d claimed it as his on that big spiral-bound notebook he always carried around, jumping up and down as he’d shoved it toward my face to tell me just how much he loved it.

  Then he’d gone and left that ripped-out piece of paper on my coffee table so I wouldn’t forget.

  A light chuckle rippled out as I thought back to that day, to the way the kid had gotten right under my skin like he’d belonged there all along.

  The same way Frankie Leigh and Ryland had done.

  So, there I was, locking the door of that truck and reaching into the bed to snag the football I’d tossed back there for my little adventure to the park that sat smack-dab in the middle of our small city.

  Meeting up for a motherfucking play date.

  Talk about being a third wheel.

  Out of place.

  A damned fish out of water when this was the very pond I grew up in.

  Kale, Rex, and I had spent many an afternoon running the fields as kids, kicking up dirt, causing trouble the way we’d always liked to do.

  A couple of hours ago, I’d gotten a text from Rex to meet them there. I hadn’t even hesitated. I needed to get the hell out of my loft.

  Nikki’s scent had been stalking me like a fucking drug since the second I’d woken up.

  I could feel the fractures and splinters getting deeper and deeper. Cracking me open wide.

  My thoughts dangerous.

  My need dark.

  The last four days, we’d basically avoided each other, me grunting hellos and her offering timid, unsure smiles as she hightailed it out the door as quickly as she could, spending as little time within the walls of my apartment as possible.

  She’d be gone before I even woke in the morning and already fast asleep by the time I made it back upstairs after closing the bar.

  You’d think with the little amount I actually saw her, it wouldn’t be all that bad.

  Not true.

  I was constantly on edge. Need gliding across my flesh like the sharp edge of a knife.

  Lust and regret a bottomless pit in the well of my stomach.

  Worry this constant thud that banged inside of me.

  Seth still had no word on who might have broken into her apartment, and until he did? I wasn’t about to let her leave.

  Guessed a little fresh air would do me some good.

  I rounded the front of the truck and headed for the park.

  Fields and playgrounds went on for what had to be a mile, all closed in by massive, ancient trees.

  The second she saw me, Frankie Leigh came running in my direction. Long, brown hair flew behind her like a cape, wild and uncontained.

  Grinning, I moved a little faster to meet her.

  Like I said.

  Sometimes it was impossible not to fall.

  I dropped the football just in time to use her momentum to grab her under the arms and spin her around and around.

  She howled with laughter, shouting, “Come on, Uncle, can’t you go any higher?”

  She was a wild one, that was for sure, so damned happy and full of life there was no way you could be around her and not smile.

  She reminded me a little of Nikki in that way, the way Nikki had been at her age, so eager to experience life; though, Nikki had done it with a tiny bit more fear.

  Doses of hesitation coming on.

  Careful.

  It had always been Sydney who’d spur her on. Telling her to run. Jump. That she could do it.

  I wondered when Nikki had decided to get so reckless.

  Brave.

  Which fucking sucked because the last thing I wanted was for her to be brave, constantly having to worry about the position she might be putting herself in. Stepping up when she thought it might right a wrong.

  Make someone’s life better.

  Even if it was just a conversation with a lonely old guy living on the street.

  I beat back the direction my thoughts were going and instead focused on Frankie, who I was still spinning.

  Her squeals of joy hit the air, and it didn’t take too long before I decided she had to have had enough and slowed to set her on her feet. Wasn’t surprised in the least when she went stumbling back toward the rest of the group, veering to the right, totally dizzy and off-kilter.

  Had to admit, I felt a bit of that spin, too.

  “She starts puking, and that’s on you. Hope you have a rag or two in your truck,” Rex shot in my direction as a smug grin tugged on his mouth.

  He stood behind his tiny son, Ryland, who was facing out, both of the one-year-old boy’s hands in Rex’s as Rex helped him balance.

  The little thing was doing his best to kick a soccer ball with his foot. Not moving it more than an inch but having a grand time doing it.

  That shit was cute, that was for sure, the kid like a tiny version of his dad.

  Sometimes it still fucked with my head to see Rex this way. Guy’d been one of my closest friends for pretty much all of my life.

  He’d taken it about as hard as I had after Sydney had disappeared. Angry at the whole damned world because ours had been rocked, none of us able to make sense of something so brutal actually taking place.

  Shocked.

  Traumatized.

  It’d taken that sweet little girl being born for his hardened pieces to start chipping away, meeting Rynna stripping the rest to the ground.

  Disquiet tumbled through me. A rumble in that dark space. Sometimes it was hard to watch. Time moving on. People moving on. Sometimes, I wished that I could, too.

  Didn’t matter if I wished for it or not. Knew I’d forever be a captive of that day.

  I shoved the thoughts down and snatched up the ball where I’d dropped it and pointed it his direction. “You wish, man. Puke duty is not a part of my repertoire.”

  Kale, who had been kneeling in front of Evan, pushed to standing and threw me a grin as he jumped into the conversation. “This from the guy who owns a bar and his sole purpose in life is to get people tanked. I’m pretty sure Olive’s has played host to a hurl or two.”

  Kale was our opposite. All clean-cut lines and cleaner jaw, his title of pediatrician fitting him to a tee.

  “Not a chance, man. Olive’s is the classiest of establishments. Assholes get trashed, and they’re out on their asses. Now you want to talk about what goes down on the front sidewalk in the middle of the night? That’s an entirely different story.”

  “Language, man,” Rex said, angling his head to the side. Knew the look on his face. If we’d been fifteen, that would have been delivered with a punch.

  “Sorry.”

  Kale laughed. “Leave it to the bachelor not to be able to figure out how to act around kids.”

  He glanced down when Evan reached up and tugged him by the hand to get his attention.

  Evan’s hands flew through the air, quickly signing something I couldn’t read.

  Kale smiled like a damned fool and signed back.

  My chest tightened like the yank of a belt.

  Evan’s adoption had just gone through. I wasn’t sure I’d ever seen the guy happier than that day.

  Not that he needed the paper. Pretty sure the guy felt that way from moment one.

  Loved seeing my crew happy. Finding love after all the bullshit that’d been tossed our way through the years.

  Brutal blow after fucking brutal blow.

  Two of them had always had my back, stood beside me during the toughest time of my life.

  Both of them had handled it differently.

  Rex had fallen into that anger and grief right along with me. Like he’d wanted to take some of it on, shoulder some of the burden like he might be able to grant me some relief, ridden with a dark empathy when I didn’
t think he really had the first clue what I was going through.

  Sydney hadn’t been his responsibility. Hadn’t been the one who was supposed to watch after her. Keep her safe.

  Kale had stood up and become the rock and had been the one to eventually encourage me to move on. To find the bright side when my entire life had gone dark.

  I waved back, moving Evan’s direction and leaning down in front of him. I ruffled a hand through his red hair.

  “Hey, little man,” I told him, knowing he’d be able to read my lips. “Did you see what I brought?”

  He dropped to his knees with that pad he used for communication, scribbled something quick. He turned it for me to see what he’d written, excitement streaking across the mass of freckles that dotted his pale face.

  You brought my truck? I’m saving all my money from my chores so I can buy it when I get my license. I’ve got twenty dollars. Is that almost enough?

  I chuckled under my breath when I read what he’d written.

  “You’re gettin’ close, buddy. Real close. What do you say for now, we play for a bit and then we take it for a drive?”

  His eyes went wide, and he mouthed, Really?

  “Really,” I told him, touching his chin.

  Yep.

  Impossible not to fall.

  I stood and gave the football a small toss into the air. “Who’s the next Gingham Lakes High wide receiver? Is his name Evan Bryant?”

  His eyes lit up behind his thick-rimmed glasses, and he gave me an emphatic nod of his head.

  I gave it a soft pitch in his direction, and he fumbled along for the ball.

  Kale watched him like a goddamned hawk.

  Always wary of the kid’s heart.

  Couldn’t imagine having to carry that weight. But neither he nor Hope would let their own fears get in the way of the kid living a full life. Just because he was born with a genetic defect that had almost taken his young life, his parents weren’t going to hold him back.

  And man, did the kid live a full life. He was so full of it he shined.

  He caught the ball against his chest, and Frankie went flying his way. Arms stretched out like she was soaring.

  “Here, Evan. Throw it to me! I wanna catch it!”