Things We Never Got Over

by Lucy Score

  “You have something better to do?”

  “Yeah. Yelling at you to go the hell home and get some sleep. Waylay’s first day of school is tomorrow. She doesn’t need a zombie aunt pouring dish soap on her cereal.”

  “First of all, we’re having eggs, fruit, and yogurt for breakfast,” I began, then realized he was trying to distract me. “Was it about a woman?”

  He looked at the ceiling.

  “If you start counting to ten, I will kick you in the shin,” I warned.

  He sighed. “No. It wasn’t about a woman.”

  “Besides love, what’s worth losing a brother over?”

  “Fucking romantics,” he said.

  “Maybe if you get it out, instead of bottling it up, you’ll feel better.”

  He studied me for another one of those long, pensive beats, and I was sure he was about to tell me to get my ass home.

  “Fine.”

  I blinked in surprise. “Um. Okay. Wow. So this is happening. Maybe we should sit?” I suggested, eying up the empty vinyl chairs.

  “Why does talking have to be a whole damn thing with women?” he grumbled as I led us to a pair of chairs.

  “Because anything worth doing is worth doing right.” I sat and patted the chair next to me.

  He sat, stretching his long legs in front of him and staring blankly at the window. “I won the lottery,” he said.

  “I know that. Liza told me.”

  “Took home eleven million, and I thought it was the answer to everything. I bought the bar. A building or two. Invested in Jeremiah’s plan for some fancy-ass salon. Paid off Liza J’s mortgage. She’d been struggling since Pop died.” He looked down at his hands as his palms rubbed against the thighs of his jeans. “It felt so fucking good to be able to solve problems.”

  I waited.

  “Growing up, we didn’t have much. And after we lost Mom, we didn’t have anything. Liza J and Pop took us in and gave us a home, a family. But money was tight, and in this town, you’ve got some kids driving fucking BMWs to school on their sixteenth birthdays or spending their weekends competing on forty thousand dollar horses.

  “Then there was me and Nash and Lucy. None of us grew up with anything, so maybe we took a few things that weren’t ours. Maybe we weren’t always on the straight and narrow, but we learned to be self-sufficient. Learned that sometimes you gotta take what you want instead of waiting for someone to give it to you.”

  I handed him his coffee, and he took a sip.

  “Then Nash gets a bug up his ass and decides to become Dudley Fucking Do-Right.”

  Which must have felt like a rejection to Knox, I realized.

  “I gave him money,” Knox said. “Or tried to at least. The stubborn son of a bitch said he didn’t want it. Who says no to that?”

  “Apparently your brother.”

  “Yeah. Apparently.” Restless, he shoved his fingers through his hair again. “We went back and forth about it for almost two years. Me trying to shove it down his throat, him rejecting it. We threw a few punches over it. Finally Liza J made him take it. And you know what my stupid little brother did with it?”

  I set my teeth in my lower lip because I knew.

  “That son of a bitch donated it to the Knockemout PD to build a new goddamn police station. The Knox Morgan Fucking Municipal Building.”

  I waited for a few beats, hoping there was more to the story. But when he didn’t continue, I slumped in my seat.

  “Are you saying you and your brother have barely spoken in years because he put your name on a building?”

  “I’m saying he refused money that could have set him up for the rest of his life and gave it to the cops instead. The cops who had hard-ons for three teenagers just raising a little hell. Fuck. Lucian spent a week in jail on some bullshit charges when we were seventeen. We had to learn to take care of things ourselves instead of running to a crooked chief and his dumbfuck cronies. And Nash just up and hands over two fucking million bucks to them.”

  The picture was coming into focus. I cleared my throat. “Uh, are the same cops still with the department?”

  Knox hitched his shoulders in a shrug. “No.”

  “Does Nash allow the officers under him to take advantage of their position?” I pressed.

  He poked his tongue into the inside of his cheek. “No.”

  “Is it fair to say that Nash cleaned up the department and replaced bad cops with good cops?”

  “Don’t know how good Grave is, considering he still likes to drag race on the weekends,” Knox said stubbornly.

  I put my hand on his arm and squeezed. “Knox.”

  “What?” he asked the carpet.

  “Look at me.”

  When he did, I saw the frustration etched on his gorgeous face. I cupped his cheeks in my hands. His beard was coarse against my palms.

  “I’m going to tell you something that you and your brother both need to know, and I need this to resonate in your soul,” I said.

  His eyes locked on mine. Well, more on my mouth than my eyes. But it was good enough.

  “You’re both idiots.”

  His gaze tore away from my lips, and his eyes narrowed. I squished his cheeks together before he could snarl at me.

  “And if either of you wastes one more damn day on the fact that you two have both worked so hard and given so much to this town in your own ways, then the idiocy is terminal, and there’s no cure.”

  I released his face and leaned back.

  “If this is your way of cheering me up about my brother getting shot, you suck at it.”

  My smile spread slowly. “Take it from me, Viking. You and your brother have a chance to fix things and have an actual relationship. Some of us aren’t that lucky. Some burnt bridges can’t be rebuilt. Don’t burn one over something as stupid as money.”

  “That only works if he wakes the fuck up,” he reminded me.

  I blew out a breath. “Yeah. I know.”

  We sat in silence. His knee and arm were warm and firm against mine.

  “Mr. Morgan?” A nurse in blue scrubs stepped into the room. Knox and I both came to our feet. I wondered if he realized he’d taken my hand.

  “Your brother is awake, and he’s asking for you,” she said.

  I blew out a sigh of relief.

  “How is he?” Knox asked.

  “Groggy and he’s looking at a long recovery, but the surgical team is happy.”

  The tension in his back and shoulders loosened.

  I gave his hand a squeeze. “On that note, I think I’ll head home to get Waylay’s cereal and dish detergent ready.”

  He tightened his grip on my hand. “Can we have a minute?” he asked the nurse.

  “Sure. I’ll be right outside. I’ll take you to him as soon as you’re ready.”

  He waited until she stepped outside before drawing me in close.

  “Thank you, Naomi,” he whispered just before his lips met mine. Hot, hard, unyielding. His hand slid up to cup my jaw and neck, holding me in place as he kissed every thought out of my head, leaving me nothing but a riot of sensation.

  He pulled back, eyes fierce. Then he pressed a kiss to my forehead and left the room.

  TWENTY-TWO

  ONE HATCHET TWO BULLETS

  Knox

  “You look like shit,” Nash rasped.

  The lights were on low in the room. My brother was propped up in his hospital bed, chest bare to reveal bandages and gauze over his left shoulder.

  Machines beeped, screens glowed.

  He looked pale. Vulnerable.

  My hands clenched into fists at my sides.

  “I could say the same about you,” I said, rounding the bed slowly to sink into the chair by the dark window.

  “Looks worse than it is.” His voice was barely a whisper.

  I rested my elbows on my knees and tried to look relaxed. But inside, a rage simmered in my gut. Someone had tried to end Nash’s life. You didn’t mess with a Morgan and walk away
from it.

  “Some asshole tried to kill you tonight.”

  “You mad someone almost beat you to it?”

  “They know who did it?” I asked.

  The corner of his mouth lifted as if it were too much effort to smile. “Why? You gonna get him back?”

  “You almost died, Nash. Grave said you came this close to bleeding out before the ambulance got there.” The truth of it had bile rising in my throat.

  “It’s gonna take more than a couple of bullets and a wrestling match to end me,” he assured me.

  I ran my palms over my knees. Back and forth, trying to tamp down the anger. The need to break something.

  “Naomi was here.” Even as I said it, I didn’t know why. Maybe just saying her name out loud made everything feel a little more bearable.

  “Of course she was. She thinks I’m hot.”

  “I don’t care how many bullet holes you’ve got in you. I’m moving on that,” I told him.

  Nash’s sigh was closer to a wheeze. “About damn time. Quicker you screw it up, the quicker I can swoop in and be the good guy.”

  “Fuck off, dick.”

  “Hey, who’s the one in the hospital bed, asshole? I’m a damn hero. Women can’t resist a hero with bullet holes.”

  The hero in question winced when he shifted in the bed, his hand reaching for the tray then falling back to the mattress.

  I rose and poured the water bottle into the waiting cup. “Yeah, well, maybe you should stay in here out of my way for a couple of days. Give me a shot at fucking it all up.”

  I pushed the cup and straw to the edge of the tray and watched him reach for it with his good arm. Beads of sweat appeared on his forehead, and his hand shook as his fingers closed around the plastic.

  I’d never seen him like this. I’d seen him every other way. Hungover, wrung out from the flu bug of 1996, exhausted after pouring his heart out in the homecoming football game his senior year. But I’d never seen him look weak.

  Another nurse pulled back the curtain with an apologetic smile. “Just checking the fluids,” he said.

  Nash gave him a thumbs-up, and we lapsed into silence while the nurse busied himself with IVs. My brother was hooked to a half dozen machines in the ICU. And I’d gone years with barely speaking to him.

  “How’s your pain?” the nurse asked.

  “Fine. Practically non-existent.”

  His answer was too quick. His mouth too tight. My brother had played the second half of that homecoming game with a broken wrist. Because he might be the nice brother, the good brother. But he didn’t like showing weakness any more than I did.

  “He’s in it,” I tattled to the nurse.

  “Don’t listen to him,” Nash insisted. But he couldn’t hide the grimace when he shifted on the mattress.

  “A bullet just ripped its way through your torso, chief. You don’t have to be in pain to heal,” he said.

  “Yeah. You do,” he countered. “Pain is what tells you you’re alive. You numb that, and how do you know you’re still here?”

  “She thinks we’re both idiots,” I said when the nurse left.

  Nash gave a wheeze followed by a wracking cough that looked like it was going to tear him apart before collapsing back on the bed. I watched the green spikes on his heart rate monitor slowly settle. “Who?” he said, finally.

  “Naomi.”

  “Why would Naomi think I’m an idiot?” he asked wearily.

  “Told her why things are the way they are.”

  “She wasn’t impressed with your Robin Hood routine or my manly independence?”

  “Not even a little. She may have made a few points.”

  “About what?”

  “About how she thought it was over a woman. Not money.”

  Nash’s head was slowly lolling to the side, his eyelids getting heavier. “So love is worth a family feud but a few million isn’t?”

  “That was the gist of it.”

  “Can’t say she’s wrong.”

  “Then why the fuck didn’t you just suck it up and make it right?” I snapped.

  Nash’s smile was a ghost. His eyes were closed. “You’re the big brother. And you were the one trying to make me beholden to you by shoving cash down my throat.”

  “The only reason I’m not kicking your ass right now is you’re attached to too many machines.”

  He gave me a weak middle finger.

  “Jesus,” I grumbled. “I didn’t want you to be beholden or whatever the fuck to me. We’re family. We’re brothers. One of us wins, we both win.” It also meant if one of us lost, we both did. And that was what the last few years had been. A loss.

  Fuck. I hated losing.

  “Didn’t want the money,” he said, his words slurring. “Wanted to build things on my own.”

  “You could’ve put it away for retirement or some shit,” I complained. The same old cocktail of feelings was trying to rise in me. Rejection. Failure. Righteous fury. “You deserved some good. After the shit we went through, then Liza J losing Pop. You deserved more than a cop salary from some shitty town.”

  “Our shitty town,” he corrected. “Made it ours. You in your way. Me in mine.”

  Maybe he was right. But that didn’t matter. What did matter was the fact that if he would have taken the cash, he wouldn’t be here in this hospital room. My little brother would be making a difference some other way. Without toeing the line. Without paying the price.

  “Should have kept the money. If you had, you wouldn’t be lying here like roadkill.”

  Nash shook his head slowly against the pillow. “I was always gonna be the good guy.”

  “Shut up and go to sleep,” I told him.

  “We went through some shit. But I always had my big brother. Always knew I could count on you. Didn’t need your money on top of that.”

  Nash’s shoulders sagged. Sleep took him under its spell, leaving me to sit in silent vigil.

  The automatic doors opened, spilling me and a cloud of air conditioning into the humidity of the breaking dawn. I’d stayed by Nash’s bedside, letting my rage simmer. Knowing what came next.

  I wanted to punch a hole through the building’s facade. I wanted to bring a tidal wave of retribution down on the person responsible.

  Idly, I picked up one of the smooth rocks from a flower bed and ran my fingers over it, wanting to send it flying. To break something on the outside instead of feeling all the cracks on the inside.

  “I wouldn’t do that if I were you.”

  I closed my fingers around the rock and squeezed.

  “What are you doing here, Lucy?”

  Lucian leaned against the limestone column just beyond the hospital entrance, the end of a cigarette glowing brighter as he sucked in a drag.

  He only allowed himself one cigarette a day. I guess this counted.

  “What do you think I’m doing?”

  “Holding up the building? Hitting on sexy surgeons?”

  He flicked ash to the ground, eyes locked on me. “How is he?”

  I thought of the pain, the exhaustion. The side of my brother I’d never seen before. “Okay. Or at least he’s gonna be.”

  “Who did it?” The cool, dispassionate tone didn’t fool me.

  We were down to business now. Lucian may not have been blood, but he was a Morgan in every way that counted. And he wanted justice as badly as I did.

  “Cops don’t know. Grave said the car was stolen. Nash hasn’t given them a description of the suspect yet.”

  “Does he remember what happened?”

  I shrugged and squinted up at the sky that was turning pink and purple as the sun worked its way off the horizon. “I don’t know, man. He was pretty fucked up on anesthesia and whatever they put in his IV.”

  “I’ll start digging,” Lucian assured me.

  “Let me know what you find. I’m not getting cut out of this.”

  “Of course not.” He studied me for a beat. “You look like shit. You should ge
t some sleep.”

  “People keep telling me that.”

  Lucian, on the other hand, looked like he’d just walked out of the board room in a slick suit sans tie.

  “Maybe you should listen,” he said.

  “He almost died, Luce. After I was an asshole to him, he almost bled out in a fucking ditch.”

  Lucian stubbed out his cigarette in the concrete ashtray. “We’ll make it right.”

  I nodded. I knew we would. This wouldn’t stand. And the man who’d put a bullet in my brother would pay.

  “And you’ll make the rest of it right too,” he said, words clipped. “You both wasted enough fucking time. It’s done now.” Only Lucian Rollins could make a statement like that and will it into reality.

  I thought of Naomi’s proclamation. Maybe we had been idiots wasting time we thought we’d had. “It’s done,” I agreed.

  “Good. I was tired of my childhood best friends acting like they were still children.”

  “Is that why you came back?”

  His expression darkened. “One of the reasons.”

  “One of those other reasons have anything to do with a pretty little librarian who hates your guts?”

  He sighed, absently patting his pockets.

  “Already had your one,” I reminded him.

  “Fuck,” he muttered. It was as flustered as he allowed himself to get.

  I had the temper. Nash had the good nature. And Lucian had the self-control of a fucking monk.

  “Whatever happened with you two anyway?” I asked, enjoying the distraction of his discomfort.

  “Your brother is in an ICU bed,” Lucian said. “That’s the only reason I’m not knocking your teeth out right now.”

  As close as we’d all been, the one thing Lucian never shared was what made Sloane hate him. Up until last night, I’d thought the feeling was mutual. But I’d seen his face when he saw her, when she walked away. I didn’t know much about feelings, but whatever was written all over his face didn’t look like hate to me.

  “You probably don’t even remember how to throw a punch,” I teased. “All those conference room negotiations. You just sic your lawyers on people instead of delivering a nice right cross to the face. Bet it’s less satisfying.”