Unbroken

by Riley Edwards

  Truth time.

  “He has been taken to the County Coroner’s office. He will remain there until Dr. Sally Levenson can examine him and give us an official death certificate. After that, Huffin and Burrow’s funeral home will pick him up. He will be cremated immediately. Per his wishes.”

  “Take me to him,” she begged.

  “I can’t April. He doesn’t want you to see him like that.”

  This was not what I was expecting. I thought there would be tears and sobbing. Not this much anger this fast.

  “Well guess what, Austin? Rick doesn’t get a say anymore,” she yelled. Bending at the waist, she put her hands on her knees and started bawling.

  I didn’t let her push me away this time when I scooped her up in my arms and carried her to the couch. I settled us both in and let her use my tee as a Kleenex. Her trembling body started to relax into me, and when the sobbing turned into a soft hiccup, she finally gave me all her weight. I thought she was asleep when I heard a soft whisper.

  “What was that? I couldn’t hear you.” I wiped her hair away from her face and glasses.

  “I don’t want him to be alone in a drawer in the morgue.” I still could barely hear her.

  Jesus, I didn’t know what to say to that. If I was telling the truth the thought of that bothered me as well.

  “April, you’re killing me, honey. I can’t let you go to the coroners. If it makes you feel any better, Sally is the best medical examiner in the state. She is also one of the most gentle and caring women I have ever met. Trust me when I tell you, Rick was taken to Sally’s office because we trust her to take care of Rick with the utmost respect and dignity.”

  “I miss him already,” she sobbed.

  “I do too.”

  I was still in shock. I myself still had not processed that my friend was gone. Rick was a damn good person and friend. Over the years he had helped me through some fucked up shit. Whenever my head would go to a dark place, and I felt myself starting to slip dangerously to the edge, Rick would pull me back.

  I welcomed the silence as we both sat there lost in our own thoughts. April was resting peacefully on my chest, her rhythmic breathing calming my frayed nerves.

  “I’m pregnant, Austin.” She started crying again burrowing her face further into my chest.

  Oh, Fuck.

  25

  Godfather

  Reid

  JJ’s smile lit up, and my soul filled with hope. I had claimed Ava and JJ a long time ago. But there was a difference, me claiming them in my mind, and them claiming me back. They had claimed me.

  Mine. All fucking mine.

  “You askin’ me to marry you?” Ava smiled from across the room.

  “You gettin’ sassy with me woman?” I joked back and threw a wink in for good measure.

  “Me? Never. But, just so you know that might’ve been the worst proposal in history if you were.” Her smile grew bigger than I had ever seen it.

  Over the years, I had watched Ava and JJ joke and banter. I had watched her smile brightly. But those smiles were reserved for JJ. The smile she gave everyone else was shy and guarded. Now she was beaming, all that goodness directed straight at me. I knew JJ was a lucky kid having Ava as a mom, but right then and there I realized just how lucky. He got that smile, all that goodness from her daily. I’d only had it once, and I wanted to bow down and hand her the world.

  “And if that was a proposal what would your answer be?” I shot back, not wanting the fun to end.

  “No.”

  “No? Well damn, looks like I’ll have to come up with something good then.” I laughed.

  “Better hurry up. Time’s a tickin’ away…” Ava let her words trail off.

  “She always this impatient?” I asked JJ.

  “Yes,” Both JJ and Mac said in unison.

  “She can’t even wait to open her birthday presents on her birthday. She opens them the day before,” JJ told me.

  Of course, I already knew that. The woman hated to wait. If you told her you had a present for her, she’d nag the hell out of you until you gave it to her. The last two years I got smart and just showed up the day of her birthday to give her, her gift.

  “Sorry to have to bail, but I got a call out,” Mac said.

  “Bye, Uncle Mac.” JJ wrapped his arms around Mac’s middle. “I love you,” JJ whispered.

  “I love you too, buddy. I’ll see you soon.” Mac hugged him back.

  “Thank you, Mac. I’ll…um… I’ll call you in a bit,” Ava said from across the room, not getting up.

  I knew they had some shit to work out. I heard most of their conversation from the kitchen. It was hard not to when Ava started yelling at Mac. I’d have to talk to Ava. I don’t think she realized what she was doing to Mac. He put on a tough guy front, pretending the reason he screwed every woman in San Fran was because he was some hotshot playboy. But the truth was Aiden Mackenzie had the biggest heart of anyone I knew. He was loyal to a fault and took his obligations seriously. Not that Ava was an obligation in the bad sense of the word. And every time Ava pushed him away, he felt like a failure. I knew this because one drunken night he admitted it. The next day he either didn’t remember the heart to heart or pretended not to. Either way, we’d never discussed it again.

  “Sure thing. Pleased as fuck you’re home safe and sound.”

  “Swear jar, Uncle Mac. That’s a dollar for the F-bomb,” JJ called out, doing some weird fist bump into the air.

  This kid.

  “I gave you a fifty-last night, kid. I think I’m covered,” Mac responded and ruffled JJ’s hair.

  “A fifty?” Ava yelled out from across the room.

  “He swears a lot mom. The fifty only covered the first hour. After that, I gave up. I wasn’t sure if douchebag was a bad word, so I didn’t count those,” JJ explained.

  “YES! It’s a really bad word you don’t get to repeat,” she answered JJ and turned to Mac. “Nice mouth,” she hissed.

  “What is a douchebag?” JJ asked.

  Ava bent down and whispered something in JJ’s ear that made is eyes go big.

  “Gross, Uncle Mac. You’re calling someone a vagina cleaner,” JJ yelled to Mac.

  I lost the battle and belted out a laugh. Damn this kid. Ava looked like she was getting ready to have a shit hemorrhage. She didn’t find anything funny about Mac’s choice of words in front of JJ.

  Mac bit back a smile. “I would say I was sorry. But I had bigger things to worry about than JJ hearing me cuss. And there wasn’t a chance in fu…” Mac caught himself. “There wasn’t a chance JJ was gonna be out of my sight. Don’t repeat those words, kid, or I’ll take my fifty back.” Mac patted JJ’s head one more time and took off for the door.

  Smart man, Ava wasn’t done with his dressing down. And if Mac stood there a minute longer she’d let him have it with both guns a-blazing.

  I walked Mac to the door.

  “Everything okay with the callout?” I asked.

  “Shit man, another body was found. The Chief is up our asses to get this solved before the feds are brought in. We can link all the bodies to one killer. At least that’s what it looks like. Either that or we have a copycat running around too. We haven’t released any information about the mutilation to the victims, so I don’t see that as a real concern. But there are always leaks. Shit, we have three bodies tied together. We officially have a serial killer on our hands,” Mac explained.

  “The cloves, the condensed milk, the cinnamon. What the hell? The sick fuck making a pie or something?” I joked.

  “Holy fuck. You might be on to something. Goddamn, I’ll have to run that by the Chief, and see what else Sally has for us. And to top this shit storm off, the media has been swarming the station snooping around. Jesus Christ the last thing we need is for some reporter wanting to make a name for themselves and put this information out there and get the public in a frenzy.”

  “Let me know if you need anything. I’ve been fucking wrapped up in
everything here, I had forgotten a world even existed outside of us. Sorry man. And the whole Jimmy thing, you need to talk about that?” I asked.

  “Nope. I’m straight. You take care of them, and I’ll handle the case. If shit goes sideways and I need your skillset, I’ll call you in,” Mac said, his voice tight.

  Yeah, he needed to talk about what happened with Jimmy. But he wouldn’t, he’d keep that shit bottled up tight. Austin said that when Mac came up from the basement he was afraid Mac was going to throw up. Mac might be quick-tempered, but he also went by the letter of the law. He took his oath seriously. The fact that Mac had committed a crime, had to be weighing heavily on him.

  “Listen, I need to thank…” I started.

  “No, you don’t. I get that you love them, I know they are yours. I could not be happier for all of you. But, you do not need to thank me. Just tell me, is Carl handled?”

  “Yes.” I wouldn’t give him details, and he’d never ask. If I told him it was done, he knew it was done.

  “Did he… was she…”

  I saved Mac from having to say the word. “No, he didn’t. He kissed her, he saw her naked, and he tried to touch her. But she stopped him. We showed up in the middle of the struggle, and that’s it.”

  Mac let out a colorful string of curse words that would’ve had him owing a C-note to the swear jar if not more.

  “One more thing. Carl was talking to Eva Martin, only she wasn’t in the house. Crazy fuck. Austin is at April’s right now telling her about Rick. Dustin is doing some more digging, Austin will help with that too. Can you get me Carl’s service record from the PD without raising any red flags? Or should I ask Royston to help? I don’t wanna pull Dustin off Eva.”

  “Crazy motherfucker. You know what bothers me? That someone as crazy as Carl can be a cop. How does that happen?” Mac shook his head. “I’ll get you his service records. By the way, Dustin told me about your security system being hacked and the feeds being deleted. That might be something for Royston to look into.”

  “Yeah, that’s a good idea. Royston was the one who finished the system for me. I just don’t understand. He’s the best fucking hacker I know, and it took him days to break into my system. After that, he went back and patched up the weak links. How in the hell did an idiot like Carl Allen hack my system? There is no way he did it on his own. And the bastard had keys to Ava’s house. He was planning this shit for a long time.”

  Another long string of cuss words flew from Mac’s mouth. Carl was lucky he was dead or on his way to being dead, because Mac looked like he was ready to tear him from limb to limb.

  “Did you know he had pictures of Ava in his locker and Jacob found them?” I asked Mac, and watched as his face turned red.

  Guess that was my answer.

  “No. He never said anything. Though that’s not surprising. Jacob had already given him a beat down. Had he told me that, I might’ve broken a leg for good measure.”

  Good to know that Jacob handled Mac the same way I did. Always trying to protect him from his own damn temper.

  “I’m taking Ava to see Suzie in a few hours. I’ll check in with you when I get everyone settled.”

  “You want me to come back and stay with JJ?” Mac looked hopeful. Damn, he missed the boy. Yet another thing I had to talk to Ava about. She had to stop cutting Mac out of JJ’s life. I understood why she was doing it, but it had to end. Mac didn’t deserve it.

  Without even bothering to discuss it with Ava, I answered Mac, “Yeah. That’d be great. Go handle your shit and call me when you’re done. Maybe I can convince Ava to take a nap. And if you have JJ, I can take Ava to go see April.”

  “Sound’s good. See ya in a few.” Mac started to walk away before he stopped and turned back. “You know I’m JJ’s Godfather, right?”

  That was an odd question.

  “Yes, I knew that,” I answered him.

  “You know I expect to be the Godfather to any more rug-rats you two spit out?”

  I let out a peal of laughter. “Sure man. Though I wouldn’t tell Ava you think she can spit a baby outta her vagina. I think women get pissy about shit like that.”

  “Noted. One more thing. You know I want to stand up for you when you marry her. She loves you, Reid. So does that boy in there. You are one lucky son-of-a-bitch. And before you say it. I know what you’re thinkin’, that you’re the lucky one. And that right there is why I know you are the man that will love them the way they deserve. Thank you for that.”

  Mac didn’t give me a chance to answer, he was down the walk and almost to his car before I had processed all of what he said.

  I was the lucky one.

  I shut and bolted the door, and went in search of Ava and JJ. I found them in the breakfast nook looking out the large bay window that gave you a perfect view of the Bridge and the Point Bonita Lighthouse. At night, you could see the light flashing, guiding ships past the point. One of the many reasons I bought this house.

  “Whatcha guys looking at?” I asked coming up behind Ava, wrapping my arms around her from behind and kissing the top of her head.

  “There’s a huge sailboat. It’s so cool,” JJ exclaimed.

  “That’s a Townsend and Downey. She’s a beauty, isn’t she? It’s too bad they’re on power and don’t have the sails up,” I told him.

  “Look there’s another boat,” JJ enthusiastically pointed out.

  We stood in silence and watched the early morning boaters taking advantage of the still waters. It was a clear morning, the normal morning fog absent. I took the opportunity to give thanks to the universe. Thankful that I had Ava back in my arms.

  JJ yawned loudly, reminding me that none of us had slept.

  “Why don’t we try and get some rest?” I suggested.

  “I’m not tired.” JJ yawned trying to cover it up with his hand.

  “Well I am,” Ava said, yawning herself.

  “Why don’t you and JJ head upstairs? I’m gonna check the house and lock up.” I let go of Ava, taking her plate and cup with me into the kitchen.

  “No,” JJ all but shouted. “We’ll wait here for you.”

  “What’s wrong?” Ava asked JJ. She turned to study his face.

  “Nothing. I just want to wait for Reid. Um, how do we know what’s upstairs? He should show us.”

  JJ was panicking, and Ava’s face paled.

  “Alright JJ. Let’s go lock up the house,” I suggested, “Is it ok if your mom goes upstairs and gets changed?”

  “Yeah, okay. But you’re just going upstairs right?” he probed.

  Ava’s eyes cut to mine, and she tilted her head to the side. Obviously confused by my suggestion.

  I nodded my head, and she answered, “Yes, I’m going straight upstairs.”

  “Okay, I’ll go with Reid.” JJ quickly made his way to my side and grabbed my hand. “Can we hurry?”

  “There should be something for you to sleep in, in the master bedroom. Help yourself to whatever you find in the drawers.”

  Ava’s confusion grew. I knew she wanted to question me, but she remained silent as she left the kitchen area. I waited until she was out of earshot before I addressed JJ.

  “What’s goin’ on, little man?”

  “Nothing, I just want to help,” JJ lied.

  “Alright, I’m gonna lay it out for you. You, me, and your mom, we’re a team. The three of us. Being part of a team means you’re always honest, even if it is uncomfortable or embarrassing. If something is bothering you, you tell me.” JJ’s eyes widened. He obviously didn’t think that Ava or I had caught on that something was wrong.

  “Okay,” he responded.

  “So, I’m gonna ask you again. What’s going on?”

  “I’m scared,” he whispered.

  “Of what?”

  I knew this was costing him, me making him be honest with me. Making him talk about how he felt, and what he was scared of. But I couldn’t let this slide. JJ had to understand that if something was wrong, he
could always trust me to help him.

  “I don’t know.” Now he was being honest. I believed he couldn’t put to words why he was scared.

  “Do you think I’m going to leave you?”

  “No. I know you wouldn’t leave me. I’m scared that he’ll come and take me next,” he murmured.

  Motherfucking, Carl Allen.

  “He won’t. I promise you will never have to worry about Carl Allen again. Ever. He will never touch you, you will never hear his voice again, and he will never get near your mom again. He is gone. Forever.” JJ looked at me, but he still didn’t look like he was convinced. “JJ, do I break promises?”

  “No,” he answered.

  “I promise you, son, that man will never hurt you or your mom again. It is okay to be scared. We’ll work through that as a family, a team. But, you have to tell us if something is bothering you so we can help you.”

  “Okay.”

  “Let’s get the house locked up so we can check on your mom. Do you know where the garage door is?” JJ nodded his head. “Go check that door is locked. I’ll check the front door and meet you at the stairs.”

  I watched as JJ tried to work out if he was going to check the door by himself. Just when I thought he was going to tell me no, he nodded his head and ran towards the back of the house.

  Brave.

  I checked the door and armed the alarm. JJ was waiting for me at the bottom of the stairs. He was out of breath, and red-faced. I didn’t bother to acknowledge either. He did it, left my side, and proved to himself he could do it.

  “Door locked?” I asked.

  “Yep.”

  “Good, let’s go find your mom.”

  We found Ava in the master bedroom wearing a pair of sweats that were three times too big for her. She had them rolled up and still had to hold them up. She looked like she was wearing… well, my clothes.

  “Can I stay in here with you two?” JJ requested.

  “Reid’s not…”

  “Yes. Of course, you can. Hop up little man,” I cut Ava off.

  If she thought for one second, that she and JJ would not be in here with me, she was crazy.