Page 9 of Crave Me (The Good Ol' Boys 4)

  One stride for Esteban was three steps for me. I know because I counted. It was the only way to keep my breathing somewhat steady.

  One stride.

  Three steps…

  One stride.

  Three steps…

  One stride.

  Three steps…

  I followed him through the swinging door that led to the kitchen. The strong, pungent smell of bleach assaulted my senses. My hand immediately rose to cover my nose and mouth. Esteban didn’t bat an eye, too focused on his task that led us to the service elevator. He pressed the button and within seconds it dinged. The doors slid open as if it had been waiting there for us the entire time.

  He stepped in while I stayed frozen in place. My heart pounding so profusely that I found it hard to breathe. My lips parted and my chest heaved with each passing moment that escalated between us. Panic began to set in and my mind started running wild. I anxiously tried to gather my thoughts, but they were as stuck as my feet were glued to the floor beneath me.

  “Get in,” he ordered.

  The unfamiliar harsh and demanding tone only added to my fear. For a quick second I wondered if he could smell it.

  I didn’t budge.

  I couldn’t.

  “Why?” I blurted, finally finding my own voice.

  “Get. In,” he repeated and my body began to shake.

  I stared into his dark, soulless eyes. I took in his daunting, eerie composure, the way his hands hadn’t left his sides, not hiding the fact that he was strapped. Which he never was inside the penthouse.

  I took in every last detail.

  From the new cut he had just above his eyebrow, to the slight wrinkle of his black suit jacket. How the first two buttons of his black dress shirt were missing, and how his stare hadn’t wavered from mine.

  Not. Once.

  Reminding me of my uncle.

  “Are you going to hurt me?” I found myself asking, needing confirmation, but knowing it didn’t matter. He wouldn’t tell me the truth.

  Esteban would…

  But he wasn’t Esteban.

  “Get. The. Fuck. In,” he gritted out.

  I swallowed hard before placing one foot in front of the other, standing on the opposite side of the elevator. The furthest spot away from him. He didn’t falter, punching one-zero-one-seven into the keypad, like he wanted me to see it and then button B.

  My mom’s birthday?

  His eyes stayed focused in front of him, and my eyes stayed locked on the side of his face. I jumped when the elevator dinged again, immediately shutting my eyes as hard as I could. Desperately wanting to pretend that this was just a bad dream. A nightmare that I would soon wake up from, finding no one was there to comfort me, but myself. I used to loathe that feeling, and now for the first time I craved it.

  I heard the doors open and I involuntarily took three, reassuring breaths.

  One…

  In and out.

  Two…

  In and out.

  Three…

  In and out.

  I was struck with a coppery scent and I knew that as soon as I opened my eyes, my life would never be the same again. The smell of fear and bodily fluids were all around me, there was no mistaking it.

  For some reason I thought about the last time I was happy. Slowly, cautiously opening my eyes, holding onto that feeling for as long as I could.

  “Por fin,” Uncle Alejandro broke the silence, “Finally.”

  I swear on everything that was holy, my heart stopped beating. All the feelings, all the emotions were gone in a flash as if they had never been there to begin with.

  I was there, but I wasn’t.

  “Venga,” Uncle ordered, “Come.”

  My eyes widened as I came face-to-face with something straight out of a horror film. My blank stare went to the man. A man I’d never seen before. His head was draped over, his arms tied behind his back, and his legs strapped to the steel chair he was sitting on. A plastic visqueen-lined area beneath him. Silver duct tape sealed his mouth and eyes. Blood dripped down his bruised and bloody face. I looked around at my uncle’s men. They wore their sadistic expressions and bloody knuckles proudly, no hint of remorse, no sign of guilt. They were showcasing their handy work.

  The man was beaten within an inch of his life.

  I looked from the man who was alive but appeared dead to Esteban who was standing at the far corner of the basement. Once again the man I knew. Except this time, he looked as broken as I felt.

  The shame and remorse eating him alive.

  Me.

  “I bring you a gift, and this is how you react?” Uncle voiced, bringing my gaze back to him.

  He was leaned up against the wall behind the man in the chair. His arms folded over his chest, one leg draped over the other. The sleeves of his shirt were rolled but there wasn’t a hair out of place.

  “A gift?” I whispered, loud enough for him to hear.

  “Briggs, I won’t tell you again. Come here.”

  I stepped off the elevator and the doors closed behind me.

  I shuddered, suddenly cold.

  My uncle smiled. “Are you scared?”

  I didn’t know what to say, so I didn’t say anything. I had to dig my nails into the palms of my hands to keep from passing out.

  “You’re my niece, the daughter of my only sister, who I loved very fucking much. I would never physically hurt you. Don’t you ever fucking offend me again by letting that thought cross your mind.”

  I blinked, taking in his words. The concrete floors were callous beneath my bare feet, the sounds of a furnace echoed through the huge, damp, concrete basement.

  “Do you understand me?” he added.

  I peered down at the man in the chair, ignoring his question. My uncle followed the direction of my stare.

  “It was a hit and run.”

  Our eyes locked.

  “And this,” he nodded at the man in the chair, “is the man who ran,” he stated, answering the question in my mind.

  My eyes scanned his body, confused and overwhelmed by the turn of events. I couldn't look away from the man's gruesome appearance. His chest was in worse shape than his face. Blood was covering his whole torso. I looked closer and sucked in a breath.

  Amari.

  My mom's name was carved on his skin, peeking out through his ripped, button down shirt on his chest.

  My uncle jerked his neck toward Esteban, who understood his silent command. He made his way to the man in the chair. For a second, Esteban’s eyes pleaded with me to forgive him for what was about to happen. He roughly ripped off the tape from his eyes and then his mouth. Throwing a bucket of water on his face and the man stirred into consciousness. Gasping for air that wasn’t available for the taking.

  Esteban quickly retreated back to the corner of the basement. I could have sworn I saw him make the sign of the cross before the sounds of the man waking up brought my attention back to the situation.

  He immediately started screaming and thrashing around. My uncle didn’t pay him any mind. For the first time in my life, I fought an internal struggle between right and wrong.

  “You didn’t kill your parents, Briggs. He did,” Uncle reminded, fueling my battle of good versus evil.

  My heart.

  My mind.

  My soul.

  “LIAR!” the man yelled out.

  I jumped, craving to place my hands over my ears, my eyes.

  To hide.

  To crawl into that empty space I’d been living in for years. To seek refuge within myself was the only way I knew how to survive.

  “YOU’RE A FUCKING LIAR!” he screamed bloody murder, whipping around even harder, faster, almost making the chair fall over.

  No one paid him any mind as I visibly struggled with my conflicting emotions.

  Unforgiving.

  Merciless.

  Remorseless.

  Please, God…

  One right after the other.

  “It?

??s midnight,” my uncle said, settling his stare on the man.

  The rest played out in slow motion.

  My uncle raised his gun, pointing it directly to the back of the man’s head. The man stopped moving as if he knew. All of the fight in him was gone.

  Locking eyes with me instead.

  I screamed, shaking. “No! No! No! You don’t have to do this!”

  “Happy fifteenth birthday, Daisy.”

  And with that…

  He blew his fucking head off.

  Chapter 8

  Austin

  “Hey,” I greeted, walking up to Alex from behind.

  She turned to face me and smiled shyly. “Hey.”

  I hadn’t seen her much since that day on the dock. There was no point to it. I fucked up and she knew that.

  I sat down next to her on the bench, surprised to find her at the pier. It wasn’t a place she came to often. I had been hanging out at Charlie’s house all day, throwing back a few drinks and shooting the shit.

  “Whatcha doin’ over here by yourself?”

  “I don’t know. Sometimes I come here to think.”

  I understood that all too well.

  “About Lucas?” I blurted without thinking.

  She immediately looked over at me, shocked and dismayed. I reassuringly smiled with an arched eyebrow and a mischievous look on my face. The last time we talked about her and Lucas was half a decade ago. Never once bringing it up after that day on the dock. Maybe she thought I forgot, or maybe she pretended like it never happened. Whatever the cause may have been, a lot had happened since then.

  I wasn’t the same boy anymore.

  And she wasn’t the same girl.

  “It’s okay, Half-Pint, I’m not Jacob or Dylan. All I want is for you to be happy with Lucas, with Cole, shit even with a chick if that floats your fancy.”

  She chuckled, shaking her head. “No girls.”

  I laughed, “A guy can dream, right?”

  She grinned, nudging me with her shoulder. “How long have you known?”

  All our lives. “Long enough.”

  She nodded with understanding as she turned to look back out over the water.

  “The boys—”

  “I know,” I interrupted, already knowing what she was going to say. “In all fairness though, they’re just looking out for you, Alex. It’s what we’ve always done. It’s not coming from a bad place. You know we love you more than anything.”

  “I know.”

  The boys had definitely done some damage when it came to their relationship, and maybe I had my part in it too. Over the last year I thought a lot about my childhood, about the things I couldn’t change and for the first time…

  I didn’t want to.

  Every memory, every moment, every life event brought me to this place in time where I was content and comfortable in my own skin. Finally, finding some solid ground to the rocky foundation that had always been placed beneath me.

  “I don’t think you do. I know you, Alex. I’ve known you as long as I’ve known them. You and Lucas have always had a special unbreakable bond. When I was a kid, I used to be jealous of your relationship. It wasn’t because I wanted you in that way or anything, it was more because I never had that connection to anyone. You’re like my little sister and that applies to all of us,” I revealed, knowing it was the effects of the booze I’d been drinking all day.

  Part of what I said was true and part of it wasn’t.

  Half-truths, so many lies. Too many lies.

  But I still found myself saying them because it was what she needed to hear. And at the end of the day, she was all that ever mattered.

  To all of us.

  “Except you and Lucas complete each other. You balance each other out in a way that we all do for one another, but you had your own dynamic going on.”

  She nodded in understanding.

  “As the youngest, I’ve always felt like the odd man out with the rest of the boys. I guess that’s why I try to do everything to the extreme. I need to make up for it or something,” I admitted out loud.

  I had nothing to lose anymore.

  I’d lost it all already.

  When I realized that, was when I started living.

  “Austin,” she murmured, completely surprised by my outburst. “I never knew you felt that way.”

  I shrugged. “I’m good at hiding things, we have that in common. The boys have never made me feel like that by any means, at least not on purpose. It’s still there, though. You know Lucas always tells me that we’re a lot alike, and I never understood what he meant until they left,” I paused, reflecting on what I was about to confess to her. The alcohol making it easier to do so. “Both of us wanting to be one of the boys.”

  She gazed at the side of my face. “I’ve never thought that about you. Not ever.”

  I nodded. “And I’ve never thought that about you, but it doesn’t change the fact that you felt that way, does it?”

  “No,” she half-whispered.

  I smiled sadly and bowed my head for a few seconds, only looking back up when I was ready.

  “I graduate in a few months.”

  “Three months,” she stated, like she was counting down the days until she would really be alone.

  I glanced at her, smiling, and it eased the worry she felt in her heart.

  “You going to miss me, Half-Pint?”

  “Always,” she bellowed, her eyes blurring.

  I wrapped my arm around her shoulder and pulled her into my chest, kissing the top of her head and letting my lips linger. I had eaten some food and put some gum in my mouth before I left, to cover up the stench of alcohol. Alex was too innocent and naïve to realize I had been drinking. Which only made me pull her closer to my chest.

  “I will always be here for you, it doesn’t matter where I am. I will always take care of you, and I will always love you. You’re my Half-Pint,” I vowed, my voice breaking.

  As hard as it was for her to know that I was leaving her, it was just as hard for me to be leaving her. Even though I wanted nothing more than to get the fuck out of this town.

  She sniffed. “Ditto.”

  “One day we won’t care what the boys think about us or what we do. On that day, we will both be extremely happy,” I said, silently praying it would be true.

  That was the hardest pill to swallow.

  “So…” I brushed off the sentiments. “It’s Saturday night and Charlie’s throwing one of his raging parties. Let’s go,” I urged, standing up and reaching out my hand for her. “No,” I coaxed, shaking my head before she could answer. “I don’t want to hear your bullshit excuses about this or that. You will have fun with me. You will drink. You will dance. You will party. And that’s a fucking order.”

  She giggled and rolled her eyes. “Okay.”

  I wanted to spend one night with her where I didn’t think about tomorrow or the next day or the day after that. How things might change between us after I left. How we may not be as close to one another as we had been this last year without the boys around.

  I wanted one night where we could both let go.

  Be free.

  Show her how much fun it was to just not give a fuck anymore. What anyone thought, wanted, or needed. To see that life didn’t start and end with her Bo. That there were other possibilities in this world where she might be happy, and I wanted to take pride in being the one person that opened her eyes to that.

  I drank.

  She drank.

  I danced.

  She danced.

  We laughed.

  We smiled.

  We lived in the moment. Where it was just me and her. And it was one of the happiest days of my life.

  “Stop walking so fast,” she rambled, holding onto my hand tighter.

  “Stop walking so slow,” I replied, slightly slurring.

  “Hurry your asses up!” Jason yelled from in front of us.

  “Where are we going?” she asked, already

forgetting what I told her.

  “The cops are coming. The party is being relocated.”

  “Oh yeah,” she giggled, and it was the sweetest sound I’d ever heard.

  I opened the passenger door for her and closed it when she was safely seated inside. I ran over to the driver’s side, jumped in, and threw my car into reverse. Her body jerked forward from the momentum, and she started to giggle.

  “Turn the music on,” I said.

  She had a hard time finding the knobs, fidgeting from one to the other.

  “Half-Pint, you’re drunk,” I chuckled right along with her.

  “I love this song!” she shouted when she found the station she wanted.

  I watched her dance around in her seat, singing at the top of her lungs. I’d never seen her so fucking happy before, and I would be lying if I said it didn’t make me love her just a little bit more.

  I banged on the steering wheel, dancing right along with her. The music switched over to a slower song as we pulled up to a red light.

  I caught her leaning back in her seat, lazily looking over at me from the corner of my eye.

  “I love you, Austin. I love you so, so, so much.”

  I looked over at her and spoke with conviction, “I love you more. I will always take care of you and don’t you ever fucking forget that. Now put your fucking seatbelt on.”

  “Oh yeah.” She sloppily grabbed the strap behind her head as I started driving again.

  “It won’t go in the buckle,” she giggled again.

  “Here.” I took it out of her hands. “Grab the wheel.”

  “Mmmkay.”

  The car started swerving a little.

  “Austin, I don’t think I should be doing this.”

  “I’m almost done.”

  I would never let anything happen to her. I didn’t care how long it took me to put her goddamn seatbelt on. I wouldn’t stop until she was safe.

  I felt her looking down. “You need to put your seatbelt on, too,” she hiccupped.

  “Done,” I stated, ignoring what she said.

  She smiled at me before facing forward as I grabbed the steering wheel again. We went back to dancing around.