38. Colson
THIRTY-EIGHT
COLSON
Finn: Just going to keep ignoring my texts?
Finn: I can see that you’re reading them, you know.
Finn: Whatever. Ignore me all you want.
Finn: Doesn’t change the fact that we’re brothers.
Colson: We’re not anything. Lose my number.
Finn: Ah, he speaks. The blessing of the century.
Colson: The blessing of the century will be when you get it through your thick head that I want nothing to do with you.
Grabbing my polo and a pair of jeans out of the janky washing machine, I prop the gray shirt on top of it and yank the denim up my legs. I have a shift at Gulliver’s, and while I’m not exactly looking forward to it, I have to go. I don’t have it in me to let Llewellyn down despite doing it with everyone else in my life. Besides, he gave me enough time off as it is, and I like being at the gym. The atmosphere creates this resemblance of peace I haven’t had in way too long, and it’s probably a good idea that I get back to my daily routine—or as close to the one I had before Mom died.
I finish dressing then make my way back to Mom’s room. It’s become my own sanctuary, the one across the hall long forgotten. I haven’t slept in it a day since being back. Being in it only reminds me of Thanksgiving night, and I can’t go there.
Violet already pops up in my head at the most inconvenient times. Never mind the fact that it’s been more prominent since New Year’s when she got off my lap and walked away from me. I hate that she asked me to stop fighting. I hate even more that I couldn’t tell her I’d stop for her.
I’ve done a decent job at making Mom’s space my own and glance at a few of my belongings throughout the room. I grab my phone from the nightstand and light up the screen. There are unread messages. I get them every day, but I’ve gotten really good at ignoring them, at pretending they don’t exist and there aren’t people out there looking out for me. Their concern is relentless, and while I appreciated it back when Sebastian came through and let me move into his apartment with him, I just want to be left alone now.
Solitary is all my heart reaches for as I ignore everyone’s texts, including Finn’s. The loneliness that digs into me isn’t uncomfortable but warranted. I deserve to stew in the ramifications of not helping Mom sooner, and instead, giving the Lincolns more of my attention.
I should have helped her, goddamnit.
Gotten her back into rehab and then paid them back.
But I didn’t do it that way and now she’s dead.
Fucking gone.
This pressure weighs down on my chest as I tuck my phone into my pocket and grab my keys. I don’t bother giving the rest of the house attention as I leave through the front door. I jiggle the doorknob just to make sure it’s locked and jog down the steps toward my car.
But then my feet come to a screeching halt halfway down the walkway. The car parked in front of mine doesn't belong there. It sticks out like a sore thumb but only because I’ve never seen that make and model on this street before.
The brazen man leaning against the passenger door is new, too. He’s an older version of Finn and me. I send him a heated glare that’s almost natural at this point. Clyde Lincoln doesn’t look at me with fatherly love in his eyes or with that forgiving look parents often give their children no matter their attitude. He regards me as if everything about me and our connection is conditional.
Like I’m a business deal he has yet to wrap up.
It only confirms the kind of person he is, one I want nowhere near me or this house.
His conniving, sinister voice slithers its way over to me. “Could be happier to see me.”
I stand there and stare at the man, a person I know I’ll never be happy to see. He’s taken too much from me. My money, my mother, and now everything she left behind, which has to be the reason he’s here at all. I knew he’d eventually crawl his way out of the woodwork. I’m surprised it took this long.
The house behind me is the perfect backdrop for whatever he has to say. A reminder that the home I’ve lived in my entire life and have come back to now that Mom is gone will be ripped away from me just as quickly.
“Don’t fucking act like I didn’t speak to you.” His tone is sharper now, like he has every right to correct my behavior. News-fucking-flash, he doesn’t.
My molars grind down, my jaw damn near breaking from the pressure. My chest aches in the same way it did when we were in Stewart’s office. When I learned that the man across from me is my biological father. “What the hell do you want?”
His eyes flick to the house behind me, and he holds up a piece of paper. “Finally came to collect what belongs to me. Took a bit of time but the bank finally fucking pulled through with the paperwork.”
“This house isn’t yours.”
“Not what your lawyer said, boy.” He cants his head to the side. “He really did screw you right up the shitter, didn’t he? Bet it was nice thinking about what you’d do with all the money your dopehead mother left behind.” He lets out a contented sigh that annoys me. “Doesn’t matter because this,” he indicates to the paper in his hand again, “gives me the right to throw your ass to the curb. House is in my name now.”
I wish my glare was strong enough to bring him to his knees. That it could act as pliers and torturously yank each of his teeth from his head one by one.
I get hung up on the way he disrespects Mom, ignoring that stupid piece of paper in his hand that I could easily take a lighter to and burn. “Don’t talk about her like that,” I counter with a venom in my voice that I’ve gotten quite used to the last month.
“Aw,” he coos. “How fucking adorable. Even now you want to come to her defense. If mommy dearest were still alive, you think she’d give a shit about you standing up for her?” He takes a small baggie out of his pocket and wiggles it. “This is what she’d care about. Same thing she wanted when she was behind bars.”
My brows push together, moving from what looks like a powdery substance in his hand back up to his face. How would he have known what she wanted then?
He smirks like he’s proud of me for coming up with the answer to the rhetorical math problem he laid out for me. It dawns on me a minute before he brags, “That’s right. Your druggie mom used her one call on me when those pigs locked her up, and guess what she asked for, Colson? No, wrong word. Begged is more fitting.”
Fucking drugs.
I thought about this, wondering how it was possible for her to get her hands on illegal substances while she was property of the state.
I stay quiet, because I’m not sure what I could possibly say to this man to make him realize how fucked up he is. Sneaking drugs into a jail for an addict through some secret contact is on another level of messed up.
All the muscles in my body seize with irritation, anger, and sadness. I don’t fucking know. Maybe all three wrapped into one. Either way, there’s a conglomeration of emotions as my stomach fills with disgust. This is why I turned to fighting, because I can’t deal with this, with him. With everything.
There’s nothing I’d rather do than cross the sidewalk and turn him into one of the guys I go up against. They’re all villains to me, this guy the biggest one. It’d be easy taking him down with how much rage boils my blood.
“What was I supposed to do?” he asks. “Deny her request?”
“You’re a piece of shit,” I spit.
“I was only giving her what she wanted,” he rationalizes.
My body moves on its own, eating up the grass as I cut across the patch of it in front of the house. “You’re going to wish?—”
“Watch your goddamn mouth,” he snarls, lifting his hand to signal what I find is one of his guys across the street. A car door opens, and it’s like all the times Finn ambushed me. A beefy dude stands there, face muscles pulled taut like they’ve never been given a day of relaxation. He’s wearing a red windbreaker, and with the flick of a hand, pushes it to the side and rests his hands on his hips. A gun glints in the daylight, the back end of a blued barrel merging into a handgrip resting on a belt buckle.
“Put the tough guy act away. You’re nothing to be scared of, but if you try and pull a fast one, Francis won’t have a problem speeding up your chances of seeing Janie again. He’ll make it quite the reunion.”
I fist my hands at my sides and manage to get out, “What do you want?”
“What’s mine. It’s time to pack your shit and find a bridge to live under.”
“Fuck you.” I’m not the guy who fell into the trap of him using Mom as leverage. I have nothing left to fight for, so at this point, I’m done holding back with him. He can reap what he sows.
“I was going to give you a month to make it happen, out of the kindness of my heart. But now?” He turns for the street, making it around the car and pulling the driver’s door open. “You got a week.”
“You think I’m just going to fall in line?”
He arches an eyebrow. I hate how his eyes have a similar shape and color as mine. How our appearances are uncanny, and I never picked up on it before. “If I’m not mistaken, you always did before. Be a good boy and keep it up,” he condescends with a smirk. He looks back at Francis. “He can help with that and will if you’re not out by this time next week. You don’t like that? Take it up with someone who gives a flying fuck. This house and the money are mine. Sooner you realize that, the better it’ll be for you.”
“I don’t owe you anything.”
Not anymore.
“Just the house,” he smirks. “But you’re right. If Janie did one thing right, it was teaching you the importance of following through on a deal.”
“That isn’t what this is,” I grit out.
This is him doing what the Lincolns do, which is taking what isn’t theirs.
“That’s where you’re wrong. Janie made this deal long before that last one you paid off. The night we took our hands in marriage, she put this into motion and just like you’ve always done, you’re going to bring it the fuck home for her.” His eyes drop to my feet then settle back on my face. “It’s the only thing you’re good for, but I guess that’s what happens when you’re a bastard child to a narcissistic junkie.”
My bite holds the weight of a Malinois attacking an intruder. I want to walk right up to him and take everything he ever took from me and more. I want to see him wither under a force that’s bigger than the both of us.
But I’m deathly still, my feet glued to the pavement below me. My body shuts down as it watches him retreat back into his car. He starts the engine and smoke billows out from the exhaust pipe, leaving my car and me in the dust.