Chapter 13
CATCHER
Eyes closed, I don’t move, letting the pulse around me sit on my skin.
I set the guitar back against the wall, careful without making a show of it, then grab my beer and drink as if none of that happened.
My eyes go to find her without permission. They always do.
She was sitting beside London, but Ruby is not there now, so I glance around the bar.
Bodies are packed shoulder to shoulder, and the air is thick with sweat and liquor.
But I don’t see Ruby amongst the crowd. Fender gets back on stage, guitar strapped low, voice rough through the mic, dragging the crowd where he wants them.
The floor vibrates under my boots as I slowly move through the bar, reading hands and posture more than faces.
I’m halfway past the women’s table when London catches my attention, and she motions to the hallway.
The hallway to the bathrooms is dim and narrow, partly clogged by the crowd sliding in and out of the main room.
A couple is tangled against the wall near the entrance, oblivious to everything but each other.
Farther down, past them, I catch a man’s shoulders.
He’s big, wearing a dark shirt, his body angled wrong, crowding someone.
Then I see her. It’s Ruby, whose back is to the wall, with some motherfucker’s hand clamped on her arm. Everything in me goes empty for one clean second. Then it rushes back in, mean and cold, like a door slamming shut.
I’m moving before I think.
He leans into her space as if he owns the air she breathes.
My vision narrows until the hallway is a tunnel, and he’s the only thing in it.
The music turns to a dull throb. The crowd becomes static.
All I see is his hand on her, and all I hear is my blood going black.
Ruby’s eyes flick over his shoulder and land on me, and I see her fear.
That does something to me—something violent and familiar. I step behind the son of a bitch without a sound. The man doesn’t hear me. Ruby’s lips part, and I shake my head once. Her gaze locks on mine like a handhold, and I feel her take the message.
The man’s voice carries, low and ugly. “We know your brother paid you a little visit last week.”
Brother?
Ruby’s color drains out as his grip tightens thinking he can squeeze the truth from her. “Where the fuck is he?”
I’m close enough to smell stale smoke and cheap cologne ground into his shirt. Close enough to see the grease at the edge of his cap, the twitch in his jaw when he tightens his grip.
“Take your fucking hand off her.” My voice stays low, cold enough to strip the air bare.
The motherfucker stiffens. Ruby’s eyes flutter shut for half a second, as if the sound of my voice gives her one breath she couldn’t get before. He turns his head just enough to look at me over his shoulder.
His eyes flick over my cut, my face, and then he smiles like he’s too stupid to recognize a grave when he’s standing in it.
“This ain’t your business.”
Rage detonates inside me so hard it damn near whites out my vision. I grip the back of the motherfucker’s neck and slam him against the opposite wall, hard enough that the sheetrock groans behind him.
I glance back at Ruby. “You hurt?”
Her eyes drop to the red marks on her skin. “I’m okay,” she whispers.
“Go,” I say.
She doesn’t move. Her eyes stay on the son of a bitch as I hold him in place against the wall.
“Babe,” I say, lower now. “Move.” Her throat works, then she slips past me, keeping as much distance as the narrow hallway allows. My body stays between them until she clears the corner.
The second she’s gone, I turn my attention back to the motherfucker who had his hands on Ruby. “Name.”
He grunts, teeth bared. “Fuck you.”
“Wrong answer.” I drive my fist into his ribs, feeling cartilage give under my knuckles.
He folds, wheezing, and swings wildly, catching nothing but hallway air.
I keep him close, steering him by the shirt and throat, pushing him toward the back door.
Everest is already in the back hall. Wick is with him.
I drag him through the back, his boots skidding. The door slams open into the alley, and the noise from the bar dies behind us like someone cut a wire. The outside heat hits like a wall, thick and wet with the stench of garbage and old beer. A security light buzzes overhead, flickering once.
I throw the fucker down. He hits the pavement on his hands and knees.
He tries to push up, and I kick him in the ribs.
He rolls, gasping, palms scraping asphalt.
He spits blood, laughing. I haul him up and drive him backward into the brick wall.
His skull snaps against it, and his knees buckle like the wall stole the strength out of him.
I keep him there with my forearm across his throat.
He laughs again, but it comes out wet. “You walked into the wrong place and put your hands on the wrong woman, motherfucker.”
The bastard gasps for a breath. “I ain’t gotta tell you shit.”
I hit him hard, driving my fist into his jaw, feeling teeth scrape against my knuckles.
I step back and let him swing on me. The punch skims my shoulder.
I answer with a knee to his stomach that folds him.
Then I grab the back of his shirt and slam him face-first into the metal dumpster beside us, and the sound rings through the alley.
I crouch, fist my hand in his hair, forcing his head back until his neck strains. “What does she got to do with her brother?”
“Fuck you.” He pants.
I haul him back to his feet, only to slam the back of his skull against the brick wall. I’m done looking for answers that he isn’t supplying. I drive my fist into his face and break his nose. His howl fills the alley and fuels my rage.
“Enough.” I hear Riggs, but barely.
I force myself to take a step back and look down at the worthless pile of shit at my feet, his breathing ragged. My fists hang tight at my sides, while I breathe through my nose until the red haze thins enough to see straight.
Everest moves in, checking the guy’s pockets with efficient hands, pulling out a phone, a cheap folding knife, and a wallet.
Riggs crouches enough to look at the man. “Shit,” he mutters, then looks at Everest. “Get the van and make sure he finds a fuckin’ hospital.”
Everest grabs the back of the man’s shirt and drags him toward the shadows near the dumpster like he’s taking out trash.
Riggs turns his attention back on me. “He put his hands on Ruby. I get it. But you don’t get to lose your head in my alley.” His voice isn’t loud, but it lands like a hand to the chest anyway.
“He wasn’t talkin’.” My tone is flat and justified.
He looks at the blood drying across my knuckles, then at my face. “There’s some shit we don’t need to be cleanin’ up in the alleyway of fuckin’ Bourbon Street.”
I stare at him, chest heaving, the taste of rage still thick at the back of my throat.
He’s right, and that only pisses me off more.
My pulse is still trying to tear out of my skin, every muscle wound so tight it hurts.
For one ugly second, all I can see is Ruby pinned against that wall, and every buried thing in me claws for one more hit, one more crack of bone, one more second to make somebody pay for all the times I couldn’t stop bad things from happening. I drag a breath in through my nose.
Riggs holds my stare another beat. Then he nods once. “Get your shit together, we need to talk with your woman.” He straightens and jerks his chin toward the door. “I’m getting answers from Ruby before whatever this is gets bigger.”
“Not my woman,” I mutter.
Without waiting for me or acknowledging my words, Riggs heads back.
Inside, the bar is still moving, but the energy near the back is tight and watchful.
The women have Ruby tucked between them at a table near the office, away from the crowd.
London’s face is pure fire. Tequila looks ready to shoot somebody for breathing the wrong way.
Luna sits close, one hand over Ruby’s, and Promise is angled like a shield.
Ruby is staring at the table, red marks on her arm where he grabbed her. When I stop in front of her, she looks up, and those eyes hit me hard.
“You okay?” My voice comes out rough.
“I’m fine.” She quickly looks away.
London makes a sound under her breath. “Bullshit.”
Ruby gives her a look, but it’s weak.
Riggs pulls out a chair and sits across from her, keeping eye contact and not towering over her. “Ruby,” he says, voice even. “We need to know what he said.”
She wraps her arms around herself, fingers digging into her sides. “He asked about my brother, Robby, and where he is,” she says.
“Your brother?” Riggs asks.
She sighs. “Yeah, my-piece-of-shit-can’t-get-his-life-together brother.”
I step closer without meaning to. Ruby glances up, and the air shifts.
Riggs keeps his voice even. “Tell us about Robby.”
“He’s been in trouble for years… bad choices, bad people. He showed up last week at my house needing help, from what or who I don’t know. With Robby, it can be anyone.”
“He brought his shit to your doorstep?” The words come out rougher than I mean them to, but the second she says house, something ugly kicks in behind my ribs.
Ruby cuts her eyes at me, already bristling.
“He was inside my house when I walked in,” she says.
Her voice is steady, but I catch the hitch under it.
Her fingers curl into the edge of the table hard enough to whiten her knuckles.
“If you’re about to give me a lecture about being more careful, save it. ”
My jaw locks.
Ruby looks up at me then, really looks, and there’s still fear in her, but pride rides right beside it.
I drag a breath through the burn in my chest and make myself ease back half a step.
“Did he say who he owed?” Riggs asks into the tight silence, pulling the room back to the point before I say something I can’t take back.
“No.”
“Where is he now?” Riggs asks.