CHAPTER 42
Asher
AGE SEVENTEEN
M y heart is thumping faster the closer I get.
I’m almost done; the battery is the last piece before I add all the fluids to the motorcycle I’ve been working on for months.
My phone says it’s one o’clock in the morning.
I shake my head. I shouldn’t be surprised.
My dad said he’d be home by now, but I know he’s with Denise, or one of his other side pieces.
He doesn’t bring them here to Scarsdale, our upper class neighborhood outside New York.
He stays in the city with his mistresses.
It used to piss me off that he cheated on my mom, but now I know that’s just the way it is when you’re the king of the Saints. You get all the pussy you want.
At seventeen, I’m not the king yet, but I’m James Donovan’s son and the fly half on our school’s varsity rugby team, so I already get all the pussy I want too.
Moment of truth. I stand back and look at my bike.
A 1973 vintage Harley. A gift from my uncle Pete.
I’ve restored the whole thing with the money my father gave me for my seventeenth birthday when he told me I have only a year left to play.
After that, I belong to the family. I’m old enough now to know what that means: One day, I’ll control this empire.
I turn the key and my bike fires right up, filling the open garage with a beautiful deep rumble.
“Fuck yeah,” I grit out, turning up my iPod in celebration.
Eminem fills the space and adrenaline rushes through my blood because, tomorrow, I’ll be riding.
I’m so consumed by the sound of the bike, my music, and the thought of what I have to do next that I don’t hear the group of men as they make their way across our vast property to the house.
I don’t hear the windows break as lit Molotov cocktails are thrown through them.
It isn’t until I smell the heady scent of smoke coming from somewhere close by that I pause and turn down my blaring music.
And that’s when I make my way to the door of the garage and see the flames a hundred feet away.
I hear screaming and then, I’m running, knowing, once again, that my father pissed off someone he shouldn’t have.
I pull my gun from my hip, ready to shoot any mother-fucker on our property the way my father and my uncle trained me to. My stomach lurches as I round the corner of the yard to see the east side of our house burning.
It’s been burning. Flames shoot through the living room window as I hear the sound of glass breaking. I don’t see anyone on the premises, but I hear another scream, and I feel like I might throw up because I know it belongs to my mother.
“James! Asher!” she cries as the heat hits me like a fucking tsunami the closer I get to the house.
I search for an open space to get inside.
The front door is impossible; the flames are out of control behind it.
I have no idea what the fuck I’m doing as I run to the back door off the kitchen and kick it in without thought.
Another wave of heat blasts over me and I can hear my mom’s sobs. I cry out for her as my lungs fill with smoke. I know I’m too late because, holy fuck, our entire living room is on fire.
Panic rises; I can’t even see down the hall where the screams are coming from.
My mother’s bedroom is on the other side.
The horrific sounds continue over the deep crackle of fire and the crash of items falling and smashing on the ground.
I hold my shirt to my face and keep trying to find a way through the burning rubble because I can’t leave her. I have to save her. My mama.
Images of her flood my head as I call out, telling her I’m coming, while I choke back sobs; in our yard, on the swings, chalking in the driveway when I was young.
The way she kisses the top of my head before ruffling my hair.
The way she watches from the stands when I win my rugby matches.
Birthdays, breakfasts, masses, family gatherings—it’s all flooding me now as I narrowly miss being smothered by one of the ornate beams from our living room as it falls and hits the floor.
The sounds of sirens fill the air, drowning out the screams of my mother that are already dimming.
My lungs grow heavy and dots line my vision as I try to lift the searing beam.
It’s too big, too heavy, and the wood is charring my flesh, but still, I try.
I still have to try. I can’t let her die.
Olivia’s eyes are filled with tears when I look up at her, finishing my story.
“It was too big to stop by myself. I was living a life of insolence: drugs, arrogance, entitlement. I wasn’t a man.
I was a boy who thought he was a man.” I swallow the boulder in my throat.
“And I wasn’t strong enough then. The smoke was too thick, and I guess I passed out.
Firefighters pulled me from the room and said I was moments from death myself. ”
She swipes a tear from her cheek. “The scars on your hands?”
I lift them, studying, remembering. “I didn’t feel anything. All I could focus on was her screaming: my father’s name, my name, crying out to God to save her. And then it was over. Everything was quiet.”
The silence is what haunts me the most.
“I’m so sorry.” Olivia’s face is full of genuine sorrow and understanding. “That’s why you fight fires now.”
I nod. “After she died, you’d think I’d stop partying.
Stop living that life. But I ran toward it to do my best to bury everything.
I was angry at everyone and everything, so I used people, women mostly.
I drank too much, took every drug I could get my hands on.
I let that anger fuel me to work for my father.
I told myself it didn’t matter, but I always heard her voice in my head telling me there was another way, that I should get out.
But after I went to jail, I never touched a drug again.
Never took advantage of another woman drawn to the power of my father’s world.
Prison changed me. It made me a better man, but it also put up solid walls around me.
I vowed to never again let in anyone that could hurt me.
About a year after I got out, my uncle told me Staten Island was looking for recruits at the one-thirteen station. ”
“Is that when you left?”
“Not quite. You don’t just leave my family. I had to train first and find a way to ease out. But I remember thinking, maybe I could save someone else’s mother.”
It’s been a long time since I’ve thought of that, fuck.
“When I was about twenty-three, I began distancing myself, because I felt like a better man when I wasn’t in that world, but there were too many ghosts. The pull was too strong. I was still heavily involved, and family was always trying to suck me back in.”
“Your father included?”
“My father especially. My guess is he still wants me to come home.” Now would be the perfect time to tell her exactly who my father is, but as I look across the table at her beautiful face, I can’t do it. I’m too selfish to give her up.
“I saw the ad online for battalion chief in Laurel Creek almost three years ago. I had just enough experience to apply, and I knew that a small town in Kentucky was the last place my family would come looking for me.”
“You’ve overcome a lot …” Olivia focuses on stirring the icing, her lip between her teeth as she tries not to let the tears in her eyes spill over.
“Seems you’ve just got a lot more information than you bargained for,” I say. “I’ve never told anyone that before. Feels good. Fucking cathartic even.”
She smiles softly as she sets the spatula down.
“Your story is safe with me.” Olivia reaches across the island and puts her hand over mine, stroking the scars there. “And, for what it’s worth, I think your mother would be really proud of you.”
I clear my throat and pull my hand away, the momentary fear of losing her crippling me. I carry the dirty dishes and measuring cups to the sink, needing a second and internally scolding myself for pulling my hand away.
I’m still lost in my memories, washing the last few bowls, when Olivia moves beside me. I turn to face her and her hands slide around my waist as she angles her face to mine. I can’t help but stiffen as her arms hug me tight and she leans her head on my chest.
“I’m sorry,” she whispers, pulling back to look me in the eyes, and my chest twitches even more. “A loss like that. It’s unthinkable.”
I let the moment wash over me as I watch the way her blue eyes focus on mine.
“You’re a good man, Asher,” she whispers, just as Dick jumps up onto the counter beside us like a fuckin’ dumbass, thinking the handle of the spatula is a good perching point.
It goes flying through the air—eventually landing on the floor, but not before icing flings everywhere, flicking onto my face and hers.
I look down at her at the same time she looks up at me in shock.
Dick takes off down the hall; it obviously scared the shit out of him too.
Olivia’s mouth tugs up and I’m left wondering if this was the universe’s way of lightening the mood after all the heaviness. Because, fuck, she looks damn edible covered in icing.
“All right then, guess we’re having a proper taste …” I lean in and run my tongue along her chin, letting the sugary icing melt on my tastebuds. It doesn’t taste as good as she does.
Olivia half whimpers and half laughs before she turns, a coy look on her face as she reaches into the bowl and smears icing across my lips with her finger.
“Fucking beautiful asshole,” I faux-snarl at her, sucking her finger into my mouth and licking the sugar from it. The feel of my tongue on her finger has those sapphire eyes heating instantly.
“I hate to break it to you, buddy, but you aren’t so scary with icing all over your face,” she challenges, and before I can stop myself, I’m swiping my own finger into the bowl, then smearing it across her lips, then dragging it farther down her neck.
Her breath quickens and I know I’m done for.
Because, before she can take another inhale, I’m hoisting her onto the counter and crushing my lips to hers.
Hands down, the best fucking treat I’ve ever had.