Chapter 16
CONNOR
“Hey,” I shout into the studio as I enter, “T-Mo, where are you?”
“Not here,” one of the artists calls back to me.
I thought I would be more relieved to hear that, but instead, I find that I’m only about thirty-three percent of the way relieved; the other sixty-seven percent is reserving itself for worry.
Worry. Shame. Guilt. Horror. Whatever name you’d like to give it.
As I walk toward my station, I drop my helmet onto my desk. “Do you know where he is?”
“He said something about staying with his brother for a few days,” he answers. “I think he’s getting burnt out.”
“Yeah,” I nod.
He’s with his family, I tell myself. The comfort that comes with that thought is quickly erased and replaced by another. It’s so bad, he flew out to be with his family.
I can’t imagine that he would go to Graham for this.
Brody would at least give him space, but…
god, I’m a piece of crap. Any second now, someone is going to walk through the front door of the shop, carrying a massive trophy engraved with the words ‘world’s worst friend,’ and they’re going to hand it to me.
“I’ll bet his wife’s running around on him,” I hear from another station. “You don’t up and leave the state unless something major happens.”
“Don’t start rumors,” I bark at him. As I move to the front door to unlock it, I add, “Just shut up and do your jobs. He’ll be back soon.”
I don’t know that I believe myself when I say that. There’s an entirely real possibility that he’s gone for good. He picked up his entire life back in New York and left it all behind with less than a day’s notice, why wouldn’t he do it here, too?
Dropping into my stool, I huff as I reach for my phone to send Julia another text message, this time telling her that Tripp flew home. I send another asking if she’s okay, but she doesn’t respond to either one of them. I haven’t heard a peep from her since the night that Tripp found out about us.
I’m starting to look desperate.
Maybe she already knows that he’s gone home, anyway. She might have gone with him, for all I know. If you pack up and leave behind the guy who weaseled his way into the middle of your marriage, your marriage is fixed, right?
Something uncomfortable pulls in my chest.
Pulling in a deep breath, I shake my head to send it away.
It was just sex, I tell myself. I can get sex anywhere.
Great, now it’s not just Tripp I’m lying to.
My fingers tap against my fuel tank, the still-running engine giving off a quiet purr while I sit idle on the driveway.
I’ve visited this place thousands of times. It’s a second home to me.
Right now, though, the Spanish-style architecture of the townhouse in front of me looks more like something out of my nightmares.
No sane person would be able to conjure up any reason that I should be here right now. My sister would spout off with words more colorful than I’d ever heard if I told her that I was here; and she would probably be right.
Turning off my engine, I slip off my gloves and open the visor on my helmet before banging a fist against the door in front of me.
“Jules,” I call into the house, “open the door!”
I wait, checking my phone every few seconds between knocks, but she never comes to the door. I can hear the TV in their living room. I know she’s home; and now I know that means that Tripp left her.
“I won’t do anything,” I promise. “I just want to make sure that you’re okay.”
A message alert pings on my phone.
That’s something that I don’t think I can do.
She’s a bubbly person by nature, but between this and the pieces that Tripp has shared with me of their past, I know that she’s probably in there crying by herself; and as wrong as it is, I want to go in there and try to make her feel better.
Comfort her somehow, if I can. I need to help pick up the pieces of the heart that I had a hand in breaking.
Maybe there’s a small part of me that wants to be able to say ‘look, I made the right decision, I did the right thing – the hard thing, but I’m not running.’
Tapping the corner of my phone against the door, I flip closed the visor on my helmet and head back toward my bike.
She’s alive, she’s conscious, she’s still in the state.
I can live with that.
As I head back toward my bike to slip my gloves back onto my hands, I shake my head with a hollow chuckle as a sick irony hits me.
There are three people I’d like to talk to right now; the same three people that I could always talk to about anything. My dad, Tripp, or one of our first riding buddies – Ray.
My dad’s ashes are somewhere in the Atlantic, because how was an eighteen-year-old kid supposed to pay for two caskets when he could barely afford to feed his sister?
Tripp would likely rather kill me than talk to me, and we buried Ray five years ago, a few hours up the coast near his parents’ house.
The carabiner holding my keys is the same one that held his until we lost him.
As I settle onto the seat of my bike, I pull in a steadying breath and run through a check list in my head. It’s a half-pass on two out of six. If I stay on this driveway and I keep waiting for Julia to open the door or make a sound, though, I’ll fail three.
Offering one more glance toward the front door and throwing out one last ounce of hope that she’ll open it, I start my bike and pull away from the building, through their neighborhood and back onto the main roads.
I find myself at a dingy-looking hole-in-the-wall bar, whose interior reeks of stale cigarettes and a mother’s disappointment. Settling onto the seat of a peeling faux leather stool, I offer a smile to the bartender, raising two fingers in a wave.
With a kind glance in my direction, he adjusts the worn ball cap that covers his oil-black hair and leans against the bar.
“You seem like a no-frills guy,” he tells me, and the corner of my mouth quirks. “We’ve got a shitty IPA and a shittier lager on tap.”
“I’ll take my chances with the lager,” I laugh.
“You’re brave,” he tells me.
A smile works its way across his lips, his eyes catching mine every now and again as he fills a pint glass from the tap. I return his smile, pulling off my gloves to rest them in the space next to me on the bar and offering a nod of thanks as he slides the glass across the surface.
Always looking for something.
Anxious and avoidant.
My forearm drops onto the bar as I pull the glass to my lips, letting my gaze trail through the small space before I return it to the man working the bar. I offer him the occasional glance, a soft smirk in a test of the waters.
The silent invitation is met with a wink and frequent looks in my direction while he works. I let myself feel the warmth that hits my stomach as I smile into my lager, carefully sipping on it.
A body drops onto the stool next to mine, a man maybe a few years older than I am, if I had to guess.
His hat, like the bartender’s, is older and worn, with ‘keep on trucking’ printed on a patch stuck to the front of it.
I can’t put a finger on exactly what it is, but something about him puts a familiar knot in the pit of my stomach.
“How’s about another round for my friend, here?” He says to the man behind the bar, using his head to gesture in my direction. When his eyes land on me, I keep my head forward, using only my eyes to look at my surroundings. “You can come on and play a round of darts with us.”
A quick glance to my right offers a view of his friends; two other men, at least one of them already drunk enough that he should be cut off. They’re talking loudly enough amongst themselves that a slur makes its way across the bar as one of them looks in my direction.
“Nah,” I say with a shake of my head. I meet the bartender in a warning gaze as I lift my beer. “I gotta finish up here and get home to the missus.”
Pulling my wallet from my pocket with a clammy hand, I take out a few bills to set them on top of the bar. A lifted brow asks a question that my mouth can’t, and the man in front of me offers a subtle drop of his chin as he swipes the bills into his hand.
He’s not alone here.
“One game,” hat man insists from his perch next to me, but I shake my head.
Shaking hands slide into my gloves, making a great effort to keep my left hand from his view before I hightail it out of the bar and into the parking lot. With frequent glances over my shoulder, I climb onto my bike, blowing out a breath more shaky than the rest of me.
Today of all fucking days.
Coming to a stop in the nearest parking lot, I slide off of my bike and rest my helmet on the seat as I pull down the zipper of my jacket. I drop into a squatting position next to my bike, bracing my forearms against my knees as I pull in a long breath.
My thumb hovers over Tripp’s name on my phone, like that’s where it’s supposed to be. Like he’s the person who always comes to my rescue, and in a lot of ways, he has been.
Ten years ago, he peeled me off of the sidewalk bloodied, beaten, and unable to walk on my own, because I’d believed a guy just like the one in that worn-down hat. Up until that night, I hadn’t known if I’d ever tell him who I really was.
When I told him that I’d been out with another man, and he figured out that it was why I was left in the shape I was in, the only thing I heard after he dropped me off with Julia was the sound of him cursing, his engine revving, and a silence that filled every one of my veins with lead.
I still don’t know what he did that night, and I’m not sure that he’d ever tell me.
My keys hit the kitchen counter as I walk into the house, met with a wiggly, yelping Koda.
The adrenaline pumping through my veins to get me home is gone, and exhaustion now racks every inch of my body.
I lower myself to the floor with my back pressed against the side of the refrigerator as he clambers over top of me, desperately licking at my face.
“Long ride?” One of my roommates – the one that I’m pretty sure has an ex-wife – asks with a chuckle as he steps into the kitchen. “Your dog didn’t leave the damn door while you were gone.”
“One day I’ll actually get the bike set up for you to ride, too,” I coo to Koda, scratching him behind the ear as my roommate shoots a doubtful look in my direction.
As I gather the bearings he doesn’t know that I’ve lost, I push myself up from the floor and head into the bathroom, stripping before I step into the shower.
My head hangs against the wall, the warm water against my skin twisting itself into the sensation of phantom blood spilling from my scalp as the image of Tripp’s face burns itself behind my eyelids.
‘Tell me where you are.’
My stomach churns.
With a blink, the concerned face of the man hoisting me off of the ground is replaced with hatred and betrayal, standing in the quiet of the shop.
‘Tell me you’re not having sex with Julia.’
My forehead meets the tile with a hard thunk.
Outside of my sister, Tripp and Julia are the most important people that I have left in my life. I have other friends, and I cherish those relationships, but those three are my family.
“I’m sorry,” I say into the downpour from the shower head, letting the water pull my words down the drain with it.
I’m sorry for hurting you both.
I’m sorry for pushing you further away from each other.
I’m sorry I made such a mess of everything.