Chapter One #2
He got within arm’s reach and bumped my shoulder. Not hard, but with intent. His cologne—a nauseating mix of cheap aftershave and even cheaper whiskey—hit before the words did.
“Looking for something, McKenzie?”
I stood my ground. He was six-one and maybe a hundred and seventy-five pounds, but I had three inches and fifty pounds on him, and he knew it. Still, he wanted the ritual. There was a neediness in the way he squared up, like he craved the friction.
“Just doing my shopping,” I said. My voice was flat. Most people hear that tone and back off. Luther just smiled wider, the kind of smile you put on right before you headbutt a guy.
“Funny, I thought your kind only came to town for funerals.” His friends snickered on cue. None of them would look me in the eye.
“That’s cute,” I said. “Is that what passes for wit at Bridger Bank these days?”
Luther leaned in, breath sour. “You think you’re better than us, don’t you?”
“I know I am.” I let him have that, let it hang in the air. The trick with Luther was to starve him of the response he wanted. If you played his game, you lost.
His nostrils flared. He shifted his weight.
I did the math—distance, stance, who’d swing first. If it went to fists, I’d have him on the ground in five seconds, maybe less.
His cronies would hesitate. One would try to cheap shot, but the other two were already looking for exits.
You can always tell the real from the fake in a fight.
He didn’t swing. Instead, he said, “You know, you could have done something with your life. Instead you just—what? Fix broken fences with that freak brother of yours? Waste of a name, if you ask me.”
I almost laughed. “Nobody asked you, Luther.”
He was about to push it further, but then a sound split the morning—a deep, wet rumble that made everyone’s teeth vibrate.
My brother Ransom, coming up main street on his Harley, pipes cut open and echoing off the buildings.
He was still three blocks away, but the noise was enough to kill the moment dead.
Luther’s buddies peeled off first, muttering half-formed insults. Luther glared at me a second longer, then spat on the sidewalk, a fat brown glob that missed my boots by an inch. “You’re not as tough as you think you are, Sarge.”
I shrugged. “But I’m still tougher than you.”
He started to reply, but thought better of it. He stalked off toward the gas station, checking over his shoulder twice. The bravado had a half-life of about thirty seconds.
Ransom rolled to a stop in front of the hardware store, engine idling like a pissed-off animal.
He was bigger than me by a few pounds, broader in the chest, and he had the same eyes—small, sharp, and brown as spent coffee grounds.
He cut the engine and flicked the kickstand, then slid off the bike with a grace you’d never expect from a man his size.
“You making friends?” he called, voice pitched to carry.
I shook my head. “Same old shit.”
He grinned, teeth white against his beard. “I heard Luther’s been running his mouth all week. Somebody ought to put him in his place.”
“He’ll put himself there. Just a matter of time.”
Ransom noticed the bag in my hand and the tension in my shoulders. He didn’t miss much. “You good?”
“Yeah,” I said. “Just got errands.”
He looked past me, toward the alley. “Is that Newt Bridger?”
I nodded, once. “He’s got problems.”
“Always did. Poor bastard.”
“Yeah.” I glanced over my shoulder, checking if Newt had moved.
He hadn’t.
Ransom fished a cigarette from his shirt pocket and lit it with a Zippo, the flame shuddering in the breeze. He took a drag and looked at me sideways. “You planning on playing savior or just observing?”
“Neither.” I lied as easily as breathing. “I got my own shit.”
He exhaled a cloud of smoke. “Suit yourself. Just don’t bring drama back to the shop. I’m not bailing your ass out again.”
“Noted.”
He swung a leg over the Harley and fired it up, engine drowning out any last words. He rode off, leaving the smell of exhaust and burnt rubber behind. Luther and his crew were nowhere to be seen. The sidewalk was empty except for me and the silence.
I headed for the alley. I pretended it was just a shortcut back to the truck, but the truth was, I wanted to see if Newton Bridger had survived the encounter. Or maybe I just wanted to see what he looked like up close, without the glass wall of the sheriff’s office between us.
I found him behind the post office dumpster, huddled against the bricks. He didn’t see me coming or maybe he just didn’t care anymore. He was shaking, his face buried in his hands.
“Hey,” I said, voice softer than I meant it to be.
He startled, tried to get to his feet, then gave up and just sat there, knees drawn up to his chest. He wouldn’t meet my eyes.
“Don’t worry,” I said. “They’re gone.”
He nodded, slow. His knuckles were scraped raw, like he’d tried to punch something harder than himself.
“You okay?” I asked, knowing it was a stupid question.
He shrugged, a bird-shiver of shoulders. “I’m used to it.”
I didn’t have a response for that. Instead, I squatted down, keeping my hands in plain sight. “You want a ride somewhere?”
He hesitated, then, “No. I’m fine. I just—needed a place to catch my breath.”
I nodded, respecting the lie. I’d done the same, once upon a time.
“If you change your mind,” I said, “I’ll be at the shop, the one west of town, about twenty miles out. You know the place.”
He looked at me then, really looked, blue eyes bright and desperate in a face that was all bones and bruises. “Why?”
“Because you look like shit,” I said, “and you shouldn’t have to take it alone.”
He laughed, a sound that bordered on hysterical. “You don’t even know me.”
“Doesn’t matter.” I stood, feeling the ache in my knees. “We take care of our own out here.”
He watched me go. I felt his eyes on my back all the way to the truck.
When I got in and slammed the door, my hands were shaking. Not from fear, not from anger. From the old hunger, the old itch to fix things, to control the outcome, to set the world back on its rails.
It never worked, but I kept trying anyway.
In the rearview, Newt Bridger was just a shadow slumped against the bricks, but even at that distance, I knew he was still watching. And I knew I wasn’t done with him yet.
* * * *
Newt wasn’t where I left him. My boots crunched the gravel behind the post office, nothing but wind and the reek of rotting cardboard. I checked the dumpster first, then the shadows behind the HVAC.
I found him huddled under the lip of the loading dock, arms around his knees, face pinched in pain. There was fresh blood on his knuckles and more at the corner of his mouth, the scab torn open fresh. He was shaking, not from cold but from something deeper, a tremor wired into the bone.
I crouched beside him, blocking the view from the street. The angle made my knees burn, but I ignored it. He flinched at first, expecting a blow, then recognized me and sagged like a marionette with cut strings.
He said, “You should go,” voice no louder than a whisper.
“I don’t take orders from you,” I said. I kept my tone neutral, not gentle—gentle would scare him worse than anger.
His eyes darted everywhere but my face.
Up close, I could see the constellation of old bruises under the new, yellow and green mapped across his jaw.
I reached for him, slow. He didn’t fight when I lifted his chin with two fingers. His skin was hot, fevered. My thumb found the split at his lip and wiped away the blood, the motion automatic, too soft for what I wanted to be.
“Who did this?” I asked.
He shook his head, too quick. “It doesn’t matter.”
“It matters to me.” My voice was quiet, the kind of quiet you use when you’re about to snap someone’s neck.
His arms tightened around his ribs. “Please, Knox. Just—don’t.”
I let go, but didn’t back off. “You plan on sitting out here all day?”
He tried to laugh, coughed instead. “I got nowhere to go.”
I almost told him he could come with me.
Instead, I stood, cracked my back, and offered him a hand. It hung in the space between us, big and calloused and ugly. He stared at it a long time, like he expected it to vanish or change into something worse.
When he finally reached out, his fingers barely touched mine, a feather-light brush, but I closed around them and hauled him up in one clean pull. He was lighter than I’d expected, unsteady on his feet, and for a second he just leaned there, pressed against my chest, all bird-bone and tension.
I could smell the adrenaline coming off him, bitter and sharp.
“You hungry?” I asked. I didn’t care about the answer.
He shook his head, but I started walking anyway, hand on the back of his neck to steady him. His pulse hammered under my thumb. We made it three steps before Ransom materialized at the corner, cigarette hanging from his lip, eyes narrowed.
“You picking up strays now?” he said.
I didn’t let go of Newt. “He’s hurt.”
Ransom snorted. “They’re all hurt, one way or another. You planning to bring that drama home?”
“If it’s a problem, you can sleep at the shop,” I said.
Ransom grinned, wolfish. “I like your style, Sarge. Don’t let Ma see him first, she’ll have a heart attack.”
“I’ll handle Ma.”
Newt tried to pull away, but I squeezed tighter and felt the resistance melt out of him immediately. He was shivering again, so I shrugged out of my jacket and draped it over his shoulders. It dwarfed him. My hands looked obscene against the softness of his skin, but I didn’t let that stop me.
We reached the truck. I opened the passenger door and waited while he climbed in, moving slow, careful of his ribs. I saw the flash of more bruises when his shirt rode up, some old, some new.
My teeth clenched so hard I tasted metal.
When I got behind the wheel, he was staring straight ahead, jacket pulled tight around him like armor.
“You want to tell me who did it?” I asked, eyes fixed on the road.
Silence.
“Luther?” I pressed.
He didn’t answer, but I knew. Luther always went too far, always needed to prove himself. I made a note to deal with him later.
“I’m taking you home,” I said. “Ma can patch you up.”
He didn’t argue. That was the most surprising part. Most people wanted to fight, want to keep their pride even if it killed them. Newt just let it happen.
It made me uneasy, how easy he gave in.
We drove in silence. The trees flashed by, sunlight flickering through them like the strobe on a warning beacon. The air in the cab was thick with things unsaid. I could feel his eyes on me, skimming my profile when he thought I wouldn’t notice.
“You don’t have to do this,” he said, barely audible.
“Yes, I do.”
“Why?”
I thought about lying, but it was pointless. “Because you’re mine to protect, whether you like it or not.”
I don’t know when I had decided that, but I knew it was true.
Newt flinched, then turned away, but not before I caught the hint of a smile. Not a happy one. More like relief.
We reached the farm. I parked by the side entrance, out of sight from the front porch. Ma would be baking, her radar dulled by the rhythms of dough and yeast, which gave me at least five minutes to get Newt inside and cleaned up.
I led him through the mudroom, then to the guest bathroom. The mirror above the sink was cracked, but it reflected everything I needed. I found peroxide and gauze in the medicine cabinet, a holdover from years of scraped knees and busted lips.
“Sit,” I ordered.
He did.
I wet a towel with hot water and started in on the worst of the blood. He hissed, but didn’t complain.
“You ever been in a fight?” I asked.
He snorted. “I’ve lost plenty.”
“First rule is to keep your hands up.”
He smiled, barely. “Didn’t have much warning.”
“Second rule,” I said, “is to hit back twice as hard.”
His smile faded. He looked at the floor, then at my hands, still cradling his jaw.
“I’m not like you,” he said.
I didn’t disagree. Instead, I dabbed at the split in his lip, careful not to break the skin more.
“You’re better than me,” I said. “You don’t need to be like me.”
He swallowed. “If you say so.”
I finished with the gauze, taped a butterfly closure on his cheek. When I was done, I stepped back, washed my hands, and dried them on my jeans.
He stood, swaying. “Thanks,” he said.
The word sounded foreign.
I watched him, hands clenched at my sides. “If anyone gives you trouble, you come to me. Understood?”
He nodded.
I didn’t trust it. “Say it.”
He hesitated, then said, “I’ll come to you.”
“Good.” I opened the bathroom door. “You can lay low in the den until you’re steady. Ransom won’t bug you and Ma won’t pry. If anyone comes looking, I’ll handle it.”
He followed, small and quiet. The house swallowed him up, made him look even smaller. I watched him settle onto the battered old couch, wrap himself in a blanket, and close his eyes.
I stood in the doorway a long time, watching his chest rise and fall, the bruises already darkening under the skin. I catalogued every mark, every tremor. I told myself it was for his safety. That was only part of it.
The other part—the ugly, selfish part—was the knowledge that, for the first time in years, I had something worth guarding again.