3. Reaper
Reaper
The Present…
Most of the time, the sound of my gloves pounding against the leather bag inside of the club’s gym soothes the unrest in my soul.
Not only the sound, but the action, the movement of my hands and feet usually lures me into a sense of calm.
A form of peace, even when I don’t truly have it.
However, today that calm is shattered by my youngest brother, Gavin, or Saint, as the Sinners call him.
He’s not shutting his damn mouth. Going on and on like a little bitch.
“Are you trying to get yourself fucking killed!”
I shrug, returning my attention to the heavy bag swaying in front of me.
“Maybe I am. What fucking business is it of yours?”
I’ve been at the gym for hours trying to blow off steam. You know that saying, idle hands are the Devil’s playground? I live by that. So, I keep busy because if I don’t, then nobody’s safe.
It’s been six months since I last let loose. Even though killing Aleksi had been for a good reason, I don’t just go around killing people anymore unless it’s warranted. I try to spend as much time as I can in the gym or at the underground fights to quiet the noise inside my head.
Both my legs and arms are like jelly and sting from hours of exertion.
I’m drenched in sweat from head to toe, but I want to keep going.
I have to keep pushing through the pain, keep pushing through the fatigue assaulting my tired limbs because other than killing someone, it’s the only way I can feel anything
Saint’s been going at it for the last forty minutes about the way I choose to handle my mental state, which isn’t helping said mental state.
Nobody understands the man I am today. No one knows what I went through that made me this way.
No one’s asked and I haven’t offered any explanations.
So, to answer Saint’s question. Do I care if I live or die?
At this point in my life, the answer is no. I don’t. I stopped caring the day she took her last breath. If she’s gone, what’s the point in me living?
Blake’s words always echo in my brain, especially when the topic of death comes up. We are not promised tomorrow, Logan. So, we must live our life like it’s our last. I just want to live before I die. I want to experience life with you until I have no more life left in me.
Remembering her words brings hope and devastation to me on a daily basis.
She lived her life until she took her last breath in my arms. She lived life like there wasn’t a tomorrow because her time came sooner rather than later.
So now, I don’t think about death or life for that matter.
It is what it is. We’re born to die. When we take our first breath of life, we are one second closer to death.
That’s what our Ma always says. Anyway, I lost all hope years ago to make a decent life for myself, especially without her.
Now I’m just counting down the days until it all ends by my hands or someone else’s.
Saint grabs the burgundy heavy bag, stopping it from swaying. My concentration and momentum are thrown off, but only for a moment, then I get right back into the swing of things, pushing myself faster, harder.
Faster, harder.
With each punch, Saint braces himself against the bag absorbing the blows as the sound echoes through Sin Gym. The Sinners fitness gym owned by Toad, our Sgt. At Arms. At the moment, we’re the only two here although, I rather it was just me.
I don’t slow down or hold back. If he wants to interrupt my time alone with his stupid ass questions, scolding me for the decisions I make in my own life, then he can take whatever I give.
“Are you even fucking listening to me?”
“No.” I throw another combo, and a couple of jabs, making sure I almost knock him on his ass before I stop my punches and glare at my youngest brother. “I’m trying to finish my workout.”
“Fuck your workout.”
I chuckle. He’s so different from the kid I used to know. The boy who wanted to save our father by becoming a priest. The man who would have been better off dead than be in our lives. God gave us our wish a few years ago.
Once upon a time Saint and I were really close. Then when he got sent up for something our father done, naturally we drifted apart. He was serving time, while I was trying to find out what to do with my life.
I unstrap the training gloves on my hands. My workout is shot to hell anyway. There’s no point continuing if he’s not going to leave me the fuck alone. I can’t concentrate.
“Does Dylan know what you’ve been up to?”
Another damn question. Another damn question that doesn’t concern him.
Everyone’s entitled to their secrets, including me.
“Does Dylan know every fucking thing you do, little brother?” He rolls his fucking eyes. “Right. He doesn’t. I’m a grown motherfucking man, Gavin. I can do what the fuck I want when the fuck I want to do it. I don’t need or ask Dylan’s permission, yours, or anyone else’s.”
I shoulder past him, then storm into the locker room with him hot on my heels.
If he wasn’t my brother, I’d have already put him on his ass for being in my business.
Nobody knows I fight at the Petrov’s underground fight club because it isn’t something everyone needs to know about for obvious reasons. And it’s also my fucking business.
How in the hell did he find out?
“You can do what the hell you want, Logan, but not when it puts the rest of us at risk. We have fucking families now. And fighting in Bratva territory puts the Sinners at risk. This has to be the reason they’ve been encroaching on our territory.”
It is. And Aleksi’s death didn’t deter them like I hoped it would.
“You’re the one to talk about putting people at risk, little brother. Or have you forgotten that quickly?”
He crosses his arms over his chest. Oh, I struck a nerve .
“What the hell does that supposed to mean!”
He knows exactly what I mean, but maybe he needs a little reminder. A little refresher of what we had to go through because of the person he’s fucking.
“I wasn’t the one fucking a politician’s wife who you knew good and damn well could have brought all of us down.”
I hate bringing Oya into this petty argument because she’s a good woman and perfect for my brother. But I also hate hypocritical, self-righteous motherfuckers, too and right now, Saint is checking all the boxes. Hypocritical, self-righteous, and motherfucker.
“Ex-wife.”
I roll my eyes. “Semantics, little brother.”
“What happened between me and Oya is not the same thing, asshole. And that was years ago.” He sighs. “What you’re doing is reckless and you fucking know it.”
I shrug.
Maybe what I am doing is reckless. However, to me, him fucking Oya is exactly the same thing.
At the time it had been just as reckless.
But I don’t want to get into an argument about it, so I keep my damn mouth closed and let him make his point.
He’s happily married. Why bring that down with the truth?
He did what he did because he found the woman he loves.
I do what I do because of the woman I love and lost. I won’t make him feel bad about his actions, no matter how bad he’s trying to make me feel about mine.
“I’m not putting anyone at risk except for myself. I fight, then I bring my ass home. Alone. I see nothing wrong with that. How the hell did you find out, anyway?”
“You’re fighting in the Petrov’s underground fights, Logan.” He tosses his hands in the air. “You can’t think that’s something that won’t affect the rest of us. They know you’re a Sinner and they’ve been doing shit against us for months because of it.”
I don’t miss how he avoids the question of how he found out, but it doesn’t matter.
Him knowing isn’t going to stop me from taking my ass down there every chance I get.
It’s my therapy. I do it for me. It keeps me sane by shutting down the memories of the past. When I’m in the ring, I’m numb.
But when I’m outside, the madness takes over.
I need to do it because if I don’t, the outcome is much more dangerous.
“I’ve got it handled, Gavin.” I throw my gloves in the locker, grab my towel, along with my gym bag, then slam the door shut. “I’m not hurting anyone.”
I shoulder past him again on my way to the showers, hoping he’ll get the hint and leave me the fuck alone. Of course, he doesn’t. He just follows behind me, irritating me even more.
“You think if you get injured or worse, none of us will give a damn? We all love you goddamn it!” He shoves me. “When’s the last time you’ve spent time with Grace or any of us? You’re either in the gym, apparently in Petrov’s fights, or just MIA.”
I let out a long sigh. My niece, Grace, King’s daughter, who I love to death, I haven’t seen in a long time.
Not because I don’t want to, but because I’m not in the right state of mind to be around her.
She’s old enough to realize none of us are perfect, but she’s a reminder of how far I’ve strayed into the darkness.
“Whether you do give a damn, or you don’t, it doesn’t matter to me, Gavin.”
I ignore the question about Grace. It’s not something I want to get into right now. I’ve got enough on my plate without getting into the complicated feelings of how my life is spiraling out of control.
“Well, it fucking should matter, Logan! We’re your family!”
“Everyone’s time comes sooner or later no matter how it happens.”
I never really thought about how my actions will affect my family.
I never really thought about how anything happening in my life affects them.
They’ve got their own shit going on. Gavin and Oya are married.
Gavin is obsessed with the professor. She’s beautiful, intelligent, a sweetheart, and she adores my brother. He’s got all he can ever want.
Dylan is married to Alana, and they have two kids, Grace, and Rory. King wasted no time asking Alana to marry him after finding out about Grace. Although it took a while for her to say yes, she finally did. He’s also got everything he can want out of this shit life.
What do I have? A fucking tombstone.
“It doesn’t matter little brother because nothing’s going to happen to me.” I strip out of my clothes and wrap the white towel around my waist, then throw my sweaty clothes inside my gym bag. “If you don’t want to watch me jack off in the shower, I suggest you get going.”
One more thing I have to do to release the extra pent-up energy since he interrupted my workout.
“I’m not going to keep this from Dylan, Logan. I can’t.”
“You do what you feel you need to do.”
He tosses his hands in the air, cursing under his breath as he storms out of the locker room.
What did he expect? For me to say, oh no, please don’t tell K ing.
He can do whatever the hell he wants. No one’s going to keep me from doing what the fuck I need to do for me, including my brothers.
Right now, what I need to do for me to make it through to the next day without killing someone is to fight.