Chapter Twelve #4
Her stepfather slinked out from a small gap between the tattoo studio and the place next door.
Pixie’s heart raced as she looked back toward the rear exit of the studio.
“You shouldn’t be here,” she whispered to him.
“I told you, I’m not giving you money.” It was a risk, calling his bluff, testing him to see exactly how far he’d really go.
But her suspicion was that he didn’t want to end up in trouble anymore than she did.
He stepped closer. “And I told you, you can’t keep me from going anywhere. If you don’t have the money, I’ll step inside and tell them what you did.”
Pixie’s head spun as she wiped her sweaty palms on her jeans. “Please . . . don’t . . . I have no way . . .”
“Yes, you do. Ask him for the money.”
It wasn’t about the money. She could afford to pay him, but if she did, she’d be paying him for the rest of her life, so she played along. “And tell him what? How do I even begin to explain what you did to me, asshole?”
“What I did to you? There was nothing I did that you didn’t want, you ungrateful bitch. The drugs, all of it. I saw you get off on it, remember. Why I should—”
Pixie gasped at the sickening sound of Dred’s fist hitting Arnie’s jaw.
Where Dred had suddenly appeared from she had no clue, but she watched in horror as Arnie stumbled backward and fell to the ground.
It took her a moment to process what happened, and by the time she had, Dred was already standing over Arnie, lifting him up by the collar, ready to hit him again.
“Dred, no. Don’t!” she shouted.
Dred turned and looked toward her, a blazing look of fury aimed straight at her. Oh my God. How much had he overheard?
With a hard shove, Dred let go of Arnie and dropped him to the ground.
“Fuck you, asshole,” Arnie shouted. “If you won’t give me my money, Sarah-Jane, I’ll sue his fucking ass.” Arnie stood, a little wobbly on his feet. He didn’t attempt to retaliate, clearly knowing when he was physically beaten.
“Go ahead and sue, motherfucker. I can afford to out-lawyer the shit out of you. Leave. Pixie. Alone.’
“She was mine long before she was yours,” Arnie yelled.
Pixie felt sick as she witnessed Trent and Cujo rush outside.
Arnie was going to tell them, and she was going to be ruined.
Trent and Cujo would no longer look at her as they did right now, with concern for her and absolute fury at Arnie.
She reached out her hand to Dred, who took a step further away.
The rejection cut through her. Witnessing it, Cujo stepped in and pulled her close under his shoulder.
“Yeah, well, she’s ours now,” Trent said calmly, coming to stand by her other side, although she could see from his fighter’s stance and clenched fists that he was anything but.
“Yours?” Arnie spat. “Used fucking goods is what she is. You want a fucking washed-up druggie for a pet, take her . . . for a price.”
Dred looked from Arnie to her, and she couldn’t bear to see the look on his face at the mention of drugs.
“Arnie, please.” Begging was the last thing she wanted to do, but she was all out of options.
She would never ask the men in her life for the kind of money Arnie wanted to go away and leave them alone.
And involving the police would likely see her charged with Brewster’s murder, but she would rather do that than allow these wonderful men to pay for Arnie’s silence.
Arnie straightened his collar and wiped his forearm across his mouth to wipe away the blood. “I’m going to ruin you, Sarah-Jane. And I’m going to ruin lover-boy too. You had your chance to pay up and make this go away. Now you better be prepared to face the consequences.”
* * *
He couldn’t have heard right, because Dred could have sworn he heard the man yelling at Pixie say she was a washed-up druggie. And there was no way the universe was playing such a cruel fucking trick on him.
But the look of abject horror on Pixie’s face told him his hearing was perfectly fine.
And when Trent had stepped between the two of them to hug her and tell her that everything was going to be okay because the guy hadn’t told them anything they didn’t already know, his stomach churned like waves hitting the sand down by Hermosa Beach Pier.
The whole time, Cujo glared at him. Dred could feel the penetrating stare, and the weight of the expectancy that he would snap out of it and step up to Pixie any minute to hold her.
Or perhaps Cujo was waiting for him to repeat Trent’s words that it was okay, when it wasn’t. It was so fucking not okay.
With a deep breath, he reached for his anchor, gripping it in such a way that the anchor’s bill dug into his palm. But even the sharp pain couldn’t detract from the sheer devastation he felt that Pixie was a junkie like his mom.
Cujo wrapped his arms around Pixie and whispered something that made her cry. He rubbed her back and continued to speak words muttered so low Dred couldn’t hear them.
He felt like an outsider, like he was having an out-of-body experience.
Pixie wiped her face, and Cujo let her go before walking toward him, coming to a stop when their faces were inches apart.
“That’s your fucking girl, and she’s hurting more than you can imagine,” he growled. “You make her feel worse and I swear on Drea’s fucking life, I will pound the crap out of you so fucking hard you won’t know whether to shit or go sailing.”
“You want us to stay out here with you, Pix?” Trent asked all the while glaring at Dred.
“No. Please. Go inside.”
Dred watched Cujo and Trent disappear back into the studio.
“You’re an addict,” he spat.
Pixie walked over to the steps to the studio and sat down. Her movements were jerky. Like her body was about to give out on her. But he’d seen that before with his mom.
“Yes,” she said, her eyes looking like they’d had all the sunshine ripped out of them.
Dred paced and pulled on the anchor so hard the cord broke. Of all the moments in his life, when he’d pulled on the anchor to compose himself, he’d never broken it. Until now.
Drowning in fury, he roared as threw it as far as he could down the alley.
Drugs and lies surrounded him. They always had.
He couldn’t remember a time when his mom hadn’t been an addict.
But she had always told him she wasn’t. She’d told him she could stop any time, but every attempt she made to go more than one day without a fix ended up with fits of anger and violent shaking and that desperate need for more drugs.
The first time he was taken into care, she’d screamed for him, but only lasted two days in the treatment center.
Two hellish days where he’d been placed with a family of older boys who’d made his life miserable.
When she’d taken him from school, swearing she was clean, she’d sneaked them onto the green-and-white GO train headed for Toronto without any tickets.
The very idea that drugs had touched his snowflake made him want to weep. He’d built an illusion of her. His perfect girl, yet she was no better than anybody else.
“How long were you a user?” he asked without looking at her.
“Two years, but it’s not what you think, Dred. I’ve been clean for six years.”
Six years. It felt too convenient. He needed to check. “Have you used while we’ve been together?
“No. I haven’t used since the day I set foot in Miami. The very next day I met Trent and Cujo and they helped me get clean.”
Dred paced the concrete, itching to let go of the last thread of control, to hit something hard enough to bring about a different kind of pain to the one currently cleaving him in two.
“But when I asked, you said you are an addict, right?”
“Yes, I did. I’ll always be an addict, but I’m sober. You know this. You’ve seen it with Nikan.”
“Don’t you dare bring my brother into it. He had his reasons.”
“And so do I!” Pixie yelled back at him.
He marched over to her, stood mere footsteps away, torn between wanting to believe her yet needing to leave. “Yeah. And what are they? Wanted to fit in with the cool kids?”
“You’re being an asshole, Dred. I was scared of telling you because I didn’t know how you’d respond. If I’d known it was this,” she said, tears filling her eyes, “I would never have bothered getting involved with you.”
“Yeah, well, I have enough junkies in my life without adding another one.”
“You’re not going to give me a chance to explain, are you?”
“Explain what? You’re an addict, and I don’t want anything to do with that. I don’t want my daughter around that. Good-bye, Pixie.”
She stood on the third step, bringing them close to eye-level. “Just like that, we’re done?”
Dred tried to ignore the tears spilling over her whiskey-colored eyes. A small voice told him to stop, to stay and talk it through. But the roar of rage was too strong. He needed to step back. Get some distance. “Yeah, just like that,” he said sadly and walked back into the studio.
Without stopping, he grabbed his bags and headed straight out of the door.
He marched toward Collins Avenue and flagged a yellow cab to the airport. Perhaps there was an early flight he could catch. The plan had been to hang out with Pixie, so he’d booked himself on the latest flight available. Now, he desperately wanted to get the fuck out of Miami.
Finally a taxi pulled over and he got inside. He spared one last glance down the street toward Second Circle, then closed his eyes until he reached the airport.
Once his flight had been changed, he’d made his way to the VIP lounge where he helped himself to a beer. Seated in a large brown leather chair facing the runway, he tried to force the feelings of remorse and shame down, but they were as insistent as Petal when she needed feeding.
How could he forgive Nikan for his addictions?
Wait, forgive wasn’t even the right word.
He didn’t forgive Nikan for anything, but he understood.
He knew why Nikan needed to escape, was even willing to work around it when he relapsed.
Anything to help his brother. Pixie was right, she and Nikan were the same, but he had treated them completely differently.
It wasn’t the fact they had both suffered addictions.
It was the fact that Pixie’s addiction was the same as his mom’s and Amanda’s.
But unlike his mom and Amanda, it sounded like Pixie was clean. Unless she was lying to him, which drug users were adept at.
His phone rang and he glanced at the screen. It was Sam. Leaning forward to grab his beer, he let it go to voice mail. He didn’t really want to talk to anybody right now.
Words started to form in his head and Dred grabbed his lyrics book and pen from his bag. The song he’d started to write for Pixie was taking shape, but he added a new line to end the bridge. When you reach rock bottom, I’ll be the savior that you need.
When his phone vibrated, he was of two minds whether to check the message. Likely from Sam, and not from Snowf—Sarah-Jane. He checked it anyway.
Wondered if you’d seen this.
It was a People magazine link. DRED-ING THE brEAKUP.
Out of curiosity, he clicked, even though he knew it was a media trick to lure readers in. He read the subheading. It’s over! Dred Zander’s girlfriend seen with new man.
The first photograph was of Pixie with her arms wrapped tightly around an attractive older guy. In the second, her head rested on his shoulder, but she looked upset about something. In the third, he was kissing her good-bye.
As much as he wanted to blame the paparazzi for grabbing the photos, there wouldn’t have been anything to snap if Pixie hadn’t been so affectionate with another man.
For once it appeared the gossip rag had gotten it right.
They were most definitely over.