19. Chapter 19
Chapter 19
BERNIE
T he river rushed around my ankles. Borrowed waders from Sawyer kept the water and cold at bay. We had yet to speak, and the only sound piercing through the crackling current was the hissing of a fishing line through the air. With one hand, I tugged at the line as I dried off the fly with the rod in my other.
Swishing back and forth a few more times, I set the fly down into the river further upstream and slowly began the steady drum of reeling it back in.
He would speak first, I had no doubt in my mind, as his shoulders inched higher and higher up to his ears. Each drop of the fly into the water on his part was less coordinated, less majestic.
All I had to do was bide my time, and that man would crack like an RPG against cinder blocks.
“Aren’t you from Chicago? Like your family?” Sawyer finally asked, his voice shaking.
“Yes,” I replied, spinning the reel as the fly rose from the water.
“Then how do you know how to do…this?” he continued, dropping his rod in front of him. “Shit,” he cursed and quickly snatched it up before it was swept away in the current.
“I’ve picked up a lot of different things,” I answered curtly, smoothly whisking the fly and fishing line through the air again. “Like how to tell when someone is hiding something. I’m really good at that.”
“I—I’m not hiding anything,” he stammered.
“No? Nothing to do with why you were out looking for Kat before anyone else was awake. Has nothing to do with the fact that you’re involved with the shit Wyatt’s messed up in?” I stated, laying the fly down gently onto the river.
“What?!” he gasped, a little too loudly.
Spinning sideways, I quickly reeled in my line and glared at him. “So, I’m right.”
“No, there’s—there’s nothing—I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he muttered, placing the fishing rod to his chest, ignoring the fly flapping in the breeze at the top he hadn’t secured to the rod.
“Yeah, you do. You know exactly what I’m talking about, and you’re gonna fucking tell me everything,” I hissed, wading toward him as I slipped the hook on a ring.
He fervently shook his head. “I don’t know anything. Wyatt’s not involved in anything.”
“Then why do you care so much about Kat being with Wyatt? What’s in it for you?”
“I don’t care that much.”
“Then it wouldn’t have mattered if we cuddled, fucked, or just talked last night. But you came looking. You asked. You even snapped at her for being there with me, not Wyatt.”
“Did you two fuck?” he asked, his eyes widening.
“See? You do care,” I answered, stopping directly in front of him.
My shadow fell over his body as he knotted his jaw. “I care who fucks my sister, yes. Any good brother would.”
Slowly, I shook my head. “But that’s not why you truly care. Why’d you come looking for her?”
His lashes fluttered rapidly over his eyes, and his bottom lip trembled. “I can’t—I can’t say anything. If my parents find out, or if… if Wyatt finds out, I’ll be screwed,” he whispered, almost as if there was a wave of relief flooding his figure that I’d continued to ask. As if he wanted someone else to finally know.
“It’s just you and me out here, buddy.”
“I don’t want Kat to marry Wyatt. She can’t marry Wyatt,” he blurted out.
“Why? Because Wyatt’s dealing drugs and uses?”
He froze, every muscle in his body stiffening. “You know about that?”
I stepped away from him a little bit. “I wasn’t one hundred percent sure, but you just confirmed it. And you’re involved, otherwise you wouldn’t have been so nervous earlier,” I replied.
Sawyer closed his eyes, his shoulders sagging. “I’m clean now. I have been for a month. I promise.”
I chewed on the fat of information now flooding my mind. Sawyer’s expression tightened, one I’d seen before. One on Dom’s face once, years ago when he’d first become team commander and during a joint mission when things went sideways, resulting in a death.
“You don’t need to explain anything to me. Addiction is a curse I wouldn’t wish on anyone.” I slowly unhooked the fly and began pulling some fishing line out.
Sawyer’s brows twitched. “You’re not going to yell at me? Get pissed? Hell, anything like that?” He turned to face me and opened his eyes.
I shook my head. “Not my place. I’m glad you’re clean, that’s all that matters.”
He gently pushed the fishing rod away from his chest, and the tension rippled from his body. The water gurgled around us, filling the silence that softened the air. Purple sunlight baked the mountains rising behind me, the bright yellow rays beat down upon the sagebrush and white pines that rose to the sky. A gentle breeze waved across the dewy field. This wasn’t really that bad. The quiet. The softness of nature was the opposite of me. And it wasn’t really that bad.
Ducking my chin, I laid my line down and twisted the reel’s handle. “Do you deal too, or is that only Wyatt?”
Sawyer finally resumed fishing. “Just Wyatt. His parents cut him off financially at eighteen, and he only gets his inheritance when he’s married, so he needed some cash. It was quick and easy. Or so he thought. Anyway, I was an idiot and ended up at a party with him where he offered some to me.” He chuckled to himself and shook his head. “I’m a fucking walking cliché because who gets addicted to crack? Like cocaine is used in every movie as the ‘go-to bad-guy drug,’ yet here I am, in real life, living that shit.” The remorse in his voice told me all I needed to know about how he truly felt about it all.
“Are you going to tell my parents so Kat doesn’t have to marry Wyatt?” he muttered under his breath, laying the line down in the water.
I glanced over at him as he swiped the back of his hand over his cheek. “The bigger question is why haven’t you said anything to your parents?”
Part of me pounded at the back of my mind, upset and annoyed that I was allowing myself to get wrapped up into shit that wasn’t my problem. But the other part of me reminded me of my motivation: Kat; and I stopped reeling.
Sawyer’s chest rose as his brows pulled tightly together, and the crease between his brows turned red. “She’s—She’s— She deserves better than him, I know that. But if I say anything to my parents, they’ll want proof. And that means telling them about—about me.”
“But you’re clean now.” I clacked my teeth together. The monster from earlier, the one I no longer had caged within my mind, begged to have me let him lash out at Sawyer. The rage that curled within my bones, dug its sharp tethers into my marrow, and the only thing that kept me from unleashing the hounds of hell was Kat herself.
“But they don’t know that I’ve ever used, and the amount of shame that’ll bring on my parents. It’ll trash our name in town, and it’ll be all my fault,” he said. Each inhale was sharper, shorter, as he gasped for oxygen, shame coating his figure.
“But what about your sister? Your own fucking sister is going to end up married to a dealer, and the further into this he gets, the harder it’ll be for him to get out. And not only that, at some point, she could become a target and end up trafficked or killed or who knows what,” I managed to explain, mostly coherently from my teeth as the detriment of Wyatt’s choices slowly became clearer and clearer.
He nodded and a gush of tears rushed down his cheeks. “Please. Please help her. Bernie, Wyatt is already suspicious of you and Kat. And he gets really angry and loses all self-control when he’s high. I know I should’ve already said something. I should’ve already done anything to stop this, but…but… I’m just so sorry.” His rushed words trailed off as he faced me, fear twisting him into a shell of a man.
Sympathy raced behind the anger turning the world red around me. “Who are they? This gang he’s dealing for.”
He shook his head. “I don’t know. I’ve only met a couple of them once, and I was so high I don’t remember anything. I swear on my life if I knew anything to help you, I’d tell you. Please just protect Kat.” He crashed toward me, stumbling through the rocky waves. The moment he was within reaching distance, he latched a hand around my arm. “Please. I know you don’t owe me shit, and I know I’m a coward. I should’ve already said something. I know I’m a monster for not telling my parents. So, please.”
I studied him, his knuckles white around the sleeve of my hoodie. “The difference between being a monster and simply making some shitty choices is how you deal with the consequences.”
He furrowed his brows. “What do you mean?”
I gazed out at the land I shouldn’t have been blessed with seeing. “This is the first step in trying to fix what you blew up. The next is telling your parents. A monster doesn’t try to fix what they blew up. A monster, on the other hand—” slowly, I looked back at him. “I, on the other hand, don’t know how to do that. So, if you want me to fuck this shit up, destroy these guys, tear these dealers apart, I can do that. Protect Kat, I can do that, and I will do that. I will protect her from whatever may come concerning Wyatt to give you time to tell your parents. This isn’t my problem to fix. That’s on you, Sawyer, because you are no monster. You’ve only made the wrong choice.”
His eyes widened as he slowly lifted his fingers from my arms. Not a sound left his lips as he stared at me.
I gave him a smile, feeling that devil I constantly danced with whirling back in. “I’ve met the monsters you think you are.”
“And—And where are they now?” he hesitantly asked, taking a step back.
I shrugged. “Do you believe in a hell?”
He slowly nodded yes, slinking away.
“They aren’t there. That place is too nice for them.”
Sawyer furrowed his brows. “Are you a cop or something?”
I chuckled, the sound was something foreign even to me. And I liked it. “No.”
“Then—Then what are you?” he asked, his voice shaking.
“I’m the thing they send when mercy is no longer an option. I’m the nightmare they unleash when the devil can’t control his own demons.”
He stumbled backward, crashing over a rock and slamming down into the river. Water splashed around him as his face paled.
Not a sound cracked through the air between us. Tension slithered around the cords tethering us to this world. The words hung heavy in the atmosphere, a truth shared in a way that I somehow knew shifted the sails of my life.
Grinning wickedly, I waded toward him and offered him a hand. “A week. You have a week to tell your parents before I decide what happens and how the news is broken. Don’t worry, though. I’ll protect Kat no matter what happens, I promise,” I stated, breaking the suspense coiling between us but not denying something I wondered if I’d tear free of.
A shaky hand broke the water. “That’s all I ask,” Sawyer replied and slapped his palm into mine. “She deserves better than Wyatt, so don’t fuck with her, okay?” I helped hoist him to his feet and he plunked upright in front of me, shaking the water from his waders.
I paused. “Did you not hear what I said?”
He slowly nodded, rolling his shoulders as a strange aura of confidence washed over him. “Yes, I did,” he stated. “Whatever you think you are, Kat clearly sees something different and, no hate to you, but she’s a really good judge of character, so I’m gonna trust her gut on this.”
I watched him slowly find his way toward the bank. I wasn’t sure what to think. I wasn’t sure what Kat was thinking. She’d seen more of me, learned more about me than anyone else and yet, she hadn’t run away.
“Will you let her know I’ve gone home?” I called out, finally urging my feet forward to follow.
He paused and left his back facing me. “Why can’t you tell her?”
Because she was fucking right.
I was the one getting attached, and the longer I stayed, the harder it would be for me to leave when I needed to. And starting now I needed to back away for a bit because if Wyatt was already suspicious, that could escalate things to the point where her life would be on the line.
He sighed before I had a chance to answer. “Yeah, I’ll tell her.” Then he placed a boot on the bank and sloshed out of the river.
I’d snatch Muffin without a word, without a sound, and disappear back into town before she realized I was gone. Drowning myself into figuring out who those guys with Wyatt last night were, what gang they belonged to was the first in a long list of what I needed to do to protect Kat. Because the more I knew about Wyatt and what he was involved in, the easier it would be for me to keep her out of it. But, more importantly, making myself busy, staying wrapped up in work would shelter me from the fact that with the promise I’d made Sawyer, came a weighted realization that I wanted to destroy Wyatt for selfish reasons too.
Because I wanted her. I wanted something real with her. Even if I wasn’t much better than Wyatt, I was damn sure going to try and make sure that I treated her exactly how she wanted.
For fuck’s sake.
“Tell your parents, Sawyer, before it’s too late,” I admonished once more before he disappeared entirely.
Shaking my head, I hoisted myself out of the water, accepting that what I should have known was exactly what I told her to not do—that she couldn’t get her hopes up. But I already had; already wanted someone who, at one point, certainly hated me, but now… At least now she tolerated me, kissed me, but accepted I wasn’t offering more than that.
Until now.
And she would eventually destroy me because of that, one way or another.