15. Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Fifteen
Carson
Cole refuses to acknowledge my presence as I get into his truck. The only sign he notices me at all is when he puts it into gear after my door shuts.
“Dad said we need to work out whatever is going on with us,” I tell him.
He keeps his eyes on the road, remaining silent.
“Nothing is going on with me. So, what’s going on with you?” I ask, hating his silence. It doesn’t happen often, but usually I know the reason for it. This is the first time I’ve been stumped.
Finally, he speaks. “I think you have that the other way around, brother.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about. You’re the one with the attitude.”
“You’re the one being careless.”
“Careless?”
His jaw works back and forth as he chooses his words carefully.
“What are you thinking? First, you bring her here instead of taking her to her brother. Then you go acting like a fool when she leaves. You know …” He waves a finger at me while keeping his focus on the road.
“She’s just going to leave again. I hope you’re ready for that, because mark my words, it’s going to happen. ”
My mouth falls open.
He glances at me. “Oh, please. How many years has she been on the road? People like her don’t just stop all of a sudden.”
“Some of them do.”
He rolls his eyes. “She’s a runner. She’s running from her past instead of dealing with it. I’m telling you this is going to end badly.”
“That is what you really think? You think she’s trying to outrun her childhood?”
“That’s exactly what I think.”
I watch the trees pass us by, thinking about what he’s said. One thing I’m sure of is my brother’s faithfulness. He always has my back.
Have I been blinded by these new feelings I’ve had since meeting her?
I take a deep breath.
“I think she’s been living, not running. Healing, not hiding,” I say calmly.
Panic flickers across his face, his wall crumbling just enough to let me in.
“Cole, nothing is going to change,” I say, finally understanding what is happening.
We’ve been through this before. When one of us makes a new friend, the other always has an acceptance period.
We’ve never come across someone one of us liked but the other did not.
I think it’s because we have the same moral compass.
“Everything is about to change,” he says, his voice cracking.
I reach over and place my hand on his shoulder. “Cole. I’m falling in love, not leaving you.”
“But you would … for her.”
His words make me sit back, startled by my own response.
He’s right. I would leave him for her.
Something I never thought possible.
“Give it to me.”
Cole places the back of his hand in the palm of mine. He flinches when I place the blade in the middle. “We’ll never let anyone separate us,” I say, piercing his skin with the steel tip.
“Never,” he agrees, taking the knife to do the same to me.
“No woman, ocean, or problem will ever separate us,” we say, gripping the other’s hand tightly, letting our blood mix.
The promise is still true. I just don’t know what it looks like anymore.
By the time we get to church, neither of us has said another word. I try to shove the argument into a locked box in my head and focus when Jackson starts talking.
He’s filling us in on the ring of human traffickers who have taken over Trap County. That motherfucking place has been nothing but a cesspool of evil for decades. The club eliminates nefarious groups that spring up over there. You get rid of one and another is already forming.
The current one is especially vile.
The number of women who go missing in Trap is insane, but nobody seems to care. They’re always lonely souls with no one to advocate for them. It’s fucking sad.
“So I’m going to need a couple of guys to volunteer to go down to Texas and scope this guy out. I think he’s the key to finding out where they hold them. There is no way they’re going directly from Trap to a buyer. They’re cleaning them up somewhere.”
“Unless they’re leaving them all fucked up. There is a market for that too,” Carver advises.
“Yeah, I hear you there. I’m not saying everyone who comes up missing is ending up with high-end buyers, but …” Jackson holds up a picture. “These women have been spotted at a prominent congressman’s property.”
He hands the photograph to our VP, Elijah, and then he passes it along down the line.
“And these two were known to be in Trap?” I ask.
When Carver takes the picture, he barely glances at it before passing it to me. “Wait.” He snatches it back. His dark chocolate eyes turn stormy, and I glance over at my brother.
“This one.” He taps his finger over one of the women. “This one works for your beloved Jesse,” he says coldly.
Jackson laughs, clearly amused by the uproar that has erupted over Carver’s accusation.
“Take it back now if you want to live,” Elijah tells him, rising from his seat. Nobody messes with his mother-in-law.
Jesus, this isn’t a good start to Carver’s first day here. We haven’t even patched him over yet.
Jackson bangs his gavel. “Jesse will be happy to hear the club has her back, but unfortunately, he’s right. Jesse recruited one of them. It was the only way the woman would accept help for her and her sister.”
Carver releases a stream of air but doesn’t argue.
My focus goes back to my uncle Jackson. “So, back to the congressman.”
“We’ve known he’s been buying women, but this is the first time we’ve had proof.”
Cole’s jaw is working but he doesn’t look at me. I know he’s thinking exactly what I am. The congressman needs to go.
“She’s been our eyes on the inside for quite some time.”
“I mean no offense, but why were we allowing a woman to go in as an informant?” Tank asks, tapping his finger over the photo. “Why put her and her sister at risk?”
Jackson leans back in his chair, steepling his fingers in front of his mouth. “She and her sister came to Trap to settle a vendetta. They were already putting themselves in harm’s way. We’re on the same team.”
Everyone in the room quiets.
“Against who?” I ask.
“It doesn’t matter. They’ll be settling on their own timeline,” he says. “Our concern isn’t with the consumer right now; it’s with the supplier.”
“Since when do we let a consumer slide? Let’s take him out, preferably before either of these ladies get hurt,” Tank says.
“I have the NorCal guys watching them. But this was what was agreed to.”
Carver stays quiet, and I know he’s doing everything in his power to bite his tongue.
“Anyway, back to Texas. I need two guys. Who’s up for it?”
My brother raises his hand, so I follow his lead.
“Carson and Cole,” Jackson says, but before his gavel lands, my brother speaks up.
“Naw, Carver and I got this. Carson already has commitments.”
“Fuck yeah, I’ll go,” Carver says, reaching for the photo that’s been passed around, and placing it in his pocket.
No one questions him.
Before I can argue, the gavel falls.
The room begins to disperse, my brother being one of the very first to leave the room.
Carver pats me on the back as he walks past me. “I’ll keep an eye on him,” he assures me.
But that’s my job.
When I finally drag myself from my chair and head outside, I realize he’s left already.
He left me without a ride.
Something I never thought he’d do.
The wind blows, drawing my attention to the dock out back. My grandfather is sitting down there fishing.
I make my way toward the lake.
He smiles when I sit beside him, his brows pulling together as he studies me. When I don’t say anything, he turns his attention back to the water.
“What’s on your mind, son?”
I take a deep breath. “Have you ever been to Ireland?”
My grandfather laughs. “No, but I hear they have good beer.”
I’m being pulled in two directions.
One half wants things to stay the same, but the other is excited about something new.
“That should be reason alone to go, huh?”
Grandpa laughs again. “I’d say so.” He pulls his sunglasses off and slides them on the bill of his hat. “I can’t think of a better reason.”
He points to the cooler sitting beside his chair. “All this talk is making me thirsty. Grab us a couple, will ya?”
I lean over, fishing two cans of beer out, flicking the ice off of them with a shake of my hand.
“What’s her name?” he asks as I hand him one.
You can’t get one over on Grandpa. He’s an expert at reading people. I suppose he’s lived long enough to have seen most everything.
“Luna,” I say, cracking open my can.
“Luna. Well, that’s a pretty name if I ever heard one.”
He taps his can to mine just like we’ve done my entire life. But it was juice or chocolate milk back in the day.
“So the desire to cross the pond was inspired by Miss Luna?”
“It is a place I think she’d like to visit. Her mother traveled there once and she has her journal from the trip.”
My grandfather nods. “You know your grandmother has always wanted to go to Ireland. Maybe I should take her.”
“You should,” I say, getting excited on her behalf. “But promise I get to be there to see her face when she finds out she’s going. If I do go, maybe we can go together.”
“When were you thinking?” he asks, and it doesn’t surprise me one bit he’s interested. He loves Grandma Maggie. He would give her anything she wanted.
“Tonight, tomorrow morning, I don’t know, just as soon as I can book it.”
My grandfather’s eyebrows rise. “Whoa there, son. Us old people need a little more time to plan such a big trip.”
My face falls. “Oh.”
“But that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t go. Can’t you book tickets from that fancy little phone of yours? What are you waiting for?”
“You really think I should do it?”
He takes a slow sip of beer as he looks out across the lake. “I know it don’t seem like it, Carson, but life goes fast. The only way to combat that is to not waste a damn moment.”
“But what if I’m wrong about her?”
Grandpa is a no-bullshit type of guy, unless he’s intending to, which I know isn’t now. He’s serious. He gets this look in his eye when he’s thinking about his first wife, my biological grandma who passed away.
“Then you’re wrong, but you’ll have a hell of a good story.”
“What if it’s a bad one?”
“Doesn’t matter. It’s either a lesson or a blessing. Can’t be anything else.”
I slouch down in the chair, resting my head against the back to look up at the sky.
He sighs. “Do you get a good feeling in your heart when you’re with her?”
“Yeah.”
“Now, I said your heart, no other body part.”
It makes me chuckle. “All parts feel great around her, but taking them out of consideration, yeah. Being with her feels crazy good.”
“If you’re willing to accept the pain that comes with that, then there is really no risk at all. Only the reward of loving a good woman.” He holds his hand out to offer the flip side. “Or if you’re wrong, then it will be a good lesson, won’t it?”
“So, I’m going to Ireland?”
He laughs. “You already knew you were going there before you came down here.”
“I’m not sure I did.”
His gaze holds mine. “Well, I appreciate you still seeking advice from me. It makes my heart feel good.” He taps a fist against his chest.
That’s another thing great loss will teach you—to let the people around you know how you feel about them. Grandpa loves hard. So does my dad. That’s how I want to be.
“You go over there and check out the green isle for me. Find some nice places I can take your grandma to. I want to impress her.”
I pull my phone out, excited in a way I’ve never been.
“Can I catch a ride when you’re done fishing? But no rush. It’s rude to rush a man who is fishing.”
He chuckles.
“I can do that. Where’s your bike?”
My fingers are scrolling over the available flights. “At home. I rode over here with Cole.”
Grandpa looks back at the warehouse. “And he can’t give you a ride back?”
“He and Carver are headed to Texas. He was in a hurry. Probably forgot I even rode with him.”
“You’re not going along?”
“No.”
His brows pull together.
“Jackson only needed two guys.”
Grandpa makes a noise, still not understanding. Cole and I are a team. He doesn’t understand why, if it’s a two-man job, we aren’t going together.
“He wanted to go with Carver. It makes sense. We need to get Carver in the loop. It will be good for him to spend some time with Cole.”
“They going to be able to keep each other out of trouble?”
“Probably not.” I set my phone down on my leg. What am I doing? I need to be here if Cole needs me.
My grandfather motions for me to pick it up. “No. Your brother can take care of himself. I shouldn’t have asked that. Those two will be fine.”
“But it is strange, right? That he didn’t want me to go with him.”
“Maybe he just wants to give you a little space so you can get to know Luna better.”
My head pulls back. “Why would I need him to give me space for that?”
But as the words leave my mouth, I think about the roles being reversed. What if Cole was entertaining the idea of falling in love …
Grandpa reels in his fishing pole, not answering the question. He knows I’ve finally figured it out.
Cole is acting differently because of Luna. I know it doesn’t have anything to do with her personally. It’s the fact that I am making decisions about her without him.
I usually run everything by Cole, but Luna is different. What is happening between her and me is just that … between her and me.
“You boys had to know there would come a time when things would change.”
Why would things change?
But a little voice inside my head tells me they already have.
“It’ll be easier for you,” Grandpa continues.
“You’ll have a Luna to ease you through this period.
Cole doesn’t have one of those, so you need to give him a little grace.
It’s a blessing that Carver is here right now.
He’ll be a good distraction for your brother until he finds a Luna of his own, hey? ”
“Yeah, I get it now. Why’d you have to go and point all this out?”
He chuckles, picking up his pole and casting it out into the lake. “I wouldn’t be a very good old wise one if I didn’t.”