Chapter 4 Leo
LEO
That motherfucker.
I’ve spent the last year thinking my goddamn brother was dead. Terrified. Devastated. Worried until I was sick to my stomach. I had visions of my big brother dead in a ditch. In a flophouse someplace. Behind a dumpster, who the fuck knows.
Death was the only thing that could have kept the two of us apart, or so I fuckin’ thought.
I’m not going to be able to focus on a thing. All I want to do is smash my fist through a wall or, better yet, through Tim’s face.
Where the fuck has he been all this time?
My mind races as I open the shop. Just my luck, I have a ton of work to do. Starting with an electrical problem on a late nineties Cadillac. No one is around, and the routine of the job is probably the only thing that’s gonna settle me down.
I pop the hood on the boat of a car and try to ignore the rage that makes me want to smash windows and take off on my bike.
Run. It’s what I want to do. But I’m not a chicken motherfucker who runs away from his problems. I’d run toward them.
And right now, my brother has got a bull’s-eye on his forehead.
All my hard work. Our hard work—my grandfather, my brother, and me. Our entire family legacy is tied up in this business, in this small, shitty strip mall.
How long has it been since I’ve seen my brother? Almost a year? Since I’ve actually had a phone call or a text? Proof of life, at least.
I can’t fucking believe that in the last few weeks, Tim had been in touch with his friends, but not me. His flesh and blood. His younger brother. When he left, he left me with nothing. A business that was about to get taken by the bank. No way to earn a living.
No assets, no credit, no cash. Nothing.
If Morris hadn’t kept me employed at the shop, I would have been out on the fucking street.
As much as I love my brother, I don’t care what he’s snorted or shot up his arm. If Josh makes good on his promise to invite Tim to dinner, I’m gonna let that motherfucker have it.
Goddamn him!
My morning only gets worse as I run a diagnostic on this Caddy. Someone who didn’t know what the hell they were doing tried to fix it before they brought it in to me.
Amateurs.
They always make it more expensive. My gramps used to love that phrase. He’d bust it out every time some cheap-ass came in, wanting him to “just” do this or do that to get a car running again.
You think hiring a pro is expensive? Try hiring an amateur.
My gramps’s motto is the story of a mechanic’s life. But today, this kind of bullshit is gonna fray my last nerve.
“Leo.”
Lia’s voice breaks me out of my funk.
I lift my face from the mess under the hood. “Yeah.” I try to shake the rage from my voice as I meet her eyes.
She looks worried, but she’s bouncing up and down on her toes, which I know means she’s literally about to burst with excitement.
“Oh fuck,” I say, “tell me. You had your call?” I look up at the old clock on the wall of the repair bay. It’s almost ten. “What happened?”
She bounces through the shop and settles on the top of my grandfather’s old metal desk.
That thing has to be close to fifty years old.
Knowing my granddad, he didn’t buy it new.
I watch as Lia settles her ample ass on the cool metal desktop.
She’s so excited, and now that she has my attention, I can see the outline of her nipples growing hard as she gestures her arms while she talks.
“It was so great,” she says. “The program is one year long if I take it online, but if I come in and do what they call practical hours in the school’s grooming bays, I can finish in closer to six months.”
“Yeah?” I close the hood of the Cadillac, making a note that I’m going to need to call the owner and let them know it’s probably gonna be another day before I even know what parts I need to undo whatever the hell they tried to do under here. “That’s great.”
I wish I could rally a little more enthusiasm. I hear how flat I sound about the whole thing, and I know how important this is to Lia.
“Yeah,” she says. “It could be great. It’s not cheap, Leo.
Tiny said he’d pay for the whole program.
” She gives me a little, wistful smile. “The guilty dad card doesn’t seem to have an expiration date.
I didn’t ask him to, but if I do the whole pet CPR certification and everything, the program’s gonna be like five grand. ”
I nod. “That’s okay,” I say. “Let Tiny be a dad. He wants to do it, let him.”
I can’t help wondering if maybe that’s part of the stress Tiny’s feeling about money. Yeah, the club needs paying tenants in the strip mall, but as far as I know, Tiny has only ever worked for the MC. I have no idea where he’d get that kind of money, or if he has any money at all to help Lia.
This dog grooming certification is something she wants to do so badly. Seeing how happy it makes her talking about it takes a little bit of the edge off my rage.
“This could change everything for me, Leo,” she says. “Not only a doggie daycare, but grooming and even some basic training. It could be the start of something really big. A franchise in the future if I get really successful. Canine Crashpad, coming to a city near you.”
When she talks about it like that, she sweeps her arms wide.
Her hair floats around her shoulders, and she looks like a sultry angel in short shorts.
I’m proud of the way she’s jumping into her dreams. Lia’s really tight-lipped about her past, about her upbringing.
She doesn’t have much. Like me, I guess.
I have the MC and her. She has Tiny and me.
Thinking of it that way makes me want to be more supportive. The money shit is between her and her dad, but if my role is to help fill the space with a tenant and that can somehow ease the pressure on Tiny to pay for Lia’s schooling, then that fixes it. I’m not going to let her down.
“So, what do you think?” I ask. “You goin’ for it?”
Lia doesn’t even hesitate a moment. She squeals and runs up to me. “Hell yeah, I’m gonna do it. Badass businesswoman, here I come.”
She gives me a quick hug, holding her body firmly against mine. The touch is intimate, her hips pressing against mine, her tits flattening against my chest like they do when she lies on top of me in bed.
The moment is too real, too personal.
Too something.
I squeeze her back and release her quickly.
She knows our drill.
We don’t show affection at work.
We don’t touch each other away from what we do in private at home.
The sad look on her face reminds me that I’m not in a good place.
I’m overthinking this shit. I mean, if somebody walked in and saw me hugging my roommate, so fucking what? She has good news to share. And being a supportive roommate isn’t the same thing as admitting to the world we’re fuck buddies.
Even still, I can’t keep holding her, or the steel in the front of my work pants is gonna give everything away. The last thing I need is Tiny or Alice walking into the shop while I’m sporting a hard-on for Lia.
She takes a minute before she pulls away.
She lingers close to me, looking into my face.
She’s trying to read me. I know she is. I can smell the berry scent in her hair and the clean, fresh smell of some fruity lotion she uses on her skin.
It’s like I can never get away from her fragrance.
It’s in the bathroom we share at home. It’s on her sheets.
It’s in her hair as she walks past me in the kitchen.
She’s everywhere.
I close my eyes and breathe it in for a second, losing myself in how she makes me feel. It’s the only good feeling—Lia is the only good feeling—I’ve had over the last year.
Even compared to the MC, which is important to me.
The MC means something to me, especially now that I know I can’t count on my actual brother. I mean, fuck. I need a brotherhood now more than ever, but nothing makes me feel the way she does. Even if the feelings and what we do and how we do it are all wrapped up in a secret.
“Leo,” she asks. “Are you okay? Be real with me.”
I step back from her all-too-knowing look. “Yeah,” I say. “You mean about Tim?”
She nods, a shadow crossing over her eyes.
“I know we haven’t talked about it much,” she says.
“But, honey, he’s your brother. I can’t imagine what you’ve had to deal with, not hearing from him all this time.
With everything that’s gone on with the business and now to find out that he’s out there. He’s talking to people…”
“He’s not fucking talking to me,” I fill in.
“Yeah,” she agrees. “That. I’m so sorry, Leo. I can’t imagine—”
I cut her off. “Don’t worry ’bout it. Let’s focus on you. You have good news, great things are ahead. Your dad’s helping you out with school. You have a lot to be happy about, a lot to celebrate. And who knows? If Tim comes to dinner tonight, if Josh gets ahold of him like he said…”
“What are you thinking?” she asks. “Are you gonna kick his face in?” Lia is quiet for a moment. “What if Tim wants to move home?”
I hadn’t thought about that. I mean, up until a few minutes ago, I’d pretty much been assuming my brother was dead. I don’t know if alive and a total fucker is better than having him be gone forever. Dead. That’s not a thought I wanna linger on too long.
“Don’t worry about that,” I reassure Lia. “Fuck him. He lost the right to live in that house a long time ago.”
I feel strong as shit about that. Tim’s not going to come back into my life after everything he’s left me to deal with and kick out the one good thing I’ve managed to pull out of this shitshow—Lia.
“Leo, good to see you again, man.” Josh grabs my hand and pumps it. He’s got a backpack slung over one shoulder.
“Arrow.” I hold open the door and wave him in. “Just one for dinner?”
I knew it.