Chapter 17 Jamie
Jamie
The night hums the way it always does at The Crest. Dad is leaning against the counter, sleeves rolled, counting the night’s take like it’s holy scripture.
We’re not supposed to call it what it really is—a family front, a hub, a money-laundering machine—but that’s exactly what it is. The Crest isn’t just a bar, it’s an altar to the Crest family name, to everything my father built with blood, grit, and people who don’t ask too many questions.
I’m in the back booth, hands sticky from whiskey and the faint residue of gun oil. I am so exhausted from working all day and there’s nothing I want more than to head to bed.
Our suppliers had just dropped off a crate under the table—unmarked, unregistered. Dad’s been selling “collectibles” to some buyers down south, the kind that don’t come with serial numbers.
We were doing the count when Miles called from an unknown number.
The one word––a single goddamn word––that slices through every wall I’ve built since we were fifteen.
Avalon.
Fuck!
Dad looks up from the ledger, watching me like he can smell trouble.
“Who was that?” he asks, but I’m already standing.
My pulse kicks. “I gotta go,” I tell him.
He just grunts. “Don’t bring cops to my doorstep.”
I salute him, walking out into the night.
It’s been years since me or Miles have used the word Avalon.
We were sixteen, standing behind the bleachers with busted lips after taking down a couple of seniors who thought it was funny to trash-talk Miles.
I was bleeding from my eyebrow, he had a split knuckle, and we’d laughed like lunatics when the principal called both our dads to come drag us home.
That night, hiding in my room, we made a deal that if either of us ever got into something we couldn’t talk our way out of, we’d say Avalon.
It wasn’t random. It was the name of a boat my mom used to tell us about when we were kids, some mythical place where the bad parts of life couldn’t reach you.
We swore it meant come get me, no questions asked.
And now he’s said it.
By the time I hit the station, the rain’s started. It’s coming down hard, relentless, drumming against the windshield.
I call Maxwell on the way. Detective Maxwell’s been on the force longer than I’ve been alive. He’s also on the Crest payroll. Not officially, of course. But he’s been known to “misplace” evidence and “forget” booking paperwork when the right envelope hits his desk.
“Maxwell,” he answers, voice gravel and bourbon.
“It’s Jamie. I need a favor.”
There’s a pause, then a low chuckle. “You always do.”
“One of ours got picked up—Miles Thatcher.”
I can hear him shuffle papers, the faint flick of a lighter. “Charges?”
“Grand theft auto, resisting arrest. Probably more if they dig.”
He exhales a long line of smoke. “Christ, Jamie, you pick up strays like a shelter.”
“Can you make it disappear, X?”
“Disappear? No. But I can make it quiet.”
“Do that. I’m on my way.”
I hate the police station. The kind of hate that goes bone-deep—old memories of sitting in these same chairs, Dad behind the glass, me pretending not to cry.
Maxwell meets me by the front desk, trench coat still dripping rain. He looks like every crooked cop stereotype rolled into one man—nicotine fingers, and eyes that never miss a thing.
“This way.”
He leads me down a hall. I can feel the eyes of the rookies as we pass—they all know who I am. Who my father is. Nobody says a word.
We stop outside holding. Miles is sitting on the bench, hands cuffed, head in his hands. He looks like hell—bruised, exhausted, but still wearing that smug half-smile that always gets him punched.
Maxwell jerks his thumb toward the door. “He’s your idiot, not mine. Two grand and we forget this happened.”
I hand over an envelope thick enough to make his eyebrows lift. “Keep the change.”
He pockets it, knocks twice on the door, and walks away.
I step in, close the door behind me.
Miles looks up. “You came.”
“No shit,” I snap. “You said Avalon. What the hell were you thinking?”
He laughs once. “Guess I wasn’t.”
“You stole a car?”
“Stole a car,” he echoes. “Needed wheels for a drop. Didn’t think I’d get caught.”
“You never think.” I drag a hand through my hair, pacing. “You know how Victor gets when you screw up. You’re lucky I showed up before word hit him.”
“I know.”
“Do you?” I lean over the table, voice low. “You remember last time, Miles? The way he hit you so hard you had a fucking migraine for a week?”
He flinches. That tells me he remembers.
There’s a long silence before he says, “I gotta tell you something.”
I exhale sharply. “Now’s not the time.”
“It has to be now.”
Something in his tone stops me.
He swallows. “It’s Chloe.”
My chest tightens. “What about her?”
“I—” He runs a hand over his face, groaning. “I messed up. I messed up bad.”
I stare. “Miles—”
“I fucked her. That’s where I was coming from when the cops picked me up.”
“You what?”
“Listen man. I went over for Bella, I promise. It just…it just happened. And she told me she is yours or something like that, but I just couldn’t walk away from her. I have tried so many times to stay away from her but…”
“Are you trying to get me to kill you, Miles?”
“I like her, okay?” he blurts out, voice cracking. “I can’t stop thinking about her. It’s like she’s under my skin. I see her everywhere. I smell her shampoo, and it fucks me up. I know she’s yours, or—”
“She’s not mine,” I cut in, too fast. “We…” My voice dies.
He keeps going, words tumbling now. “I don’t know if it’s because of the past or because of her. The girl I took… the girl I shouldn’t have. I don’t know if it’s guilt or obsession, but it’s eating me alive. I can’t sleep, can’t think. I hate myself for it, but I want her anyway.”
He’s shaking, fists clenching and unclenching. I’ve never seen him like this. Not when we were kids. Not when Victor beat the sense out of him. Never.
“Fuck,” I mutter.
He laughs bitterly. “Yeah. That about sums it up.”
I want to hit him. I want to tell him to shut the hell up and never say her name again. But instead, I lean back, arms crossed, watching him unravel.
“You know what I think?” I say finally. “I think you’re an asshole.”
“Yeah,” he whispers. “You’re not wrong.”
“I think you should lose my number.”
His eyes flick up, sharp with panic. “Jamie—”
“Don’t. You think I can just listen to that and pretend it’s fine? You fucked up, Miles. You always do.”
He looks like I just tore something out of him, but I don’t care. I push off the wall and walk to the door.
“Come on,” I say. “Let’s go before I change my mind.”
We sign him out twenty minutes later. Maxwell doesn’t say a word. He just tips his head as the guard hands me back Miles’s belt and chain. I slip him another roll of cash for good measure.
Outside, the rain’s stopped but the streets still glisten under the sodium lights. The city smells like wet asphalt and moss.
We drive in silence for a while. Miles stares out the window, jaw tight. I should drop him off and be done with it, but old habits die hard.
We make a stop by the warehouse where Rico’s waiting. The kid’s pacing by the door, cigarette dangling from his mouth.
“You’re late,” he says when he sees us.
“I know.” I toss him a folded wad. “For your silence. I think you’ll need to do the drop on your own tonight.”
“But the boss––” Rico says.
“I will pay you for your time,” I tell him.
Rico counts, nods, and disappears inside.
Miles looks at me. “You didn’t have to do that.”
“Yeah,” I say, lighting my own cigarette. “But I did.”
We end up at his apartment. I haven’t been here in months, not since before everything fell apart. This is where we go when we need to lay low.
He drops onto the couch, groaning. “You remember when life was just stealing bikes and skipping class?”
“Barely.”
I toss him a beer from the fridge and crack one open myself. We sit there for a long time, the TV playing some muted rerun neither of us watches.
Then he mutters, “You ever think maybe we were born cursed?”
I smirk. “I think we just keep making the same dumb choices and expecting them to fix themselves.”
He chuckles under his breath, then lights a joint and passes it to me.
We smoke. The air goes soft and slow, thick with silence.
I don’t forgive him. But for now, this is fine. The two of us, sitting in the dark, half-broken, half-loyal, pretending the world outside doesn’t exist.
Because that’s what Avalon was always meant to be. A place out of reach. A promise between brothers that we’d always have each other’s backs.