Chapter 16 #2
He shakes his head. “I got out Law, not because I’m any better than those people who can’t break the cycle. I got out because I had you guys. You think you were a burden for me? You were everything good in my life. The only good things in my life.”
He reaches across the table and grabs my arm in a death grip, his voice fierce.
“I’d work with Victor King a thousand times over to give the five of us a new life.
Even if he told me it was drugs and not counterfeit he wanted to move through this place.
Even if he told me I had to sell the fucking drugs myself. I would have done it.”
My eyes are stinging now and shit, I don’t want to cry in front of my brothers and Nick. But Mac isn’t done.
“If you show up here with some girl and tell me you’re in love, the only thing I’m saying is congratulations.
I don’t give a shit who she’s related to.
You tell me you’re happy, that she’s the one for you?
I’m welcoming that girl with open arms.” His hand comes up to clutch the back of my neck, bringing me close.
“Because you deserve to be happy, Lawson. More than anyone I know, you deserve that shit.”
His voice is shaking now. “And I would have stood between you—any of you—and Dad’s fists a thousand times. Not because you’re weak or pathetic—because you’re my little brother and I fucking love you. Every one of you.”
There’s a long moment of silence where Mac just stares at me while I try not to let the tears fall. Then a throat clears behind us.
“Fuck, man. I stay downstairs to sling a few drinks and Mac starts confessing his love for everyone?”
My older brother releases me and we all turn to see Jonah standing by the front door, a bewildered expression on his face. “What the hell did I miss?”
I sniff, rubbing my burning eyes, while Nick chuckles.
“Just our dumbass brother,” Sawyer says, his voice a little shaky, jerking his chin toward me. “Apparently he fell in love with Victor King’s niece and thought we were all gonna be pissed.”
Jonah’s face lights up. “Seriously? You got a girl? Is that why you’ve been gone all summer?”
I groan. “Sorry about that. I haven’t really been pulling my weight.”
“Are you kidding me with that shit?” Jonah scoffs.
“Yeah, honestly, it was kind of nice, man,” Sawyer says.
“Thinking that maybe you were out there having fun, doing something for yourself for once. Instead of always working like a dog in this place.” He gives me an uncharacteristically serious look.
“You’ve always done that, you know. Put in too many hours.
Bailed everybody out on their shifts. Like you think you need to make something up to us. ”
“You don’t Lawson,” Mac adds. “You never did.”
I release a breath, trying to let that sink in. To make myself believe it.
“Hang on, I want to go back to the girl,” Jonah says, taking a seat at the table. “Do we get to meet her?”
A fresh sting of tears hits my eyes and this time, I don’t think I can stop them. “Probably not,” I croak out. “I fucked it up.”
None of them say anything about the mortifying tears as I try to brush them away. Nick’s hand comes down on my shoulder.
“Tell us,” he says. “Maybe we can help.”
So I tell them about keeping her a secret all summer.
About how we kept insisting it was temporary when we both knew it was way more than that.
I tell them about Victor coming here tonight, trying to use my relationship with Nova to get back into business with us.
What I said to him, and what she overheard.
“She says she’s leaving now,” I say, reaching for the whiskey.
After all that, I definitely need another drink.
“She thinks being here is putting us in danger because King will keep trying to use her.” I swallow a gulp, the fire doing nothing to make the next words easier to say.
“And she doesn’t want to be with me, because she thinks I’m ashamed of her. ”
“Okay, we’ll get to the second part,” Mac says. “But the shit about Victor—that’s not a problem. We’re not gonna feel pressured to get in bed with him again just because you’re with his niece.”
“I don’t know if it’s that simple,” Nicks says.
“I mean, that fucker can cause problems. I heard he’s getting squeezed out over in Mount Casper.
” Nick owns a motor cycle restoration shop and he gets a lot of interesting characters coming through his place, the kind that have information on the area’s less than exemplary residents.
“Who knows what kind of pressure he’ll put on you if he’s feeling cornered. ”
Mac snarls. “I don’t give a shit what kind of problems he’s having. I’m not the same scared, desperate bastard I was at twenty-four. He doesn’t scare me.”
Nick starts to respond but gets cut off when Mac’s phone rings. Probably one of his many late night booty calls. He pulls it out, I think to silence it, but what he sees on the screen makes him pause.
“It’s Smitty,” he says, and a weird sense of forbidding slinks into my gut. Hunter Smith is the chief of Solitude’s volunteer fire team. I glance at the clock on Mac’s stove to see that it’s close to midnight. Why would Smitty be calling now?
“Hey man,” Mac says into the phone, then immediately stands. “Where?” he says, voice suddenly professional. “Okay. Yeah. And they’re calling us in? Fuck, everyone? Yeah, okay. I’ll be there in ten.”
He tosses his phone down. “I gotta go. There’s a fire in Mount Casper.”
“Shit.” Nick stands too. He’s not on the volunteer squad like Mac is, but he’s a former Marine and good in an emergency. “You want me to drive you?”
A strange numbness is spreading up from my limbs. “Where’s the fire?”
“One of the shops on Main Street,” Mac says, looking distracted as he pats his pockets for his keys.
“Well, that’s lucky,” Jonah says. “This late at night, probably no one will be around.”
Mac grimaces. “The main drag in Mount Casper is even older than ours in Solitude. Do you know how many of those places aren’t up to fire code?
The city council just got a grant to install some proper fire stops between the stores and reliable sprinklers.
” He shakes his head. “We’ll be lucky if the entire block doesn’t go up.
They’re calling for volunteers from two counties. ”
The numbness has spread to my chest now, making it feel like I can’t catch my breath, like the room is closing in around me. “Mac,” I say, hardly recognizing my voice. “What business?”
He must not hear the panic in my voice because he’s walking out the room, probably looking for his gear bag. “Mac!” I shout, and everyone in the room goes still. “Where did the fire start? What business?”
He looks at me, understanding dawning. “A tattoo shop.”
I’m across the room and barreling through the front door before any of my brothers can catch up. “Lawson, man, calm down,” Jonah calls after me. “It’s after midnight, no one is in that tattoo shop.”
She had to get her supplies from the shop. She promised she’d wait until tomorrow but…God, what if she didn’t? What if she was only putting me off and still planned to leave tonight?
“Lawson.” Nick catches my arm before I reach the stairs. He takes one look at my face and nods, expression tightening. “I’ll drive.”
“I’ll drive,” Jonah says. “You go with Mac in case Smitty needs help.”
“Lawson, you can’t go in that building,” Mac shouts after me as I fly down the stairs. “You wait until the crew gets there, do you understand me?”
I don’t bother answering. There’s a panic pounding in my veins and I know, I just fucking know, that Nova is in danger.
And if she is there tonight? If she went to the tattoo shop because she was trying to leave town? Well, that would be my fault. And I won’t ever be able to forgive myself.