Chapter 8
Chapter Eight
RAFE
When I go to the gym, I find Jax and Keane already sparring in the ring. They’re practicing some choreographed punches. I watch for a minute before moving over to the large bag. Jax is a dirty fighter, so it doesn’t surprise me when he drops low to the mat and delivers an uppercut to Keane’s right kidney, then swipes his legs out from underneath him. Keane grunts when he hits the floor. We never use gloves when we spar, but we do wrap our knuckles. Dislocated joints or damaged hands make messy trigger fingers.
I snatch a bottle of water from a pre-stocked minifridge. This place, this massive cabin that’s more like a mansion in the middle of the forest—Kellan’s quiet place, he used to call it—is equipped with everything we could want, including a movie theater, a gym, and an indoor swimming pool. The cabin may have been our home away from home when we needed a place to escape and unwind, but when building it, Kellan never forgot the world we lived in. All the windows are made of bulletproof glass, the doors are reinforced steel that would take a cannon to burst open, and there are secret tunnels that can be accessed from several rooms that lead to the garage or off the property.
Grabbing the tape, I start wrapping my hands. I need to release some of this pent-up anger. Seeing Andie again has me all fucked up in the head. Deep down, I know Jax would never hurt her. Not like her father . My fist slams into the bag, the jarring shock of the impact traveling up my arm to my shoulder. I hit the bag again and again until I’ve got a steady rhythm going. My body goes on autopilot as memories of the last time I saw Andie run rampant through my brain.
I understand why she hates my guts. I would too if I were her. But Kellan did the right thing in making sure she got the hell out of this town and away from their father. I miss him. I miss my best friend. Kellan saved me from a life I didn’t want. Or so I thought. Joke’s on me. Come to find out, this life isn’t so different.
I’m the youngest son of Julio Ortiz, the man who controls the flow of drugs along the southern border between the United States and Mexico. I couldn’t escape that world fast enough. A world that took my mother from me. It consumed her and twisted her until it finally killed her. She died of an overdose. I watched it happen. I remember with crystal clarity how her eyes rolled to the back of her head, froth erupting from her mouth. Her emaciated body shook violently as the needle in her arm flopped around like a fish caught on a hook. And then she was gone.
My father was the one who got her hooked on drugs in the first place. He would regularly shoot her up with who the hell knows what. Keeping her high was his way of controlling her. Ensuring her pliability and weakness made her easy to control. Making sure she never left him. It didn’t matter that he never loved her. It didn’t matter that he would parade his whores in front of her, forcing her to watch as he fucked them; or worse, him watching as other men defiled my mother for his pleasure. She was nothing but a toy to him. And my older brother, Alejandro, was just like him. I didn’t want that life. I didn’t want to become a clone of my father. Like Alejandro. So I left and never looked back.
I block out the images by delivering a flurry of punches to the bag.
“You’re going to break that thing if you keep that up,” Keane comments from the ring, leaning against the ropes, sweat dripping down his face and chest.
I drop my hands and bounce my shoulders a few times, cracking my neck from side to side. I walk over to the ring and hop up, ducking under the ropes. Jax is standing in the middle of the mat, and I stop in front of him in a silent challenge. Jax is taller by a few inches, but I’m more solid. He tosses his water bottle to Keane and gets in position. The anger inside of me is still there, and he’s the perfect person to release it on.
The shit that went down in the kitchen was messed up. However, my brain focuses on one thing: Jax touched my woman. But Andie isn’t yours anymore . Her father made damn sure of that.
Without warning, I strike out with my left fist and take him by surprise, which is rare. His head whips back in an arc before he slowly turns his face my way, his green gaze blazing.
“Don’t you ever touch her again,” I warn him.
Being typical Jax, he just smirks at me and licks the blood off his bottom lip.
“Knock it off,” Keane commands, coming between us. “We aren’t doing this today.” He steps back once he’s sure we’re not going to attack each other.
“Just wanted to make sure we’re clear,” I say.
“Crystal,” Jax replies and delivers a heel kick to my stomach, doubling me over and sending me flying backward a few feet.
Keane’s arms outstretch to either side, his hands slamming against our sternums to keep me and Jax apart.
“Dammit, I said no more. Deal with your shit another way. We have more important things to worry about than you two getting into a pissing match over Kellan’s little sister.”
Keane knows damn well I never saw Andie that way. Even though she and I kept our relationship a secret, he, Kellan, and Jax knew about it. I’m about to tell him to fuck off when he says, “Dom called. Mr. Rossi will be here in an hour.”
I silently curse under my breath as dread coils in my veins. He’s coming for her.
Jax ducks under the ropes and walks off.
“Where are you going?” Keane calls to Jax’s retreating back.
“I think I figured out how Max knew where to find Andie.”
Of course, he doesn’t elaborate.
“Did he tell you?” Keane asks me.
“What do you think?”
With Jax gone, Keane takes his place on the mat. We go through a few combos, but my mind is distracted, so after the third time I fail to block a punch, Keane drops his arms to his sides.
“You know I’m here for you if you need to talk.”
Calling it quits, I rip off the tape from my hands. “I know.”
He leans back against the ropes, making them concave under his weight. “She grew up,” he states, and I hold back my snarl, the words she’s mine at the tip of my tongue.
“She can’t be here,” I tell him, the hint of desperation clear.
Keane and Jax don’t know how far Max will go when it comes to her. But I do.
“Not up to us.”
“Whatever.” I toss the used wrappings on the mat and walk off.
I love Keane like a brother, and I trust him with my life. But I don’t trust him with hers . The only way to save Andie is to get her as far away from her father as possible. No matter what it takes.