SMITH (The Beckett Boys, Book One)

by Olivia Chase

  “Someone needs to knock people out for a living,” he said, sitting back and sipping from his mug again as his green eyes watched me intently.

  “Are you serious? You think you’re performing a public service by beating up strangers for money?” I laughed and shook my head as I picked up a piece of buttery toast and ate it.

  “I am being serious,” he replied. He put the mug down and leaned forward. “People have been watching men fight since the beginning of human history. The Romans had coliseums where they watched people fight to the death—“

  “And that’s a good thing?”

  “It’s just a thing.”

  “So you’re like a modern day gladiator,” I said, not buying it for even a second.

  “I’m just doing what I’m good at, and people seem to like it. Besides, it pays the bills and that’s pretty necessary too.”

  “You could get hurt badly someday,” I said.

  “I could.” He didn’t seem too bothered by the idea.

  “Have you ever lost a fight?”

  He thought for a long moment. “Not that kind of fight, I haven’t.”

  “What kind of fight did you lose?”

  He started eating some bacon and then drank more coffee, stretching his back so that his shirt rode up in front, revealing his taught stomach. “I’ll tell you what fight I lost recently—the fight to stay awake last night. I was out like a light,” he said. “Did you sleep good?”

  Nice subject change, I thought, but decided to let the matter drop. It was none of my business, he’d made that clear.

  Which only told me what I already suspected—that Zack was never going to look at me as anything but a cheap lay, someone to fuck. Not someone he could tell his secrets too, someone he could trust and spend months or years of his life with.

  “I did sleep well,” I said, continuing to eat the meal he’d cooked me. It was impressive how good every bit of it tasted, even the coffee. As I ate, I looked across at this enigmatic, mysterious man sitting there with his movie star good looks and sexiness, his brilliant green eyes.

  He was there but not there—real but not real.

  How could I have slept with him? Did we really do all those things to each other? Now in the light of day it all seemed completely unreal, imagined.

  I missed his arms around me, holding me tightly in the darkness and warmth.

  Just as we were finishing the meal, I was going to bring up the fact that I needed to leave at some point. I couldn’t really stay at his apartment, I had no plan and no purpose.

  The thing to do was go back to my parents, tail between my legs, apologize and then beg my uncle for my job back at his restaurant.

  As I sat there considering my future, which seemed to unfortunately look all too much like my recent past, I opened my mouth to speak just as a knock came at the apartment door.

  Zack turned to me with a deadly serious expression on his face. He put a finger over his lips and shook his head, making sure I knew not to speak or make a sound.

  Suddenly, my heart was racing.

  Why did he not want to answer the door? What was he afraid of?

  And if he was afraid of whoever was at the door knowing he was home—then how bad might it really be?

  The knock came again, louder and more insistent this time. After a pause, a deep voice penetrated from outside in the hallway. “Zack, it’s Lance. I know you’re there. Answer the door.”

  But Zack didn’t move a muscle. He sat there, still, his eyes now focused into the distance as he waited.

  My heart raced faster, my mouth dry. I wondered if he owed someone money, or if he’d done something even more illegal than simply fighting.

  “Zack, you can’t run from this forever. You need to fucking man up and let me in, sit down and talk to me. I mean it. I’m not going away, and you’re not going to ever get rid of me until you have the balls to look me in the eye.”

  Zack shook his head but said nothing.

  More time passed.

  “You hear me, Zack? I’m not going away, I’ll be back again, and one way or another you’re going to have to deal with what happened!”

  Not long after that, there was one last, loud bang on the door that made me jump almost out of my chair. But then there were footsteps audibly retreating away, down the hall, down the stairs outside the building.

  Zack got up and walked to the window and looked out and down, presumably to make sure that “Lance”—whoever that even was—was really leaving. After a moment, he turned around and came back to the table and grabbed his plate. “Are you still working on that?” he asked, pointing to my plate. His tone sounded as if nothing had even happened.

  “Ummm…yeah, I’m done, I guess.”

  “Want a warm up on that coffee?” he said, as he walked away carrying the plates.

  “No, I’m good, thanks,” I said, getting up and following him to the kitchen. “So…who was that at the door just now?” I asked.

  Zack paused for a split second before putting the plates in the sink. “Nobody,” he said, his tone making it clear there would be no discussion.

  “I get it, none of my business,” I said, sighing.

  He turned and gave me a strange look. Folded his arms. “Do you think it should be your business?”

  “I don’t know,” I said. “I just feel like you’ve asked me to stay with you and it’s kind of scary to feel like someone might come busting through the door and…god only knows what would happen.”

  Zack smirked. “It’s not that kind of thing,” he said.

  “Okay, so what kind of thing is it?”

  “The kind of thing that doesn’t even need to be talked about,” he said. “Someone from my past who needs to let shit go.”

  “It all seems very mysterious,” I said.

  “It’s not mysterious, it just doesn’t interest me,” Zack said. He walked past me, brushing against my body lightly as he walked back towards the table and grabbed the glasses to bring to the sink.

  I stood where I was. “Maybe that’s how you’re going to feel about me pretty soon,” I said.

  He gave me a puzzled glance as he passed by yet again. Now he was at the sink, running the water. “I don’t know what that means, Caeli.”

  Him saying my name still sent pleasant shivers up and down my spine, but I ignored it. “It means that you seem quite good at walking away from people.”

  “You don’t know anything about who or what I walk away from.” He rinsed a plate and glanced at me. “We could both make snap judgments based on very little information, but only one of us is actually doing that.”

  It occurred to me that not only was Zack Wild sexy and gorgeous and dangerous with his fists—but also with his words as well. He was no dummy, and his intelligence and quick wit caught me a bit by surprise.

  “I don’t want to make snap judgments, but you refuse to tell me anything.”

  “I tell you what you need to know.”

  I laughed hollowly. “Which is not very much, apparently.”

  He continued washing dishes. “We just met.”

  “Exactly. And yet we’ve already had sex. Clearly that was a mistake,” I said, feeling my emotions rise as I felt him treating me like I mattered less to him than the dishes in his sink.

  “Don’t pretend you regret it,” he said.

  “Maybe I do,” I said softly.

  “Then you don’t ever have to do it again,” he said simply.

  I glared at him, feeling my stomach clench. “You’re mean,” I said.

  His jaw tensed as he glanced over to me. “And you’re pushy.”

  “And you’re scared.” As I said the words, I realized they were true.

  He smiled but his eyes flashed. “Scared of what?”

  “Scared of being real, afraid of revealing any real part of who you are.”

  “I’m not the one who works some job where they treat me like shit, and then lives in an apartment my Dad walks into whenever he wants an
d talks to me like I’m a child,” Zack said. “That sounds like someone who’s scared to me.”

  “You’re so cruel,” I whispered. “And I don’t think I want to be around you anymore,” I said.

  I waited for him to say something, anything. He just stood there, his green eyes flat and cool.

  Fine. This needed to end, and now it has.

  I turned around and walked away from him then, surprised at just how badly it hurt inside to realize that it really was ending so quickly. Of course, I’d known that this would be a fleeting, passing encounter—everything about Zack made that all too apparent.

  But this was just…such a pitiful finale.

  I felt like I wanted to burst into tears but kept it inside as I left his apartment. I wanted for him to chase after me, call my name—I knew that I would happily come back if he asked me to, despite my bravado.

  The truth was that my feelings had been hurt when he’d shown such little willingness to tell me even a shred of detail about his life. But nevertheless, I didn’t want to lose him so quickly, and if he’d come after me I would have stopped my progress for the exit.

  But he didn’t come, and so I didn’t stop walking, just slowed long enough to take my purse with me.

  Soon, I was out in the street, and alone.

  ZACK

  It’s time to let her go.

  My entire body went rigid with revolt as she walked away from me, and I wanted nothing more than to go after her, take her in my arms, tell her everything would be okay.

  Tell her that I’d explain everything, let her in completely, because she deserved it.

  Except I knew that was never going to happen, because my life was finished and the last thing I would do was drag someone like Caeli down into the abyss with me.

  I heard the door slam and I felt like I wanted to puke.

  Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.

  The pain in my gut and chest was intense, almost enough to cut off my breath. If I’d known that I was going to catch real feelings for this girl, I never would’ve gone near her. Not that I had been able to stop in any case.

  But this was better. She was walking away from me, and I knew that she was right to do so.

  I had been a bastard when she’d merely been asking normal questions like the intelligent girl she was. And I’d brushed her questions and concerns aside because I knew that I could never open that door again.

  My entire life had become about forgetting exactly the things she wanted to know. Maybe the thing with Caeli and I could have gone on a bit longer if that idiot Lance hadn’t shown up at my door mouthing off.

  When would they all stop chasing me, stop haunting me?

  In the distance, I heard explosions and gunfire, and I closed my eyes, swaying a little on my feet.

  I could smell the smell again.

  I could taste and smell the acrid scent of smoke and flame and charred flesh in the air. The smell and taste of death.

  The body parts on the ground.

  Pieces of my friends around me, strewn about like garbage.

  “Fuck this.” I opened my eyes and blinked. Hot rage raced up and down my spine and I walked to the bathroom, stripped down, got into the shower and put the water on ice cold. I stood beneath it, shouting, as the pain of the cold water overwhelmed, for just a moment, the cold loss of everything I’d ever held dear.

  I got out of the shower, soaking wet, no towel, and walked to the refrigerator, grabbed a six pack and sat down at the kitchen table, cracked my first brew.

  It was morning.

  I didn’t give a flying fuck.

  If you’re falling in love with that girl, soldier, than you’ve truly malfunctioned.

  No, Sir. This soldier has taken care of the situation.

  I downed the first beer in short order.

  After the second and third beers, my head was a little fuzzier. After the fourth and fifth, I was pleasantly buzzed and the image of Caeli Powers was slightly fading in my mind’s eye, which was just what I was after.

  When I finished my sixth beer, I got up, wobbling ever so slightly. I walked to the fridge and grabbed another six pack. After I pulled the beer out of the case, I slammed the door shut, and it bounced back open from the force of it. I slammed the door again and again and then I punched the refrigerator so hard that the entire thing shook.

  “You stupid fuck,” I said, and I could hear the slur of my words.

  I stumbled out of the kitchen, moved to the couch and began consuming more beer.

  The anger coursing through my body wasn’t something I could deal with. I wished I’ve never laid eyes on that girl, wished I’d never seen her.

  I needed to forget she ever existed.

  Needed to wipe her clean out of my head.

  By the time I was done with the last six-pack of beer, I was passing out, facedown on the couch.

  And still, the last thing I thought of before losing consciousness, was her smiling face.

  CAELI

  I was walking a long time, not wanting to call anyone or talk to anyone about what had happened to me the last two days.

  So I just walked, knowing that eventually I’d get back to my apartment.

  I was in no rush to get back there. In fact, I was in no rush to get back to anything resembling my life.

  Zack’s penetrating, cruel words were still ringing in my ears as I walked those miles and miles.

  He’d been right that I was working a job where people treated me like crap and staying in an apartment where my father waltzed in and acted like I was still a child.

  Meanwhile, I was the one who’d been cleaning up his and my mother’s mess that they’d made of their finances.

  It was because of them that I had to stop going to school and work for my uncle, pay them rent, all of it to help bail them out of the spot that their bad decisions had gotten them into in the first place.

  And the only reason I was doing that was exactly what Zack had accused me of being—I was simply scared.

  I was scared to defy them.

  I was frightened of being hated by my parents for acting ungrateful and going on with my life when they were on the brink of losing everything.

  But did helping them mean I had to work for my asshole of an uncle and his cretin sons? Did I have to live in my parents’ property and pay their rent just because they had bought a place they couldn’t afford and couldn’t find tenants for?

  How did it all become my problem?

  As I walked, the questions just circled and tormented me, right along with Zack’s eyes and his voice still crystal clear in my mind.

  I wished that I hadn’t been pushy.

  I wished I had just one more night in his arms.

  Someone honked as they approached me while I walked on the side of the busy street. I was used to it, cars had been honking occasionally.

  But this car slowed down as it went by me, and I realized that it was a police cruiser.

  “Shit,” I muttered. After the other night, I didn’t relish seeing any more local cops.

  And then my worst fear was realized, as Jamie Grubbs stepped out of the police cruiser, hitching his belt and smiling at me as he approached. “Hey, fancy seeing you here, Powers,” he said, approaching.

  “Yeah, imagine that,” I said, trying to keep the frustration out of my voice. I literally would have rather seen anyone step out of that car than Jamie.

  “What’s going on?” Jamie said. “Where’s your car?”

  “It’s home.”

  “You doing the walk of shame or something?” he asked, and he seemed to grin, but his eyes looked harsh as he said it.

  “None of your business,” I replied curtly.

  He flinched. “Hey now, what’s with the ‘tude?”

  “Sorry, I’m just tired. I’m not that far from home.”

  “You’re a few miles yet,” he said, shaking his head slowly. “You sure you’re okay, kiddo?” He stepped forward and reached out, putting his palm on my shoulder, dirty
-fingernails still clearly in evidence.

  “I’m fine, I promise.”

  His hand lingered. His eyes softened. “Caeli,” he said, “why don’t you come let me give you a lift home, huh?”

  I looked down at his hand and tried not to squirm. “I really don’t mind the fresh air.”

  “Come on, don’t be silly,” he replied, and began guiding me toward the cruiser.

  I didn’t want to, but then I thought—why not take the ride? It would get it over with, and my feet were starting to get quite sore.

  We walked to the cruiser and got inside.

  It smelled of coffee and stale air, and maybe a hint of sweat. Jamie turned the sound down on his police radio, giving me a wink and a sly grin.

  My skin crawled. I suddenly wanted very much to get out of the car.

  “You warm enough in that skirt?” he asked, adjusting the temperature.

  “Yup.” I nodded, pretending not to want to jump out of the car screaming.

  He turned toward me, looking into my eyes. “I’m a little worried about you, kiddo.”

  “I’m the same age as you, Jamie.” I tried to smile, but it was getting tougher.

  His eyes crinkled around the edges. “You know, I always felt like we had a connection. I mean, we were good friends. Remember?”

  “Sure. Of course we were. But we were little kids.”

  “I’d like to think we still are friends.” He stared at me and I got a strange feeling in my belly.

  Run. Leave. Get out of the car now.

  “We’re still friends, of course,” I lied. “But we just have lives now, we’re adults.”

  He laughed, nodding. “Heck, I think about those days a lot, though. Think about you a lot,” he said, licking his lips, and now his mustache was slick with his spittle.

  I felt nauseous.

  “Thanks,” I said. “Well, should we get going?”

  “You’re in a big hurry for someone who was just hoofing it.”

  “I figure the way we’re going, I might have been faster if I’d just kept walking.”

  He grinned. “Gosh, you’re funny. Always were, too.” He leaned forward and his hand snaked towards my bare leg. “Most girls as pretty as you aren’t funny at all.”