by Teagan Kade
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
DEACON
Caught in the morning light, her hair fanned out on my pillow, she’s beyond beautiful. She’s going to have a killer headache when she wakes up, though. Note to self: Lightweight drinker.
I’m watching her when my eyes lift to the photos on the wall, to one in particular—to her.
I look at the picture, at the woman there who could almost double for Lux. The woman that was almost my wife until she was taken from me, and what could you do about it? Fucking nothing. That’s what.
Doubt begins to creep back into my head. What are you doing, my friend? You’ve had your fun. Let her go.
I can’t, but the voice grows louder in my head, the picture damning.
What if you lose her too? Would you be able to forgive yourself?
Like I said, people will come, people who want to hurt me and anyone close to me. What the fuck am I going to do then, if she does get hurt, killed, because her association to me?
Fuck.
I look between her and the picture and the voice grows, louder and louder and louder until there’s only one way out.
You have to let her go, push her away.
I don’t know if I can do it. We’ve grown so close. I think of life without her and…
You have to. It really is true. If you love something, you have to let it go.
Love—It’s always been such an abstract fucking concept to me. I’ve only felt it twice, only believed it then and now, which is why it has to happen.
If I strip away the emotion, my head’s right. She will never be safe with me. I can’t have her death on my conscience too.
I take a deep breath and exhale.
Today.
Today we break up.
*
An ugly wave rises from the back of the set, a definite close-out.
“Go,” I command.
Lux looks to me, dubious. “Are you sure?”
“Fucking go!” I yell.
She turns and paddles hard, but the wave is buckling before it even gets going. I see her go down from the very top, a slab of water hammering her into the reef.
I watch the wash and plead. Surface. Surface.
She does, spluttering and coughing, thankfully no coming waves to take her out again.
She paddles over clearly furious. “Why did you make me take that?”
“You need to know what it’s like to wipe out, what it’s like to call a dud.”
“I almost got dragged across the reef. Is that what you want? Me, bloody and broken?”
“Maybe.”
She shakes her head. “What the hell is going on with you today? Is it because of last night? I’m sorry. I don’t drink much.”
I laugh. “You think I’m pissed off because we didn’t fuck?”
“I don’t want to do it drunk, Deacon. I have sex with you with all senses firing, special, like always.”
“Special,” I scoff, the lie burning my lips. “I’m out of here.” I turn and paddle into the first wave of the next set, dropping to the bottom of it fast and riding it out of the impact zone.
I’m starting my way up the beach when I hear her behind me.
“Wait. Talk to me. Deacon!” she shouts over the din, running up the beach to catch me.
I turn fast, almost hitting her with my board. “What? What the fuck is it?” The anger in my voice is strong, physical.
She takes a step back and for the first time I see fear in her eyes, but that’s good. She needs to fear me. It’s the only way. “I don’t understand. We were fine, incredible, and now you’re flipping out, completely someone else? It doesn’t make any sense. What happened?”
I stab my finger at her. “I’m simply seeing clearly.”
“And what do you see?”
I don’t want to say it, but my mouth is moving and soon the words have left my lips. “A talentless Playboy bunny who’s better off back in Cali-fucking-fornia.”
The hurt’s all over her face, but she doesn’t buy it. “What the hell is wrong with you? This isn’t you at all.”
I jump towards her. “How the fuck would you know what I am? You think just because we screwed a couple of times we’re somehow soulmates, that we’re going to go home and get married, start a family and buy an SUV to cart them around in. If that’s what you’re thinking, you’re delusional. If that’s what you’re thinking, you don’t know me at all.”
Keep going.
I shake my head, the water fanning out but the action does nothing to relive the sudden migraine crushing my skull. “Jason, your cop friend? Why did you have him look into us?”
That gets her. “How did you…?”
I laugh, looking up to a murky sky. “Does it matter? I have contacts too, you know.”
“You don’t even have the internet.”
“I don’t need it to know you’re sticking your nose in places where it doesn’t belong, dangerous fucking places.”
She throws her arms wide, drops her board and walks closer, the rain whipping across her face, her hair stuck to her cheeks in flaxen tendrils. “How many times do I have to say it? I. Can. Handle. Myself. I called a friend, yes. I had him run your names to be on the safe side, to get an idea of who these guys I’m staying with are, and you know what? You’re ghosts. You don’t exist.”
“And that’s a problem?”
She replies “Yes,” but she doesn’t sound sure.
“We’re ghosts for a reason.”
“So tell me?” she pleads, pounding against my chest with her hand. “Tell me so I can help, understand, fucking something?”
I let the blows fall. “I can’t and, frankly, I don’t want to.”
Lux wipes away tears, rain, the ocean, ten types of water and all of it salty. “I thought you trusted me.”
It’s killing me to do this to her, but it has to be done.
“I barely know you.” The words are poison in my mouth, acidic.
She looks to the ground, sniffs back more tears. Even when she’s sad she’s adorable. “Is this really what it’s come to? I told you the first time we met and I’m getting really, really fucking sick of saying it over and over and over again—I can handle myself. Whatever you’re mixed up in, we can face it together, right?”
No.
I’m not going to put someone I love in danger, even if it means kissing happiness goodbye forever. If Lux got hurt, killed, because of me I could never forgive myself. Enough people have paid for my crimes already. “You have no idea. You think we have something special, a connection?” A pause, don’t even know if I can do, but I’m in too deep now. “Honestly? You’re just another fuck, another pussy.”
She slaps me in the face. I want her to do it again. I fucking welcome the pain right now. “You’re a fucking bastard,” she spits. She stands back. “You don’t mean it.”
“I do.” It doesn’t sound very convincing.
She steps back up to me, locks eyes. “Tell me it meant nothing, truthfully, and I’ll leave.”
Fucking hell. I take a deep breath. “It meant nothing. You… mean nothing to me.”
I think she’s going to slap me again, but she turns and walks past me calmly, board under her arm. “I’ll be gone by morning,” she says, quiet.
I want to beg her to come back, to tell her everything, but this is the way it has to be. It’s going to hurt at first, fuck it is, but I’ll get over it and move on.
I always do.
*
Fucks knows how I managed to fall asleep, but I wake up restless, drained. I walk out to the smell of shitty coffee, Razor and Bo sitting at the table waiting for me. I keep walking past them. “Who made you assholes the parentals?” I notice she’s missing. “Where’s Lux?”
Razor stands, hands on the table shaking his head. “Gone.”
I try to act surprised. “Oh?”
“Taxi came past early this morning and picked her up. Saw it out the window. She didn’t even say goodbye, man.”
/> “What the fuck did you do?” Bo continues. “I know you said no girlfriends, no relationships, but I thought you two…”
“You thought we what?” I shout back.
He puts his hands up. “Fuck, calm down.”
I take a mug off the shelf and place it on the bench, can almost picture Lux in front of me with her legs spread and her nipples tenting out one of my tees. “It’s for the best.”
Bo stands fast, the chair he was sitting on screeching back. “Fuck that, bro. You had a good thing going there. You don’t just drop a girl like that, just snap and dump her. She was a fucking dream girl, man, once-in-a-lifetime material.”
“Like Abbey, you mean?”
“Don’t you—”
Razor goes to say ‘Fuck Abbey,’ but he pauses before speaking again. “Why? Tell us. We have a right to know.”
I pour the coffee. It looks like fucking dirt in a cup. “Why the fuck should I? Who I date, who I fuck is my own business. You don’t get a say.”
Bo shakes his head. “You are the one who dragged us down here, remember? I was going places back home. I had a life.”
I laugh, picking up the mug. “You had eight jobs in two years. I hardly think you were ‘going places’.”
“Fuck you, bro.”
Razor comes around the bench, takes the mug out of my hand. “Fucking tell us.”
I give in. “Fine. You think she’s safe here with us?”
The two exchange a glance, confused. “Sure.”
I lean against the bench. “They are going to come. That guy, the one with the neck tatts? He spooked me. If something were to happen to her because of my shit, I…”
Razor leans against the bench with his hands. “You were there for her, remember? Hell, she’s only alive now because of you, and maybe she has her own shit. Has that ever crossed your mind? Nothing is going to happen. No one is going to find us. I mean, fuck, you finally had a smile on your face. The old Deacon was back, not this mopey, melancholy excuse for a human being. Finke’s fucking dreary enough without your doom and gloom.”
I place my hands on the counter. “I looked at that picture of Abbey, I looked at her, and I knew what had to be done. My happiness isn’t worth her life. Imagine if they found out about her. They could use it as leverage, and what do I have to give them? Fuck all. That’s what.”
The two of them consider it.
“It’s a mistake,” says Razor. “You can’t live your whole life like this, man, treading on eggshells. Sooner or later you’ve got to open up, no matter how painful it may be.”
“Thanks, Dr. Phil,” I scoff, “but I’m fine. She was just another girl, another hole.”
Razor laughs. “Fucking listen to yourself. You’re talking shit.”
I’m watching him, staring at the scar on his face they cut into him because they were looking for me. It was a fucking miracle I got him out before they kept going.
I push off the bench. “I’ve had enough of this.”
“Where are you going?” Razor calls, as I head towards the door.
I grab my jacket on the way. “To be alone. Is that okay, Dad?”
Problem is, deep down I know they’re talking sense, so why did I do it?
Because you are fucking scared.
Bo’s still shaking his head as I close the door. “Fucking pathetic,” he says. “Mom and Dad would be fucking ashamed of you right now.”
I leave and slam the front door closed, press myself against the back of it. Razor’s right. They would be, but fuck them. Dad’s dead, Mom’s dead, Abbey’s dead, not to mention the men I worked with, men who died directly because of me. They’re all dead and I’m not about to add anyone else to the list.
You did the right thing, I tell myself.
So why then does it feel so fucking wrong?
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
LUX
I’m so used to the glum weather of Tasmania that the heated hammer of the Midwest US comes as something of a shock.
It’s a blur now. I was thankful the others weren’t home when I arrived back from the beach, that they couldn’t see the tears falling from my face, my broken heart on show. The taxi ride to Hobart wasn’t much better. The guy driving kept asking me what was wrong. All I could tell him was “I’m fine, I’m fine,” the whole way there, thankful to catch the last flight out of there even if it did cost me everything I’d earned at Sarah’s.
Jason picked me up at LAX. He was kind enough to let me crash at his for a while. His girlfriend didn’t mind, said she enjoyed having a female around after being stuck at sea for six months with a Navy ship full of “dicks with heads”.
Days began to blend together. I lost track of things, couldn’t even summon the energy to get out of bed most mornings.
It was something Jason’s girlfriend said that finally motivated me to get out. “You know the best cure for a broken heart?” she told me. “A road trip.”
I made plans the very next morning, Jason loaned me a couple of hundred and his car provided I’d be back by the working week. Where I was headed, I certainly wasn’t planning on staying, not after what Deacon had said about the place.
And now I’m here—smack dab in the middle of the United States headed for the mysterious Millertown.
I squint up at the sun as I step out of the car, no company but for a tumbleweed that, given its dry disposition, seems about as happy as I am to be here. What the hell are you doing, Lux, seriously? You should just let him go.
But I can’t.
The guy behind the counter of the gas station is wearing a World’s Biggest Dick shirt with one arrow pointing downwards to his crotch and another to his head. He chews on jerky, gut brushing the counter.
I keep my distance. “Hi, I’m wondering how far it is to Millertown?”
He eyes me. “’Bout fifteen minutes up the road. Ain’t much of a vacation spot, though, hunny.”
I take out my phone, pull up the picture of Deacon I took with my cell that day in his room before the whole wardrobe incident, the picture of him with the mysterious girl. “I’m looking for this man.”
Jerky Guy studies the picture.
He leans back, hands on the counter, eyeing my chest. “You know, kind of looks familiar, but hell, we get a lot of people through here.”
I doubt that.
He finally looks up. “What did you say your business was again?”
I pull out my badge, the one I was supposed to hand in weeks ago, let him take a nice, long look. “Police business.”
He nods, satisfied. “Look, there’s this guy, Storm, about ten miles up the road, got a big place. If it’s ‘police business,’ he’s you’re best shot. Damn well knows everyone around here. Knows trouble, too… or did.”
“His actual name is Storm?” Jesus, I really have hit the sticks. What next? ‘Rainbow’?
The World’s Biggest Dick spits a wad of something to the floor. “That’s his name. Tell him Aaron sent you.” He points down to a map laminated into the counter. Five miles and then left down this road. Follow it straight. Can’t miss the place.
I tuck my cell away. “Thanks.”
*
The weather turns a little as I come into the driveway. For all I know I’ve been sent to some serial killer club. That’s why I slip a Glock into my waistband, the metal cold against my ass—Deacon’s ass. If only I could stop thinking about him I’d be fine. If only I never left California I’d be fine.
Too late for that.
On the property there’s a palatial house that looks new and a large shed nearby not so new. I try the house first, but no one seems to be home. I have better luck in the shed, grease-soaked jeans and boots jutting out from the bottom of a lime Chevy Nova. The whole shed’s full of cars and bikes in various states of repair. It’s the kind of testosterone drenched zone Dad would have loved.
“Hello?”
Someone slides out from under the car. Given the guy’s ink and dark hair, he could double as another Hunt
. He sits up, no shirt, body also at a Hunt level of muscular perfection.
“Can I help you?” he says, voice rough, large wrench in hand.
“Storm?”
He nods, placing the wrench down and standing. He swipes a rag off the tool bench.
This time I pull out the badge first. “I’m Officer Jackson, from California.” I replace the badge with my cell, bring up the shot of Deacon and zoom in. Concentrate. “I’m looking for this man.”
While he looks at the picture I quickly sweep my eyes over the shed. It’s filled with car parts, engines. There’s a university degree of some kind on the wall, a little out of place, a picture of a woman and a kid pinned above it.
Storm flicks his eyes up to me, continuing to clean his hands. “Long way from California, aren’t you, Officer Jackson?”
I slip the cell back into my pocket. “It’s very important.”
“How’d you find me?”
“A guy at a gas station, Aaron, said you might be able to help.”
Storm shakes his head. “He did, did he?”
“Yes.”
“Motherfucker.”
“Sorry?”
He points to my pocket. “What’s he done, your mystery man?”
“I’m afraid I can’t really comment. It’s a personal matter.”
This guy is the dictionary definition of a bad boy criminal, yet I don’t feel uncomfortable in his presence. There’s something about him that puts me at ease. Maybe it’s the photo on the wall. Maybe it’s the fact he hasn’t killed you yet.
“So, Storm’s your real name?” I continue. Good one, Lux. Insult the guy.
“You haven’t told me your first name yet, Officer Jackson.”
“Lux.”
“Well, Lux, it strikes me as a little odd you’ve hiked up all this way from California looking for this guy, no partner, no patrol car. So, if you want my help, I’m afraid I’m going to need a bit more than ‘it’s a personal matter.’” He leans back against the door of the Chevy.
He’s got me there. Oh, fuck it. “Okay, I met him in Australia, surfing. You might say we formed something of a relationship, but I think he’s in trouble.”
“What makes you say that?”
I don’t want to give this guy too much information, but he seems like he knows Deacon. I expected to be door-knocking for days, but if I can get what I need now it would save a whole lot of time. “I don’t know. He pushed me away, completely out of character. I think he’s expecting something to go down maybe, didn’t want me to be in danger. I want to help him, be with him, but I need to know a bit about his past, who he is. He’s very… private.”
