Rise and Run (Broken Man Trilogy Book 1)

by RJ Plant

  I took another deep breath, seething, so angry I could barely see, but I kept going.

  “And you know what? If it weren’t for me, Felix would be dead. He’d be dead if I hadn’t helped him with Henderson. Oh, but I get the bad rep for that, don’t I? ’Cause that’s what it always goes back to, isn’t it?”

  My voice got quiet, recalling the words I’d spoken to him so many years ago.

  “Aren’t you glad, old man? Aren’t you grateful that I was able to talk Felix out of taking his fucking meds that day?” Then, much louder, “Aren’t you grateful, you selfish, hateful, abusive, self-righteous fuck! You think I owe you anything?”

  I turned away, closed my eyes. The anger welled, constricting my chest, manifesting in the need to hit something, throw something, destroy anything.

  A soft hand on my arm surprised me. I looked at it, looked to its owner, anger turning lukewarm as I looked at Kaitlyn.

  “Roy Henderson?” she asked in a small voice.

  She looked at me, then to Rian. I turned back to face Rian and Shaina, waiting for Rian to say something. It was a rare thing to see the great and mighty Rian Connell look uncomfortable.

  “You look uncomfortable, Rian,” I said. “Do you want to tell her? Or should I? Or …”

  This was not my shite to deal with, not really.

  So I let Felix out.

  *****

  I blinked, tried to ground myself. The pain was minimal. I looked around. Kaitlyn, Rian … Shaina.

  I wasn’t sure how I’d gotten here. By the look on everyone’s face, I didn’t want to know.

  It’s your lucky day, isn’t it? Conor said. You’re getting to atone for past sins.

  “You killed Seth,” I shouted.

  Shaina’s eyes narrowed. Hadn’t meant to even say it aloud.

  Are you sure about that? But I’m not talking about Seth, am I? I’m talking about Roy Henderson.

  I looked at Kaitlyn, who had backed away from me when I’d shouted. Remembered what she said about the virus. About what would happen if I touched someone.

  “Did you kill my father?” she asked. The tone of her voice seemed to indicate she already knew the answer.

  The questions flooded my mind again. What was going on? How did I get here?

  You got here because of Rian. Well, go on, then. Answer her.

  I could hear laughter in my head. Painful sound.

  “Kaitlyn, I …” I reached toward her and even as I thought better of it, she jerked away.

  Didn’t think it was because of the virus this time.

  Nice to be the one everyone fears, isn’t it?

  “Shut up,” I yelled aloud, palming my forehead as though the pressure alone would shut him up.

  It couldn’t. What’s worse, even as I hated him, I took comfort in his presence. I wanted to scream.

  “Felix,” Rian said.

  I looked up as Rian reached out a hand.

  “Don’t,” I said, more angrily than I meant. I tried again: “If you touch me, the virus will kill you.”

  I looked at Shaina. Looked away.

  “You’ve seen what happens,” I said.

  She turned, vanished into the house.

  “He doesn’t deserve to be comforted,” Kaitlyn said, glaring at Rian. “He’s a murderer.”

  “You don’t know the half of it,” I said.

  “He was just following orders, Kaitie,” Rian said. “Your father was not a good person. He’s the reason Marie, God rest her soul, is dead.”

  “What are you talking about? Mom died from cancer.”

  “They found it early, when it was treatable,” Rian said. “But Marie wanted it to take her. So she could get away from Roy. He was abusive, Kaitie—he beat her mercilessly.”

  She was silent. Like she knew but had hidden from the truth of it.

  “She could have just left him. Why didn’t you do anything before?” she asked, eyes searching everywhere.

  “Kaitie—”

  “She was your sister. Why didn’t you help her? You waited—” her words choked off. “You waited until she was dead and then you decided to do something? Decided to have my father killed?” And then to me: “And you killed him?”

  But I didn’t …

  “I can’t fix everything, Kaitie dear, no matter how significant the loss,” Rian said. “And sometimes there are more important things that need protecting.”

  His eyes landed on me.

  “I can’t …” Kaitlyn whispered, eyes clouding with tears. “I can’t do this.”

  She ran. Back down the drive.

  Well, that went arseways, Conor said, and I could feel him pull himself forward.

  26

  5 November 2042, Belfast, United Irish Republic

  We’d done enough damage, the lot of us, Rian, Felix … me. Maybe mostly me. I’d let my anger get the best of me. And I’d probably just shat on whatever truce I’d tentatively made with Felix.

  It was worth it for him to feel hated for once.

  I turned to Rian.

  “It’s a right-good mess of it you’ve made, isn’t it? Don’t worry, I’ll pick up the pieces.”

  Rian didn’t say anything, didn’t try to stop me as I left to find Kaitlyn.

  She was sitting at the edge of the drive, arms hugging her knees to her chest. She was quiet, but tears still fell, an automated response. I sat down beside her in companionable silence.

  “Aren’t you going to ask which one I am?” I said, finally.

  She glanced at me before looking back out across the splotchy green horizon.

  “I know who you are,” she said, then bumped against me. “I’ve spent enough time around you to know the difference.”

  “Why did you call Rian?” I asked, trying not to let anything show through my voice.

  “I don’t know. I just … I guess I wanted him to be able to see Felix again.”

  “Didn’t quite think that one through, huh?”

  “Felix is his son. Anyone can be blind when it comes to family, to loved ones.”

  “Adopted son,” I corrected. “Which is not family. I was Felix’s family. And, technically, Rian adopted me.”

  “I’m sorry,” Kaitlyn said. “I’m sorry Rian took Felix from you. He’s concerned for Felix, though. He’ll do anything to get Felix back and keep him safe.”

  “Everything Rian has said to me makes it seem otherwise.”

  “Why would he show his hand to you? You’re almost as much the enemy as Bernard.”

  Ouch.

  I could ignore the dig. I hadn’t really come to find her to talk about me, anyway.

  “About what you heard back there … I’m sorry, Kaitlyn,” I said and meant it.

  “What … happened?”

  “I know it’s not easy to hear, but Rian’s right. Your old man was … not a good person.”

  “I know that. I’d be blind and dumb not to. Maybe I didn’t realize the extent of it at the time, but …”

  “He was getting out of hand, drawing attention, hurting people and the like. One day, Rian just sort of snapped. Told Felix that Roy needed to be dealt with. Rian might say Felix was following orders, but Rian never sent him to do anything. Felix just responded to what Rian had said. Responded to what he didn’t say.”

  I shook my head, trying to figure out how to explain better.

  “That day at the police station. Your hands,” Kaitlyn said.

  I nodded.

  “To his credit, Felix wanted to tell you. He was just … He was just scared.”

  More silence.

  “What made Rian decide to give Felix the medication to suppress you?”

  “I don’t think he could even differentiate us at the time. Sometimes we struggled, Felix and I, in the beginning. Before I knew how to take control, before I knew I could, the internal struggle, at times, became a very ugly external one. It wasn’t always like that. We were friends, brothers—it was only normal to fight like it. Within a few years of his adop
ting us, Rian could tell something was really, very wrong. When the tests began, that’s when I became violent.

  “I was terrified at first, and so young. I didn’t understand. Raged against it every step of the way, I did. Felix was … timid back then. Not at all like he is today. He would be the one waking up when they sedated me, though I’m not sure why. He seemed like the better version of us, of course, too docile to fight what they were doing to us. Or maybe he didn’t care.

  “Rian began to keep track of us more carefully, then decided who he wanted to play father to.” I laughed just at the sound of it. “Esposito focused solely on locking me away. Or in light of recent developments, I suppose that’s not all he focused on.”

  Kaitlyn nodded and another few minutes of silence passed.

  “And my father?”

  “The suppressant formula wasn’t fully functional until we were about nineteen. That meant with whatever he was taking, I could still push my way through. Sometimes I could suggest to him not to take the meds.

  “Felix goes to confront Roy. Despite size and training, Felix wasn’t going to win. There’s a difference between fighting a bag and fighting a body, a difference between sparring and fighting an active participant who fears for his life. Roy went on the offensive before Felix had even thrown a punch and he would have beaten us close to death, but he took off to get a knife. When he came back …”

  I looked at Kaitlyn, waited until I had her full attention before saying, “I finished the job Felix couldn’t. I didn’t have to kill him, Kait. I just had to defend us. And I’m sorry. Not for killing Roy, mind you. I’m sorry that everyone has kept this from you for so long. Felix isn’t the murderer—at least, not your old man’s murderer. That would be me.”

  “I won’t pretend I’m not hurt or angry, but you seem just as much a victim as anyone. In your case, it was self-defense. At least I know the truth now.”

  I balked at being called a victim, but if that’s what Kait needed to tell herself, well … who was I to argue?

  I stood up and offered Kaitlyn my hand.

  “We still have a job to do, Kait. Even if it means working with those we’re more than a little sore at.”

  She nodded, took my hand, and stood up.

  *****

  5 November 2042, Belfast, United Irish Republic

  We sat around the kitchen table, Kaitlyn and I on one side—a united front—Rian and Shaina facing us, and Brinly on the end, facing the entryway, ever neutral.

  If you can call a triple-agent neutral.

  “Bernard only took a couple of guys with him,” I said after explaining the plan—minus Truepenny’s involvement—to Rian and Shaina. “It should be easy enough to take them out, grab Bernard, extract the information from him. We just have to let him find you.”

  “What’s to stop them from shooting us right on the spot?” Shaina asked. “They don’t need anything from us. Or are we disposable, like Seth?”

  Her face looked older, harsher. Meaner.

  I took a deep breath. I could have protested my innocence. I hadn’t called Felix. It was never in my head for Seth to die like … that. If I’d wanted him dead, I’d have shot him. So I did the only thing I could do without hinting that Felix and I were having control issues. I owned the deed.

  “I know I hurt you, but you have to be reasonable. He was going to kill me, so I acted first. For fuck’s sake, he shot me with no provocation. Twice.” I held up my right hand for emphasis and wiggled my nub. “Sure, it’s not what you want to hear, but it’s the truth.”

  “There seems to be a lot of that going around today,” Brinly said with eyes for only Rian.

  She was leaning back in her chair, feet propped on the table and hands behind her head in a relaxed position, as though she could force the chair to recline through sheer will.

  And I half believed she could do it.

  “Someone needed to start the trend,” Kaitlyn said.

  “I was just trying to protect you, Kaitie dear,” Rian said.

  I stood up, then leaned across the table, propping myself up on my hands.

  “What’s done is done,” I said. “It’s really more important that we move forward and deal with Bernard.”

  “Why didn’t you just do it yourself?” Shaina asked. “You were in the same room.”

  “You think I should have tried to interrogate Bernard in a building full of GDI soldiers armed to the teeth?”

  She didn’t respond.

  “Look, Shaina,” I said, and she flinched like I’d hit her when I said her name. “I’m not saying anyone here is expendable. What I am saying is that the best time to get to Bernard is when he has minimal security and is out in the open. Which will be the exact circumstances when he finds you and Rian in Dublin.

  “We let him find you at the flat, we take out his security, we find out how deep this little radical faction goes. Then we kill him. Then we can all fuck-away-off to our own magical places, free from one another.”

  There was a long pause. I sat back down and stared at Rian, waiting for his response.

  He finally nodded.

  Good.

  “Do you still have video feed to Kaitlyn’s flat?” I asked Rian, to which he nodded again.

  “You and Shaina can arrive in view. Kaitlyn, Brinly, and I can find a way in without being seen and wait in Felix’s flat to monitor the situation. We’ll go in first and call you once we’re in position. When Bernard arrives, we’ll know.”

  “You bugged my flat?” Kaitlyn asked, sounding more irritated than offended.

  “Let it go, Kait. We’re all moving on.” I patted her knee.

  “Wait, why are they going to my flat?”

  “Because that’s where I told Bernard they’d be.”

  *****

  5 November 2042, Dublin, United Irish Republic

  I stared at the back of the building. There was no back door and the building was distinctly lacking another key element.

  “How is there no fecking fire escape?” I asked, offended by the audacity of the fire escape refusing to be where I thought it ought to be. “Isn’t that a safety hazard?”

  “Three buildings down,” Brinly said.

  “How many years have you lived here?” I said to Kaitlyn. “Did you know there wasn’t a fire escape? How do you live in a building with no fecking fire escape?”

  “Free rent and hot showers,” she said.

  I gave her my best disappointed look, then peeked around the side of the building and saw part of a standard GDI roller. It didn’t seem like anyone was around. Rian and Shaina wouldn’t arrive until after we were in position.

  Which meant we had to get in position.

  I jogged down the alley to the fire escape Brinly had pointed out. I was grateful the iron staircase led all the way to the ground, since I’d need all my energy for roof hopping.

  The roof was littered with small stones and other debris, which seemed to have landed there from nearby bomb-struck buildings. A concrete wall, about two feet high, ran along the perimeter of the roof.

  I gauged the distance from this roof to the next. There were only about four feet between the two. I leaned over the back edge, near the fire escape, to get the girls’ attention, then waved them up.

  “I hate you,” Kaitlyn said, looking at the drop between the buildings after she and Brinly joined me.

  I smiled at her.

  “Shouldn’t be anything you can’t handle,” I said. “Brinly?”

  She studied the distance, then said, “Should be a breeze.”

  She took several steps back and kicked some of the debris out of her way. In two long strides she surged forward, briefly touching her right foot against the concrete wall before jumping over to the next building.

  “Go on, then,” I said to Kaitlyn. “You’re up.”

  She looked over the edge again and let out a string of foul words that any sailor would be proud of. She walked to about where Brinly had made a run at it. Then she took
a few more steps back.

  “Oh, I really hate you,” she said, then launched into a run and jumped.

  It was less graceful than Brinly’s, but it got the job done.

  “The next one is a little worse,” Brinly said when I joined them. Kaitlyn paled as she glanced over the side.

  “It’s a lot worse,” she said. “As in, the distance across is farther than I am tall.”

  I walked over to the edge to see how much Kaitlyn was exaggerating. The answer was, she wasn’t. There were at least six feet between this building and the one we actually needed to be on.

  “At least there aren’t walls around these two,” I said.

  “Yeah, but the extra height would’ve actually helped in this case, considering the greater distance,” Brinly said, eyeing Kaitlyn. “She won’t make it over, Conor.”

  “I could have told him that myself,” Kaitlyn said sharply.

  I looked over the distance, then at Kait. She couldn’t weigh terribly much.

  “Go on, Brinly,” I said. Then to Kaitlyn, “I’ll give you a lift.”

  “A lift? What does that mean exactly?”

  I could hear Brinly laugh as she jumped across.

  “We can’t all be built like a gazelle,” Kaitlyn muttered.

  I knelt with my back to Kaitlyn.

  “Climb on,” I said.

  “You’re not serious,” she said.

  “Oh, I am that. Don’t worry, I’ll probably not kill us.”

  Kaitlyn put her arms around my neck, leaned in and, one leg at a time, wrapped herself around me. After I stood, I did my best to resituate her so that most of her weight was being carried as close as possible to my center of gravity.

  Bloody gravity.

  I gave myself enough room to make a run for it without burning all my energy in the process. I could see Brinly smiling, laughing, from the other building.

  I made a half-hearted rude gesture at her, which only made her laugh harder.

  Then I ran.

  I sprung off the very edge of the roof with all the force I could muster.

  “Shit, shit, shit,” Kaitlyn whispered, the sound moving against my right ear.