Free and Bound

by Chloe Cox

  Charlene sighed.

  “That’s called being in love, you dumb goober.”

  “And that’s what I can’t do.”

  “Really? I thought the problem with Gabby was that you wouldn’t marry her, and that’s why she ruined your life.”

  A pause. High noon under fluorescent lights, across a row of beat-up chairs.

  Gavin said, “If anyone else said that to me…”

  “You don’t scare me,” Charlene said. “Goober.”

  “Charlie, why are you doing this?”

  “Have you ever thought about what she did to you, Gavin?”

  “What she did to me?”

  “What she did to you when she made the choice to push that scene on you. She didn’t ask you. And she did it because you hadn’t asked her to marry you yet, which is…” Charlene trailed off, shaking her head. “Point is, if we saw a Domme pull that crap, we’d have her prosecuted. You’d run her out of town on a freaking rail. You’d do it personally!”

  “You don’t have any goddamn idea what you’re talking about.”

  But he turned away.

  “Nurse!” Gavin called out. He didn’t much use the Dom tone in the regular world, but this situation warranted it. The surprised nurse looked up from his clipboard, confused about why he’d stopped just outside the swinging double doors.

  “The woman in room two,” Gavin said. “What’s her status?”

  “Are you family?”

  “I brought her in,” Gavin said. He walked up to the other man, still standing there with a clipboard. “She awake?”

  “She’s awake, but she’s still getting her stomach pumped,” he said.

  “Make sure she knows I’m still here,” Gavin said. “Understood?”

  Automatically, the nurse nodded. Gavin turned away before the other man could think to question any of it.

  And now Charlene looked like she was about to cry.

  What in the hell now?

  “I know what she did, Gavin,” Charlene said. “Gabby told me. And she told me like it was…like it was just some wild adventure, like it was a fun caper that the two of you got up to.”

  Gavin stood perfectly still.

  Didn’t talk. Just shook his head.

  “It wasn’t—”

  “And I laughed!” Charlene said, miserably. “She was trying to convince herself that it wasn’t a big deal, and I went along with it, because we were practically kids and neither of us knew how to talk about things that weren’t ok.”

  “We were all young,” Gavin said, gently. “We were all stupid.”

  “Yes! Exactly! So why was it your fault, Gavin? Why not hers? Why not all of ours? Why not just bad fucking luck?”

  Gavin studied her. He hadn’t seen her this upset in ten years.

  “Charlie, what’s going on?”

  “You did nothing wrong!” she shouted. “You should have broken up with her! You were the only one mature enough to take it seriously, and Gabby couldn’t admit she’d screwed up because it scared her to think she could hurt you, and I don’t think you’ve ever admitted that, either. She hurt you, and you’ve never trusted anyone since.”

  Gavin finished his lap around the center aisle of chairs, never taking his eyes off his oldest friend. He approached her slowly, like a nervous stray. He had a feeling this was new territory for Charlene too.

  “This about me,” he said. “Or you?”

  “Screw you, Gavin,” Charlene said, and began to cry. “You’ve actually got a chance at something real, you lucky SOB. And I’m not telling you how to deal with your past, I’m just saying quit pretending you have, because it’s getting in the way. It follows you around like a freaking poltergeist, and it just chased a woman who loves you all the way to Los Angeles.”

  Cursing, Charlene dug into her purse for a tissue, started dabbing at her eyes. Still managed to roll them at the look on his face, though.

  “Oh please,” she said. “It’s obvious. She loves you.”

  She finished dabbing, her face kind of puffy and raw. Charlene had told him once that she never cried in public because you have to know what kind of crier you are, and she was not a camera-ready crier. Gavin was in the inner sanctum by accident.

  “Charlie, you have your whole life ahead of you,” he said. “They’re not all like your ex.”

  “Shut up,” she said, and finally turned to show him her whole face. Tear-streaked, but damn defiant. “You have to get right with what happened to you, Gavin, because it’s not just about you anymore. You have a shot, a real shot. So from all of us who will never get even that: don’t screw this up.”

  He didn’t know what to say. He’d carried that weight for so long, he’d grown around it, making it part of him. And now one of the only people in the world he knew to be just good, through and through, was telling him to put it down. He didn’t know if he knew how.

  “Yeah, well,” Charlene said, eying him like a damn mind reader, “if that doesn’t do it, may I remind you that if you don’t get right with that, you’re going to break Olivia Cress’s heart into those million pieces you were talking about. Hell, you already have. If you can’t do it for yourself, Gavin, do it for her. But, goddammit, do something.”

  Gavin took another step forward, and wrapped his friend in the hug he knew she needed. Charlene burst into tears again, grieving her own loneliness and still trying to be a friend at the same time.

  I am one lucky son of a bitch.

  “Sir?”

  Charlene pulled away, and the nurse with the clipboard stood behind him.

  “She’s asking to see you.”

  37

  Olivia wheeled the old Impala in a big arc, aiming at the open gates of the lot that housed the machine shop. Still the same bone-dry dirt lot, still the same desolate location, nothing but storage facilities and old, broke down factories for miles in every direction, punctuated by the occasional surviving family farm and lots of dry, brown brush. Still the same low-slung tin roof, same long, low building.

  Lots of new cars.

  “What is all this?” she whispered.

  A guy she didn’t recognize came out of the dark mouth of the machine shop’s open doors, wiping his greasy hands with a rag.

  “You got the right place, lady?” he said as she stepped out of the Impala. Not entirely friendly, either.

  “I still own part of it, so yeah,” she said. “I’m Olivia Cress.”

  Heels hadn’t been the best choice, though.

  The guy dipped his head, nodded.

  Then walked away.

  Olivia sighed. “Doesn’t mean I still know my way around,” she said to no one at all. None of this felt like it belonged to her anymore.

  She shielded her eyes from the sun and walked toward the shop, crossing the shade barrier and pausing to let her eyes get used to the sudden, relative darkness. She could hear the shop as she approached, heard it even louder there at the entrance, the clang and stamp and whir of metal and rivets and lathes.

  There were a whole bunch of guys she didn’t recognize, all of them too busy to catcall her.

  Which was obviously fantastic, except for the part where she didn’t understand any of it. They’d been struggling for years, trying to get by with the old-timers making up for her Dad’s depression. She’d had to work constantly to cover all those loans to save her family’s business.

  So where the hell was her family?

  “It’s been a long time.”

  She whirled around to see Benji, looking exactly the same, apparently ageless after a certain point of grizzling, and she wanted to hug him. The old man stopped her, held up hands covered in grease.

  “I’ll say hi when you’re properly dressed,” he grinned. “Does your dad know you’re here?”

  “Surprise,” she said, and tried to smile.

  “Office is in the same place.”

  She looked up—the light was on in the small room, elevated over the shop floor. With Benji watching she refused
to be nervous. Instead she smiled, properly this time, and made herself climb those metal steps, one foot after the other, until there was nothing left to do but turn the knob on the flimsy wooden door.

  She took a deep breath, and shoved it open.

  There was a moment of silence.

  “What the hell are you doing here?” she demanded.

  Her brother Jack swung around in his swivel chair, grinning ear to ear.

  “Liv!” he said, and got up out of what they used to call the captain’s chair with more energy than she’d seen him have in…well, years.

  Then he hugged her, with more strength than he’d had, ever.

  She was dumbfounded.

  “Seriously, what are you doing here,” she said, because she couldn’t think of anything else to say.

  “Good to see you too,” he laughed. “What are you doing here?”

  She didn’t know how to answer that, exactly.

  “How are you?” Liv asked, and followed him back to the captain’s chair, where it was clear he was working on something. “You’re feeling ok? Is school ok? You look good. You look really, really good. Are you ok?”

  Words weren’t going to be her strong suit today. But Jack knew what she meant.

  “I was going to tell you,” Jack said. “The treatment program you found me is helping. Like, a lot.”

  “A lot?”

  This time Jack smiled.

  “It’s not official yet, but I think it’s in remission,” Jack said. “I mean, still the special diet and everything, so I’m not going to join a hot dog eating contest any time soon, but…”

  Olivia reached out for something to steady herself.

  His smile was absolutely priceless.

  “Seriously?”

  “Seriously.”

  Olivia made a noise she had never heard before—it was not a squeal—and jumped up to hug her dumb brother all over again. She’d spent so much time, so many tears, planning for a future where her brother didn’t get to…

  Didn’t get to have a normal life.

  “Wait wait wait wait wait. Why are you running the company?” she said, looking around. “Where’s Dave? And why aren’t you in school?”

  “I am, don’t worry,” he laughed. “I get school credit for this, like a special project. I, uh. I started a new product line, kind of. We’re doing totally custom mod kits and accessories and stuff, because I figured out how to laser-cut molds so we could use fiberglass. And we do it all in-house with—”

  Olivia looked at her brother, his face glowing and alive and just freaking happy while he rambled on. The last time she’d been home he hadn’t had the energy for this much enthusiasm, and it was only now, in comparison, that she realized how bad it had been.

  “Wait, you ok?” he asked.

  “I’m a lot better now,” she said.

  Jack looked at her a little more carefully. It was disconcerting to see signs of maturity start to emerge in a little brother. Just weird.

  “Yeah, so what are you doing here?” he asked.

  Olivia sighed.

  “It’s the tenth,” she said.

  Jack looked at her blankly.

  For a second.

  “Oh,” he said, and blinked. “I guess I forgot.”

  Olivia stared back. She’d realized it was the anniversary of her mother’s death, that she hadn’t talked to either her father or her brother in…too long to really be ok with, and she’d panicked. She’d assumed the worst.

  It usually was the worst. Her annual horrible grief pilgrimage to make sure her dad didn’t do anything permanent and her brother was still doing ok, everything considered. She hadn’t even been comfortable leaving the L.A. area until Jack was out of high school, but she’d had to bring in money somehow. She’d only ever traveled for work, and she’d called Jack all the time. And she never missed the anniversary, like a sadness birthday, every freaking year.

  And Jack had forgotten all about it. She’d never once allowed herself to think he might be that lucky, to not have to think about it.

  “You mad?” he said, looking like a guilty puppy.

  “I am the exact opposite of mad,” Olivia said, hugging her brother again, smiling at how hug-squeamish he still was.

  But there was still one more thing.

  She steeled herself, and tried for a neutral expression.

  “How’s Dad?” she said.

  Gavin knocked on the open door, waited a beat, and walked in.

  Simone had arranged her blankets, covering her legs. The tube, and the machine, was gone. She was wiping something black from around her mouth—liquid charcoal.

  Simone saw him and turned away, embarrassed and tangled in her IV. He figured she didn’t have a mirror. Maybe she was a little messed up still, and just realized charcoal leaves a mark. It felt raw and vulnerable to see her like that, crushed under the weight of real life, stripped of her usual armored glamour. She could use a break. He stole a line from Liv.

  “So,” he said. “How was your day?”

  Simone laughed out loud, her smile lighting up her eyes. Sometimes she still reminded him of Gabby.

  “Jesus, Gavin,” she said, her voice hoarse and parched, and rubbed her throat. “Oh God, that hurts.”

  Gavin smiled at her, gently.

  “They sobered you right up, huh?”

  Simone nodded.

  “Maybe I’ll get to skip the hangover, though. Silver lining?”

  She was sober enough, anyway. Probably wishing she wasn’t, but she was together enough to have a talk. Gavin walked all the way into the room, left the door propped open behind him. Looked at Simone’s sad face.

  “What happened?” he said.

  She sighed.

  “I saw my dad, at the party, and…” she shrugged. “Then I got shitfaced. And Holt was there, and—”

  “I know about all that,” he said. “What happened with you?”

  Simone stared at him.

  Then looked away.

  “I don’t know.”

  “Bullshit,” Gavin said. “Do you remember the ride over here?”

  Simone looked down at her hands, one of them with an IV stuck in it.

  “Did you call my father?”

  “Charlie did. She was with me when you called. Do you remember what you said?”

  “Please don’t,” she whispered.

  “You haven’t given me a choice,” Gavin said.

  “This is going to break my father’s heart,” Simone said, and he could tell she was trying not to cry. “He’ll never forgive me. He shouldn’t ever forgive me. If you knew the stuff I’d pulled…”

  “After Gabby.”

  Simone nodded miserably.

  “You know how I know that?” Gavin asked. “You told me. You told me you’d never replace her. Never be as good, and your dad—”

  “I know what I said,” Simone said.

  “Then you know it’s bullshit,” Gavin said. He put his hands in his pockets, waited for Simone to get over the initial hump of being pissed off. No one ever liked it when he told uncomfortable truths.

  “Leave me alone,” she said.

  “No. You called me. You made a half-assed attempt to kill yourself, and you called me. Now it’s my business.”

  “Thank you for saving my life,” she said, acidly. “But unless you’re going to fix it—”

  “You are going to fix it. You’re going to go to rehab, and therapy, and whatever the hell else you need, and you’re going to take it seriously, because you’re going to have the Club Volare community behind you.”

  For the first time, Simone looked almost hopeful.

  “But Holt said—”

  “You’re not going to play or be involved in any scenes for a long time,” Gavin said. “But we don’t leave our own out in the cold. You have a home.”

  For a beat, she looked at him with wide-open eyes, and Gavin could have sworn she looked just as young as Gabby had been, all those years ago.

 
Then she started to cry.

  It started slow, but it just kept coming, until Simone was all boney shoulders shaking and shuddering with those big sobs she’d been holding in for ten years, give or take.

  “You’re gonna be ok, Simone,” he said. He brought her another tissue box, which she tore into, pulling out big fistfuls of tissues.

  “No, that’s just it,” she said. “After what I’ve put my dad through, after…why do I get a second chance?”

  He thought of Charlene.

  “I don’t know. Life isn’t fair. But you got one, and if you don’t grab hold of it with both hands, you’re letting down the people who never got one.”

  Simone blew her nose, wiped at her face. The more she wiped away, the more honest she got.

  “Easy for you to say,” she said.

  That’s it. Gloves come off.

  “Look at me,” he ordered.

  She did. She completely froze, one tissue halfway to her face, but she looked at him.

  “The past is gone,” he said. “You can choose to live there all by yourself, or you can live here, in the present, where there are people who care about you. Until you get right with that, you’re going to keep messing up and keep hurting the people you care about, so get on it, Simone. Understood?”

  Slowly she nodded.

  “Like you and Olivia,” she said.

  Gavin took a step back.

  Then another one.

  He heard someone clear their throat behind him, turned around. Charlene, standing there with Daniel Delavigne, who looked like he’d seen a ghost.

  “Any more words of wisdom?” Charlene said.

  “Yeah,” Gavin said. “I’m an idiot.”

  38

  Olivia followed her brother back down to the shop floor, her heels clicking again on the polished concrete, audible even over the machine noise. Jack opened the back door, out to the part of the lot where they took deliveries.

  “He’s back at work?” she asked.

  Jack opened the big metal door and grinned.

  Olivia stepped back out into the sun, shielded her eyes. Then she just sort of stood there for a while.

  “Is he with a customer?”

  “Yup.”

  “Is he laughing?” she said.