by Jo Raven
I don’t jack off, either. I bury my nose in her hair and close my eyes, forcing my body still, my dick to weep alone. All I want tonight is to drift off with her in my arms, to sleep and dream good dreams.
Dream of the present—and not the past, or of bleak scenarios of the future.
I think I probably manage to fall asleep in the end, but it feels as if I’ve only just closed my eyes when my phone buzzes somewhere behind me.
Untangling myself from Octavia who somehow ended up half on top of me, I hunt for my phone. Is it my alarm, is it time to leave already?
But no, it’s a call coming in, and grabbing the phone, I hurry out of the bedroom, not to wake up my girl.
“Matt?” a familiar female voice asks as I connect the call.
“Gigi. It’s…” I check my watch. The fuck. “It’s four in the morning. What’s the matter?”
“We’re all fine, don’t you worry.” Her voice is a bit strained though as she goes on. “I’m babysitting your kids tonight. We went to the movies yesterday, and tonight was your mom’s turn to keep an eye on the little monsters—”
“Is Mom okay?”
“Yeah, yeah. Told you, we’re all fine.”
I lean against the wall, my head swimming. “So you’re home babysitting, and you’re all fine, but you call me at four in the fucking morning, almost giving me a heart attack. What the hell for?”
“Sorry.” Her voice is hushed. “It’s just that… Mary wants to talk to you. Well, she didn’t exactly say that, but…”
“But what?”
“She had a nightmare, and she’s been crying and calling your name. Well, not your name. Daddy. That’s what she keeps saying. And something about the baby, and Octavia.”
Shit. “What about the baby and Octavia?”
“I don’t know, Matt, seriously. She’s crying, I can hardly make out what she says, but she’s not calming down, and I thought you might want to talk to her. Maybe hearing you she’ll calm down.”
Fucking shit. “Pass her the phone.”
I shouldn’t have left my kids alone.
I shouldn’t have brought Octavia along.
I shouldn’t be messing things up after all this time. Can’t have my little girl sad, or Octavia in danger because of her insistence on meeting her douchebag of a half-brother… and yet I couldn’t abandon Evan, not after he helped me out when I was at my lowest, back when I lived here.
Dammit.
“Daddy?” comes a tiny, hiccupping voice, and my chest grows tight. “That you?”
“It’s me, baby. Tell me what’s wrong.”
There’s a lot of sniffling and sobs that threaten to break my fucking heart. “Are you okay, Daddy? And Tati, too?”
“Yeah, we’re both just fine, and we’ll be there tomorrow. I’m sure it was all a bad dream.” I close my eyes as the sniffling continues. “Why don’t you tell me what it was?”
I need to fix this. Somehow.
“There was blood, and it was dark, and… and people died, and I was so scared.” Her small voice is turning me inside out. I’m her dad. I’m supposed to protect her, make sure she’s never afraid—but how do I protect her from a dream?
“And do you have this dream often, sweetheart?”
Hiccups. Damn, I hope Gigi is holding her right now, giving her the hug I’m too far to offer. “Yeah.”
Shit. “What is scaring you? Something’s scaring you. What is it? Tell me, and I’ll make it right.”
“Daddy…”
“What is it?” I rub a hand over my face. Goddammit, I knew something was off. I should have delayed coming here, should have insisted she talked to me before we left St. Louis. “Talk to me. You know I love you. You and Cole. I’m always here for you. Tell me what’s wrong.”
She doesn’t say anything, and I think she won’t tell me. But then she sighs.
“I’m scared,” she says, and then, “about the baby.”
Huh. “The baby will be fine. Why would you worry about that? The baby won’t take your place. Ever. Or Cole’s. I love you all—”
“I’d rather,” she whispers, “have Tati.”
And the line goes dead.
What the hell does that mean? Why choose?
Jesus. Fucking nightmares. None of this made any sense, unless she is jealous of the baby and that feeling is translated into fear and nightmares?
Who the hell knows?
One thing is clear to me: I can’t wait to get back home and get to the bottom of this.
* * *
After that, sleep is a lost cause. Jittery with damn nerves, I throw some clothes on and go down to the kitchen. I brew some coffee and drink it standing at the window, staring out into the dark.
It’s like a throwback to my early, dark days in Destiny—only back then I’d been drinking booze. Booze until dawn broke, and then coffee so that I could function enough to go to work.
A shudder wracks me.
A noise from the hallway snaps my attention away from the dark outline of trees against the night sky. The stairs creak, and I turn, fully expecting to see Octavia there.
But it’s Evan.
He staggers into the kitchen, his shirt half-unbuttoned, his pajama bottoms winkled, his feet bare, and sinks into a chair at the table. “Matt.”
I pour him a cup of coffee. “Milk, sugar?”
“Nah.” He gulps half of it down, or maybe it’s all of it, what do I know, before looking up at me. “Thanks.”
I shrug. “Couldn’t sleep either?”
He reaches into his pocket, fishes out a bag of pills and throws it on the table. “Pain keeps me awake. Forgot to take these last night.”
“My fault. Shit, I should have made sure you took them.”
“You’re not my babysitter, Matt. You came, you helped me out. I’m grateful. I need to be able to take care of myself.”
“Well, that’s the thing.” I sit down across from him, take the bag and study the pills inside. “Sometimes you have to accept you need help. I’m glad you called, man.”
He studies his empty mug as if it contains some answer to a cosmic question. “Yeah.”
“Hey, Evan.” This has been on my mind since we arrived, and now, in the dark hour, I can’t keep the question inside me any longer. “Why did you really ask us to come over?”
He looks up at me, his eyes narrowing. “What do you mean?”
“I mean, sure, I drove you to the doc’s, we got you pet food, Octavia played with Melissa, and it was all good. But you could have gotten anyone here in Destiny to do these things for you. The guys at the garage. Your sister.” I lean forward, fold my arms on the table top, letting my hunch play out. “What did you want to tell me?”
His eyes widen before he looks quickly away. He scratches at the cast, as if he can reach the skin underneath. “No idea what you’re talking about.”
I rub both hands over my face and sigh. “Fair enough.” Hunches can be wrong, anyway, and I’m beat. I push back the chair and climb to my feet. “Then I’ll head back to bed. Try and get some sleep, dude.”
“Matt, wait.”
I turn back around, lean against the kitchen counter. “What?”
I’m so tired that time seems to stretch and then snap, moving in weird jumps. One second I’m there, the next Evan is standing in front of me. He’s tall enough that he’s staring at me eye to eye, something that rarely happens. If any other guy stood like that in front of me, I’d have already fisted my hands, ready for a fight.
It doesn’t happen, though. He looks awful, thin and in pain.
“Look, I…” He lifts his good hand, lets it drop again. “I’m not sure what I wanted. I had this damn feeling of sinking, of not touching bottom, and I had this idea that you could help me.”
I don’t know what to say to that.
“I guess… I wanted a friend,” Evan says. “A real friend, who’s been through fucking bad times and made it out whole, you know? Maybe I needed someone I could trust and tal
k to. Maybe I needed to tell you about Jasper, and about Melissa.”
“And did you get what you needed? Feeling better now?”
“I dunno.” He takes a step back. “I feel lighter, for sure. But I still dunno what to do about either.”
I’m not God. I’m not even a saint, like Octavia, who wants to save the world. I’m a grumpy bastard, obsessed with death and with keeping my little family safe.
But Evan trusted me to help him find a solution. And I think I got it.
“Would you consider coming to work for me?”
He blinks up at me, looking confused. “For you? At the garage?”
“Yeah, at Mancave. Kaden has been pestering me for a long time now to hire another mechanic, someone experienced and trustworthy. I couldn’t think of anyone to suggest, but if you’re looking for a city to move to, and a job…”
He reaches out with his good hand, bracing himself against the wall. “You mean that?” The breath he draws is shaky. “I don’t take charity. I don’t—”
“This isn’t charity. Dammit, Evan.” I shake my head at him. “You think I wouldn’t have called you if I’d known you were looking for a job? I only just put the pieces together yesterday—the need we have for someone like you at the shop, your decision to move away from here. Just… tell me, are you interested?”
“Like you have to ask.” He gives an incredulous laugh. “I’d be in fucking St. Louis, close to my sister, to Melissa… working with you. It’s like Christmas came early this year. Jesus Christ, Matt. You don’t know what you’re offering.”
His eyes are shiny now, and I dunno what to do with that, so I clap him awkwardly on his good shoulder. “I’ll talk to Kaden tomorrow and call you, but I doubt he’ll say no. Man has been on my case to hire someone forever. Now get some sleep. Everything will work out, you’ll see.”
Right?
Chapter Fourteen
Octavia
We wake up early, say a quick goodbye to a bleary-eyed Evan, and climb into the pickup truck. I’m still half-asleep, but at least Matt looks wide awake, the frown line between his dark brows deeper than ever.
“What’s wrong?” I ask as he drives down the quiet streets of Destiny, looking for the exit to the highway.
“Nothing.”
Even his voice is strained. “Matt…”
He’s quiet as he clears the little town and we speed toward the prison. I wait him out. He talks to me these days, not like when I first met him.
Eventually, he glances sideways at me. “Mary called me this morning, early. She was crying.”
I straighten in the seat where I’d slumped. “What? Why? What’s wrong?”
“Nothing’s wrong. I mean…” His fingers tap a quick beat on the wheel. “She’s fine, everyone’s fine. But she’s scared.”
“Of what?”
“She won’t tell me, but she asked about you. If you’re okay.”
“Me?” I frown, not expecting this. “Was she having a bad dream?”
God knows I know all about those.
“Maybe.” He shrugs. “But that tells me something.”
“And what’s that?”
“She doesn’t feel threatened by you. You know, the stealing her dad part? I don’t think that’s what’s been bothering her.”
“What then?”
“I dunno, Tay. I told you, I’ll talk to her again as soon as we get back. I’m sure we’ll figure it out.”
I chance a quick look at his profile. Strong, determined. I want to save the world, he’s intent on getting it done. “We will.”
Together we’ll do our best.
* * *
The gates of the prison are tall, armed guards in sentry boxes standing on either side. As we sit in the pickup, waiting, the gates swing open and two men walk out.
I lean forward, straining to see in the gray morning light from the overcast sky. They are both shabbily dressed, in old jeans and wrinkled shirts, beaten-up duffel bags thrown over one shoulder. They’re walking close together, banded together against the rest of us, but don’t look at each other.
As they approach, I see one of them is old, the other young.
Ross.
Matt opens his door, but I’m out of the truck before he makes it around to help me down. He reaches for my hand and wraps his fingers around mine as the two men split, each heading in a different direction without as much as a word or a nod at each other.
Ross is walking straight toward us, but I don’t think he’s noticed us. His head is down, his shoulders hunched, his shoes dragging on the asphalt.
Matt tugs me to his side, and we wait. Ross slows down a few feet away, his head coming up. He stops. His duffel drops to the ground.
His jaw goes slack, and his eyes flash with confusion. His mouth forms a shape—a word—but I can’t make it out. Maybe it’s a curse.
I take a step forward, pulling on Matt’s hand. “Ross.”
He shakes his head, then stills. “Octavia? What are you doing here?”
I open my mouth, but nothing comes out. I can’t stop staring at him, at my half-brother, with Merc’s eyes, and Gigi’s mouth, and that white-blond hair. His angular face has its own beauty, a beauty I never cared to notice when all I wanted was to spit on and slap that face for hurting me so much.
But above all I’m shocked at the changes in him—how much taller he is, leaner, kind of bent at the shoulders. I look at his thinner face, the hint of stubble, the wary eyes and can hardly believe this is Ross, the boy I once knew.
My nemesis. The boy I hated.
The family I left behind when I left Destiny. I gave him no thought for years, tried to put my life before Matt behind.
But you can’t erase the past, can’t delete it. Where would you stand otherwise to face the future?
Matt steps forward, grabs Ross’s duffel bag, swings it over his shoulder. “We came to drive you home. Unless you have other arrangements?”
Ross’s gaze swings to Matt, brows drawing together. He shakes his head.
“Good. Then get into the pickup.” Matt’s other hand is still wrapped around mine, and he pulls me back. “Come on, Tay. Let’s go.”
We turn back to the pickup, and I keep craning my neck to look at Ross, pretending to be tucking my hair behind my ears.
He’s still standing there, in the middle of the street, staring.
“Matt…”
“Don’t worry. I’ve got this.” My door was left open, so he just helps me up and into the passenger seat. He throws the duffel into the back seat. His double cabin truck is big, which is useful when we are with the kids. He stalks slowly around the truck, then stops and gestures at my half-brother. “Move it, Ross. Octavia wanted to talk to you, but don’t test my patience, or I’ll just drive away and leave you here, got it?”
“Matt!” I slam my hand into the windshield. “You won’t.”
But what Matt said seems to snap Ross out of his shock. He blinks, then starts toward the pickup. Still staring at Matt, he opens the door to the back seat and climbs inside.
After a moment, Matt does the same, sliding behind the wheel, closing his door, and suddenly it’s the three of us inside the truck cabin, with the strong odor of male musk, unspoken questions, and sweat running down my back and slicking my palms.
“Let’s grab some coffee,” Matt says, and I stare straight ahead, doing my best not to turn and look at Ross. “You two can talk. Then we drop you off home, and we’re on our merry way.”
“Your merry way where?” Ross mutters, his voice flat. “Back to St. Louis?”
“Where else? That’s where we live.” Matt doesn’t look back at Ross either, his eyes on the road as he swings the truck around and takes us back to the highway.
“Yeah.” Ross snorts. “Got away, didn’t you? Or so you thought. You went far away, and thought you’re different now, someone important, not fucking dirt from Destiny, middle of butt-fuck nowhere.”
“Fuck you, Ross,” Matt mutters.
Crap.
“You turn up to pick me up and talk? You shitting me? You thought that we’d be buddies now, or what? You had me locked up once because you thought I kidnapped your kids. I bet your little girlfriend here put you up to it, told you I had to be the one, and guess what? You all went away, but every time there was a brawl, the police picked me up, locked me up and piled it all on me.” His hand comes hard on my shoulder from behind, startling a yelp out of me. “You little bitch.”
“That’s it.” The truck veers onto the shoulder, and Matt steps on the brakes. The truck comes to a stop. He half-turns in the seat. “if you speak that way to my wife ever again, I’ll punch your face until not even your own goddamn father recognizes you. And then I’m gonna leave you here to walk back on your own. Got it?”
I’m breathing hard, my heart slamming against my breastbone. I place a protective hand over my belly. “I only wanted to check on you, Ross. See if you’re okay. I never wanted—”
“Okay? How the hell could I ever be okay? You saw to that, and now—”
“Get out,” Matt says. “Go on. Get the fuck out of my truck, or I’ll come around and haul you out. Get the hell out!”
Ross throws the door open and jumps out.
No, no, no. This isn’t how it was supposed to go. I was supposed to talk to Ross, to ask him how he really is.
I open my door, too.
“Tay. Where are you going?” Matt places a hand on my leg, but I’m already turning, searching with my foot for a hold to climb down. “Wait.”
But I’m too intent on getting out, reaching Ross before he stalks off, to wait. I find a foothold and start sliding out, one hand on the door frame, the other on the door.
My foot somehow slips, and I gasp as the door starts closing, and I’m falling down to the street.
“Whoa, steady.” Strong hands grab me under the armpits, lowering me more slowly to the asphalt. “You okay?”
Panting, adrenaline shooting through my veins, making me shaky, I look up through my long hair at Ross. He’s still holding me, his brows drawn together over his icy eyes. There’s something like a question in them. A doubt.
