by Paula Cox
“Secondly, I brought you here because I wanted you to give her a message. I don’t want or need her forgiveness, but I want her to know that I am sorry. I tried to tell her at her mom’s funeral, but I couldn’t do that to her that day. And I’ve tried a few times to find her, but I am guessing she’s jumpy still around guys like me. So I thought you could do it.”
“Why would I want to do that? What you did to her was unforgivable. I don’t blame her for never, ever wanting to see you again.”
“I get that. I didn’t want to hurt her or to take her away from her mom. I’m not sure if she told you, but that night of the fire, I had to make split second decisions, and they were the wrong ones. I should have had my detective partner bring her straight to the hospital and keep her there, but I knew Riley’s guys were capable and following her mom. So I kept her locked up while he was out there killing.”
“Killing?” she asks, her eyes wide as she leans in with her hands wrapped around the circular bistro table. “What does that mean?”
“Three of my men were gunned down by Riley that night. Another eight or so were injured. One died the night after. It was a mess. Everyone was on the run from Riley’s Knights. I knew that if Anna was out there or with me, he would find her. So I shipped her off to that house with the intention of getting her when I got the all-clear or when Riley was found. I know now that it was a huge mistake.”
“Do you mean that?” Roxy asks, boring holes into me as if she’s trying to fish the truth out of me.
“Yeah. Frankly, I’d give another six guys and myself to Riley if it meant I could give Anna time with her mother before she passed. I know what that feels like, to lose a parent…” My voice trails off as I watch a couple come into the coffee shop, their arms draped around the other.
While I’m not looking, Roxy picks up her phone and begins to dial. It’s only when she starts to talk into the receiver that I pay her any attention. “Hey, Anna. I’m actually at this coffee shop on Maple Street. Perk Me Up. Can you meet me here instead?”
“What are you doing?” I whisper towards her.
Roxy places a hand on her phone as she answers me. “Getting you a second shot,” she says through pursed lips.
CHAPTER 22
“Please, Anna. Do this for me. Just hear him out, and if you don’t like what he has to say, you can go and be pissed at me. I promise.” Roxy takes my hand and points me towards the open window to the cafe. Mack is looking at us awkwardly, as if he is attempting to read our lips. It makes me even angrier than before.
“He doesn’t deserve another second of my time, Roxy! Look what he has done to me. I lost my mom because of him.”
“Not because of him, Anna. You lost time with her because of him, but he really did try his best to protect her. You said it yourself the other day; if his guy wasn’t there, she would have died alone in her house. He gave her a second chance, even if it didn’t work out the way we might have wanted it to.”
I hate it when Roxy is more reasonable than I am. I did say those things just a few days ago as I sobbed into the pillows of my new couch. She rubbed my back and promised that I was being sane by being pissed at Mack. Now she is taking it all back by tricking me to come here and see him.
My chin shakes as I get a tight, full sensation in my throat, a lump that won’t go away. I force my eyes up towards the sky, praying that this will stop the tears just about to fall. “I can’t do this, Roxy. I can’t sit there in that cafe with him and listen to him explain to me how it wasn’t his fault. Someone has to take the blame for why I only had minutes to say goodbye to her.”
“You should blame him. You should be fucking livid with him.” Roxy points towards Mack as he shrivels in his chair and pretends to not see us. “You don’t have to take him back, but you know your mom would have wanted you to at least hear the guy out.”
“What?” I ask tiredly. “What would my mom want?”
“She would want you to be happy, and that man makes you deliriously happy. She said it to me herself a few days before everything happened. I was calling to check in on her, and we were talking about you.”
“Did she tell you about how I basically failed at being her daughter? I wasn’t there those last few weeks. I rarely got around to even calling her on time. I’m sure she wasn’t exactly happy with me and how I would never let her in on what was going on with me.”
While so much of my guilt has been about not being at the hospital, the last week or so, my heart has been broken to pieces by the call log on my phone. Her phone number didn’t pop up for days. Even worse, there were so many unanswered phone calls and unopened voicemails reminding me of how I put myself before her.
“You didn’t fail. We talked about you and why you weren’t around as much. I won’t lie to you—I think she was a bit sad that you weren’t calling her back regularly, but she said to me, ‘Anna’s in love, and that’s a good thing.’ After Riley and everything he put you through, she knew that you deserved to be with someone like Mack who made you feel loved and safe.”
“Roxy, feeling ‘loved and safe’ don’t make up for the fact that he held me hostage all alone in a safe house. He paid some guys to force me back in the house. I couldn’t even take a step outside without them throwing me indoors. What kind of love is that? No way in hell would she have approved of it.”
“But, that’s the thing. He’s not the white picket fence kind of guy, Anna.” She sighs as she turns me away from his view. We land at the side of the cafe, towards an alley. Lowering her voice, she explains, “You’re not a white picket fence kind of girl either. Your whole life you’ve been different, and your mom knew that. The kind of guy that you want and deserve isn’t going to be the one who works a nine to five job and then comes home to their kids and dog. The kind of guy you want and need is sitting in that cafe broken up about something he knows he did wrong.”
I have no response for that. Everything she is saying is reasonable and logical. Those guys in suits and ties with briefcases and lunch breaks never did it for me, and I couldn’t care less if the guy I dated had retirement on his mind or money in some portfolio. What was more important was that he let me be me and gave me some sense of adventure every now and then. Riley was the start of that. There was something about Riley that, underneath the jealous, yet tame side, was something dangerously mysterious. I know what that is now. And maybe I saw the same kind of mystery in Mack, but what was the answer to him? How could I know him now that my mother was gone and his name was attached to his death?
I shake my head back and forth as I lean against the cold brick. Under my breath, I cry, “I can’t do it, Roxy. I can’t. There’s just too much… too much broken there.”
“Then let him try to fix it. I’ll stay here, outside the restaurant. If you come back within ten minutes, I’ll drive you home myself and fix you up a hot toddy. We’ll drink our sorrows away and watch some horrible Disney princess movie like little girls. I’ll stay the night with you until it’s okay. I promise.”
Truth be told, I’m too broken down to say no any longer. It’s not that she’s convinced me; it’s that I am simply way too tired to argue this point. The days after my mother’s funeral have drained me, both emotionally and physically. I am in no position to keep this going. I just nod my head and put my eyes down on the ground. It’s better to get this over with now than stand in this alleyway with the stench of restaurant garbage and the few stares of passerbys any longer.
Roxy takes my hand as she leads me back into the cafe. Instantly, it feels as if at least thirty mouths put down their coffees and thirty eyes track my move from their tables to where Mack stands waiting for me. He practically glows in anticipation while I wilt like a dying flower needing to be watered. Roxy pulls the chair out for me and makes some excuse about needing to take a call outside. We both know it’s a lie, but we politely give her permission to slip out.
I look over my shoulder, towards the window at the street outside. I bargain with a h
igher power to let this be over with quickly, but Mack doesn’t exactly open up like a book to me. He leans back in his chair, his hands behind his head, as he studies me cautiously. My heart ticks the silent seconds down with each beat. We both just wait for the other to break.
His voice catches me off-guard. For whatever reason, it sounds heavier than before, like his voice has carried an unseen weight on it. “I don’t know how to do this, Anna. I’ve never apologized for a thing in my life, but I owe you one. What I did with keeping you in that house knowing your mom was sick… it was just… I don’t…” He struggles to say the words I need to hear until finally, “I’m sorry. I am so sorry, Anna. I know that you could never forgive me for it, and I don’t expect you to, but I just need to lay it out there for you.”
I bite my tongue, holding back a mountain of anger and resentment that has built itself up inside of me. My stomach turns from the acid of it all. I feel as if I am about to erode or explode at any given moment. “What do you expect me to say to that, Mack? Do you really think I could just… move on?”
“I don’t want you to move on. I want you to be as fucking angry as you want to be. Like I said, I’m only here because I needed to say it.”
“So this is a guilt thing? Your conscience weighing on you? And, what, you thought seeing me sitting here, nodding my head, and pretending like everything's okay would somehow absolve you of your shit?”
“No!” He puts his hands up in defense, rocking back in the chair again. “That’s not it at all. I love you, Anna. Believe it or not, but it’s true today as it was before everything happened. But I’ve never loved anyone else before. I’m not good with this caring for others thing. What took place back at the shop and restaurant was me acting on the pressure to keep you safe. It was a fucking dumb wrong move, but I just wanted you to be safe.”
Some part in me knows this to be true. I replay those moments of him staring out at the burnt ruins of the shop, him reading the texts flying through his inbox, and him throwing me into the back of the police car without hesitation. He wasn’t himself that night. He was a man in crisis, watching the whole world he built burn to pieces around him. Maybe I’m the one thing he can’t risk?
Again, I bite my tongue, but this time I’m swallowing back the words that would redeem him. I let out a sigh as I go to grab my purse. I’ve had enough of this. I’m taking my out that Roxy promised me in exchange for hearing him out. But as I turn to go, I feel his grip around my wrist. It’s the kind of touch that sends shivers down the spine. There’s a familiarity behind it that’s impossible to ignore.
“This is the last time I’ll talk to you, but if you care about me, come to the shop tonight and see what I’ve done. I’ll wait all night for you, if that’s what it takes. If you’re not there by midnight, I’ll leave you alone for good. I promise.”
I don’t answer him. I head straight out the door into a waiting Roxy who can barely hide the disappointment on her face. “You owe me a princess movie and some drinks, girl.” I spot her car in the parking lot and head there without looking back. I can’t bear to see him or Roxy when I’m like this.
I spend the rest of the afternoon nursing a vodka cranberry with a blanket tucked over my shoulders. Roxy sits beside me, letting me rest my legs on her lap. Every hour or so, she tugs the blanket down and looks over me as if I’ll change my mind with her prompting, but I’m firm in my spot. I’m not going anywhere, especially not to the place where my relationship burned to cinders.
I fall asleep soon after. My dreams play out just like the movies, with me riding off into a black and white sunset with a man on a motorcycle. I half expect to see me clinging to Mack, but then I start to notice how my arms flail for the passengers we pass and I shout without sound for help. It’s not Mack taking me away from the city lights, it’s Riley. His motorcycle speeds off even faster, this time being chased by someone else on a white and cream bike.
The person pulls up to us. Only inches away, I smell something familiar over the dust and grime of the road. Peppermint. “Mom?” I lip towards the person with the helmet. She removes the visor, revealing a face from at least fifteen years ago, the kind of version you remember from a favorite photo.
Over the noise of the two engines jamming into one another, I hear her say, “Jump, Anna.” I ask her over and over again what she means, but there’s no explanation. Just, “Jump, Anna.” Finally, I see it—a broken, incomplete bridge coming up from the horizon. Part of me knows that Riley won’t slow or pull off. He’s too focused on getting me away as fast as he can. My mom steers to the side with seconds to spare as I hear her scream again, “Jump!”
My body falls back to where it was on the couch. I jolt myself awake to a dark room. Roxy’s long gone, the TV is black as the night sky out my apartment window. Before I can think, I run towards the door, grabbing my shoes and the sweatshirt. A cab spots me down the way and picks me up. When I give him the address, he turns back towards me and asks, “Are you sure? This time of night?”
The city of Portland unfolds as we drive the few miles to the shop. My heart seems to beat outside its chest with every stop light. It’s just enough time to go over everything I want to say to Mack. I want him back. He was right when he admitted that he wasn’t thinking about anything but my safety. He wanted to hide me away, but the only way I can ever be secure was if I’m with him. While I can’t ignore my mom, I also can’t push away her want for me to be with someone like him, someone who made me feel alive each and every day. For that, it’s worth all the risk to be with him. For my mom, I will finally find happiness with a man who can truly take care of me.
I can’t jump out of the car fast enough when it stops right in front of an unfamiliar building site. A few floodlights point towards the new building with its empty rooms and newly installed windows. The restaurant’s front is painted an emerald green while the tattoo shop is an old school red and gray brick. Swinging from over the door is a sign reading, “Anna’s Crazy 9 Tattoo Shop.” It’s painted in bold red letters as if I had tattooed it myself.
I don’t see him when I’m staring up like this. The man practically falls on me, calling my name. “What the fuck are you doing here, Anna?” I look up at a ghost, a man I expected to never again see in my life. I back myself up into the corner of the new building, away from his grasp.
“Zeke? I thought you were… you were…” No matter how hard I try, I just can’t get the word dead out of my dry mouth. He peers back down at me, a small grin on his face as his arms open up. Another shadow appears behind him. My finger reaches up to point it out, but it’s too late. Mack slams into him, and the two tumble to the ground with a slap.
And I’m left watching the man I should love wrestle with the man we left behind for dead.
CHAPTER 23
“Mack!” Anna shouts above us, her hands pulling me away from the chaos, “It’s Zeke!” I have only seconds to process what she’s saying before I see it. It’s him. He’s barely moving with his arms clutched around his side, but it’s definitely him.
“What the hell, man?” I say, completely befuddled. “What are you—how are you—” I kneel down beside him, wrapping my arm underneath his to hoist him up. He lets out a terrible grunt of pain. Something warm trickles between the two of us. I look down to see blood from a bullet wound seeping from his chest onto my flannel shirt. The smell catches me next—infected flesh. Zeke may be alive, but it won’t be for long like this.
“Anna,” I say in a low tone. I turn back towards her, but she’s already running towards headquarters, her arms flailing for attention. I scream, “Tell them to call the doctor! He needs help!” I look down at my best friend, his face still that strange dusty purple it was when we left him on the floor of the Knights headquarters. His lips are covered in dry blood, his cheeks sunken and dry, but there’s a light that flickers impossibly in his pale gray eyes.
I take off running after Anna. I move as fast as I can on the slick sidewalk while still cradling him
in my arms. The whole sprint, I lay out everything that I need to say before it’s too late again, “I’m sorry, Zeke. I am so sorry. We shouldn’t have left you back there. We should have come back for you.” It’s a day of firsts—two apologies in one.
As we reach the door to the building, he takes my hand and pulls it into him. I place him gently on a blanket someone has brought from the stockroom. The men gather around as Anna sits so that his head can lay across her lap. I lean down to whisper as he says to me, “Don’t apologize, Mack. You did what you had to do to survive. I’m not going to be pissed about that.” He takes a deep breath in, his eyes darting from guy to guy. “Damn. It’s good to be back here. I thought I was going to die in that shit hole they kept me in.”
“Why did they let you go?” one of my men asks while the others shush him back down. I agree that we need to let Zeke rest if he is going to have any chance of getting out of here, but the truth of it is that those swollen, festering bullet holes have the look of death on them. Wasting time could ruin just about any chance we can get at some real answers.
