by Bella Jewel
He’s my everything.
He comes out of the bathroom ten or so minutes later and leans down, smelling even better. He kisses my forehead, a long lingering kiss that flutters my heart. “Miss you when I’m gone,” he murmurs. “Call you later, beautiful.”
Little do I know it’s the last genuine kiss he’ll give me.
Because when he walks out of this room, everything is going to change.
He’s going to drive the car right off the beaten path. We’re no longer going to be on the straight, narrow road with an end in sight.
No, we’re going to take the long way around.
The really, really long way.
That’ll no doubt destroy us forever.
“I DON’T KNOW WHERE he is,” I say to Blade, pacing around Jack’s kitchen, waiting for the man I haven’t heard from for three days.
“I’m sure he’s okay, we’re doin’ our best to find out where he went. Mick is with him, that much we know,” Blade tells me, scrolling through his phone, finding someone else to call.
Brody left me that morning in bed to visit Mick, and I haven’t heard from him since. Today is the third day, and I’ve been sick with worry, calling him over and over, only to find the calls going straight to voicemail. He’s gone somewhere, but nobody has any idea where.
Did he leave me?
Have they gone together?
Or worse, has something happened to him because of Mick?
I don’t know, all I know is something isn’t right. What that something is, I’m not sure, but it’s not right.
“It’ll be okay,” Jack says, gently putting a hand on my shoulder. “He’s probably just tangled up in something with Mick. He’ll call soon.”
I know he wants to believe that, but I can see in his eyes that he’s scared for his son. He’s worried. Wondering the same things I am. What the hell has happened, and where is Brody?
“We’ll wait for Lee’s call,” Blade says, dialing someone else and pressing the phone to his ear. “I’ll keep trying to get hold of Leroy, he’s the one Mick was staying with. He might know something.”
He too is not answering his phone.
Which scares me even more. Does he know something and he’s too afraid to tell us so he’s avoiding it?
“I’m going over there,” I say, unable to sit around waiting anymore. “I’ll wait there until someone shows up. If Leroy is avoiding me, I’ll find out.”
“No,” Jack says, “I can’t let you do that, it could be dangerous.”
I cross my arms and say, “Jack, I respect you, but I’m going. You can try and stop me, but your attempts will be futile.”
Jack exhales. “Women,” he mutters. “Fine I’m coming with you.”
“Great,” I say, grabbing my keys and walking out the door but not before I shout to Blade, “Call me if you hear anything.”
“Will do.”
Jack and I climb into my car, and the entire drive to Leroy’s house is quiet, which doesn’t surprise me. He’s worried, too. No doubt wondering what kind of hell his son has gotten himself into this time. I mean, they just got through the last one, and things were good, and now this.
Mick.
It all comes down to Mick.
“Here we are,” I say, arriving at the old, run-down home.
It’s still tidy, it just needs a serious gardener, and maybe a paint job. Otherwise, it looks good enough. I climb out of the car and Jack follows, and we approach the front door together. We knock a few times, but nobody answers. I’m about to take a seat on the front porch when I see movement inside. Just a flicker of it, from the corner of my eye, but it’s movement.
Someone is in there.
“I just saw somebody,” I say to Jack, rushing to the window and banging on the glass. “I know you’re in there! Open up! I’m not leaving until you do!”
Jack bangs on the front door again, over and over, until finally the latch clicks and it opens, presenting us with Leroy. I knew he was here. I just damn well knew it. He’s hiding something, otherwise he’d have no reason to ignore us.
I glare at the overly tall, overly lanky man with messy blonde hair, a shirt that’s at least two sizes too big, and eyes that look like he hasn’t slept in a month. Wow. I had no idea he looked like this, I didn’t think Brody would dump Mick with someone that looks like he hasn’t had a job since the seventies.
Although, maybe that’s exactly why.
Leroy probably wouldn’t care if Mick was here, he seems to live in his own little world. Clearly. He was happy to ignore us.
“Why are you hiding from us?” I say, the moment his eyes swing to me.
“Don’t know what you’re talkin’ about,” Leroy mutters, “I don’t even know who you are.”
“Don’t lie, son,” Jack growls. “You know damn well who we are.”
Leroy exhales. “Leave me out of this shit. I asked them to leave me out of this shit. They didn’t. Now you’re not goin’ to leave me out of this shit either, I see. I just wanna chill in my own home, relax, not have to keep the fuckin’ place locked because I’m worried about who the hell might be at my front door lookin’ for them. You’re the mildest of the groups, believe me.”
“What do you mean?” I ask, worry gripping my chest.
What does that mean? The mildest of the groups. What groups?
Leroy looks around, then exhales and says, “Inside. Hurry up.”
We both walk inside quickly, and he closes the door, locking it. The thing that strikes me as concerning is that he locks at least four deadbolts on the door, not just one. He’s scared. I glance at the windows and notice they’re also locked. Someone has given Leroy a reason to be worried, and I’d bet that someone is Mick.
And I’d also bet Brody is helping Mick get out of the shit he has gotten himself into.
So here we are.
“You got somethin’ to be afraid of?” Jack asks, glancing at the locks on the door.
“You could say that,” Leroy murmurs, sitting down on an old faded grey couch that has more tears than not.
It looks well used. I’m not sure if that’s a good or a bad thing.
“Care to tell us what’s goin’ on?” Jack asks Leroy, directly, without any pause or hesitation. “We’re lookin’ for my son and can’t find him. Been three days. Last time we knew, he was with Mick, and now they’re both missing.”
Leroy shakes his head. “Don’t speak to me about Mick. I wish I never agreed to have him here. It has caused me nothing but problems.”
Jack nods at him to go on.
“It was okay for a while,” he tells us. “Kept to himself. If he went out, he’d come home and I’d barely notice. Slept a lot, drank a lot, went out a lot, but like I said, kept out of my way. Then he started coming home all banged up, like he’d been fightin’. Never asked him about it, because, again, he wasn’t bothering me. His business is his business. Then he started takin’ somethin’, I’m sure of it. Started gettin’ all jumpy, all freaked out, angry, worried, and that’s when things started going bad.”
“Brody knew none of this,” I mutter to myself, because it’s true, Brody thought everything was going well here. He had no idea it wasn’t.
“No,” Leroy confirms. “No Brody didn’t know. He always called before showing up, and Mick always made sure to be on his best when he was around. Think he knew he was in too deep, and I actually think he wanted to keep Brody out of it.”
Well, respect for that.
“Anyway, a few days ago, Mick came home freakin’ out, he was all busted up, rantin’ about somethin’, talkin’ to himself. He’d lost it. Completely lost it. He was scared, too. Staring at the doors, the windows, almost like he was waitin’ for someone to come after him. That was the day Brody showed up, first time unannounced. Mick freaked out, and he managed to get him to speak of what happened.”
“And?” Jack says, his voice strained. “What happened?”
“Mick had been fightin’; not just any fights, de
ath matches. Baby matches, though. Small fighters, fighters that didn’t stand a chance against him, with all his craziness. He was winning those, obviously. Gettin’ a bit of cash, probably feelin’ better about life, so he started diggin’ deeper, demandin’ to go up against better fighters. He had the bug. He was seeking the thrill. He’d lost his damn mind.”
Death matches?
Oh, god.
I feel sick to my stomach, physically sick. I didn’t even know that was a thing. I didn’t even know it existed. Maybe naïve of me, but the very idea of someone fighting until the other person is dead makes me sick. It is the most gruesome and horrible thing I’ve ever heard of.
“H-h-h-how did he even get into fighting those kinds of matches?” I whisper.
Asking the burning question.
“Not hard,” Leroy says. “You start fighting underground, there are always whispers of it, I guess most people aren’t that fuckin’ stupid so they don’t bother, but some people, crazy people, people like Mick, it sparks their interest. Money is huge if you win. If you win.”
“Fuck sakes,” Jack mutters. “Continue the story so I can find my boy.”
“Well, Mick went into a fight with someone, someone that was obviously better than him, one of the best I hear, and he bailed. He lost his shit in the ring, and he got the fuck out of there. Never finishing the fight. How the hell he got out, I do not know, but he did. Went completely bonkers on them. So, of course, people lost money, didn’t they? Fuckin’ shit loads of money. Safe to say, some pretty fucked up people are after Mick now. So, Brody went to help him.”
What?
Oh, my god.
No.
No, this is not happening.
Brody went to help Mick, who got himself in a world of trouble by making a stupid fucking mistake. Now Brody could likely find himself hurt, or worse, dead.
No.
“Fuck me,” Jack growls. “You know where they went? Anything? Anything at all?”
“Can only give you a few names I heard bein’ thrown around, but no, I don’t know. I do know that I’ve had people drivin’ past lookin’ for them. I’m scared out of my mind. One of them fuckers is goin’ to take me soon and demand answers if those two don’t show up. I’m gettin’ out of town today, not riskin’ my life.”
“Smart idea,” Jack says, standing and pulling out his phone. “Tell me everything you know.”
Leroy gives Jack anything he knows, and Jack advises him to get out of town sooner rather than later.
Then we leave.
The drive back is equally as silent as the drive here.
Because now ... now we’re both afraid.
Really afraid.
This is the worst situation we could have ever found ourselves in.
No doubt about it.
13
THEN – BRODY
“WHAT THE FUCK WERE you thinkin’?” I bark to Mick, fists clenched.
He stares at me through two very fucking banged up eyes. He looks like shit, no doubt about it, and he’s fucking got himself into a situation he’ll find no luck getting out of. He did the worst thing any fighter could ever do, he fucking ran from a fight. He bailed, and now he owes a lot of people a lot of money.
He’s fucked.
I’ve got to try and find a way to get him out of it, without getting either of us killed.
“I lost it in there,” he mutters. “Lost it. Couldn’t think. Couldn’t hear. I freaked out. I ran. Straight out back. Nearly decapitated anyone that came near me, I was losin’ it that bad.”
Losing it.
He loses it a lot.
I’ve seen the worst of it. The attacks no one else has seen. The screaming when he sleeps. The way he flinches when he hears noise. Mick has always had issues, always had underlying problems to do with his abusive father and absent mother, but going away and doing a few tours, seeing some bad shit, it fucked him up. It triggered mental issues that were already hiding beneath the surface.
Scares me to think now there might be no way back for him.
Fighting ain’t helping.
Getting into shit ain’t helping.
He’s going to wind up dead if he doesn’t get his life on track soon.
I’m not going to let that happen.
I promised him, a long fucking time ago, that I’d have his back through anything. We made a pact, back when shit was normal, and friendship was all we cared about. Then I didn’t sign up with him, and something changed, he got angry with me, like I let him down. I did let him down, but back then, I was in a fucking bad place, and if I’d gone over, the way he did, I’d probably be where he is now.
Don’t want that for him.
I just want him to find his way back. However the fuck we can do that.
“You entered a fuckin’ death match, Mick,” I growl. “Could have stayed normal fighting. You could have resisted the urge to do somethin’ so fuckin’ stupid.”
“Made me feel good, the adrenaline. Made me feel like I wasn’t the only crazy fucker in this world, Brody. It made me feel like I wasn’t alone.”
Well fuck me.
What do you say to that?
How do you argue it?
You can’t. You simply can’t.
“Get that, bro, but now you’re in danger. Not worth it.”
“You don’t get it,” he growls. “You do not fuckin’ get it. You would have, if you came with me, but you don’t know. You know fuckin’ nothing, Brody.”
His voice is clipped, angry, and I get it. I fucking get it. I should have been over there with him, instead I was going to through my own turmoil. He got it, hell, he helped me get through it, but I know I let him down. I also know I owe it to him to have his back now, to get him through it, because he had no one else.
“Get that,” I mutter, “but don’t want to see you dead because you made stupid choices. You’re disappointed in me, you’ve made that clear, but I’ve had your back since you got back. I’ve had it and I’ve helped you through.”
“Have you?” he snaps, gripping his fists tightly together, anger bubbling out of him. He’s depressed, and depression has a way of making you feel shit you couldn’t even imagine feeling during times when you are well. That’s the problem with it, your mind mentally fucks you, and you are led out of control. “Have you helped me?” he goes on, “because you kicked me out because fuckin’ Melanie couldn’t deal.”
He can do anything, anything at all ... but bringing Melanie into this ... it fuckin’ makes me wild.
She’s dealt with a lot, too. A lot she didn’t have to, but she did because she’s on my side, even when it nearly drove her insane. He isn’t going to make this about her. No fucking way.
“Listen,” I growl, voice low, “leave her out of this. She put up with a lot of your shit, bro, and you know it. Gotta take care of my relationship, too. You don’t have to understand that, but I’m doin’ my best. You want to push me, then push me, but I’m goin’ to keep doin’ my best.”
He stares at me, emptiness in his eyes.
I lost him a long time ago.
I’m just hoping I can get him back.
“What the fuck do we do now? I’ve got people after me. Can’t go home. Can’t run. Can’t do fuckin’ anything. It’s over for me. Everything is fucked.”
“We’ll figure it out. We’ll go quiet for a few days, see if we can find a way out of this. If we can’t, then we’re goin’ to have to deal with it face on. One day at a time. One issue at a time. Yeah?”
He nods, but I can already see he doesn’t believe it.
No. He thinks this is the end of him.
Hell, fucking maybe it is.
Maybe it is.
14
NOW – MELANIE
I CAN’T BREATHE.
Quite literally.
I can’t move. I can’t think. I can’t do anything but stand there, staring at him.
It has been months. Months and months, since I’ve last seen Brody. When he told
me it was over, he didn’t love me anymore, and left. I knew he didn’t mean it, I’m not stupid, but I’ve been searching for him ever since, and now he’s here. Standing in front of me. Looking at me with an emptiness in his eyes that goes far beyond anything I’ve seen from him.
He’s almost dead inside.
Almost.
“Brody,” I whisper, because my voice, it’s gone. I couldn’t find it if I tried.
“What,” Brody growls, low and deep, “the fuck is she doing here?”
Out of all the things I could have imagined in this moment, that was never what I thought he’d say. No, not in a million years did I think those would be the words that left his mouth. I thought he’d be shocked, but I, right up until this very moment, still believed he loved me. That he left to protect me. Because I meant so much to him.
Was I wrong?
My knees tremble and tears reach my eyes, but they don’t spill over. I’m panting, feeling so many emotions in one hit, I don’t know what to do except stare at him. Taking every single inch of him in. From his cropped hair, to those incredible brown eyes that used to look at me with so much love, so much affection, and now they’re looking at me like I mean absolutely nothing.
Nothing at all.
It breaks my heart into a million pieces.
“Okay calm down, everyone,” Finn says, stepping in next to Brody, whose eyes are still locked onto mine.
I have so much to say, but no words will come out.
Nothing will leave my lips, no matter how much I’m willing my body to cooperate.
“Melanie, why don’t you go home with Lucy and we’ll contact you later, yeah?” Finn says.
“No,” I whisper. “No. Not until he says something to me. Not until he acknowledges that I’m here. I deserve as much after months of looking for him.”
“Told you not to,” Brody growls, his voice low and husky. “Told you we were done. Nothing has changed.”
Those words hit me like a punch to the stomach, and my knees start to tremble.
It hurts so much I can barely breathe.
Every breath I do take is utter agony.
“Brody,” I say, my voice shaky, “I know you don’t mean that.”
