by Hazel Parker
Chapter 17: Biggie
Life fucking sucked.
Uncle was dead. Kyle was alive. And Lilly was gone.
And for what? Some misguided sense that she’d be better off without me than with me?
I tried desperately to consider if there was any way I could have better handled the fallout from Uncle’s death and how I had handled her, but I didn’t see a way that it could be done. If I’d let her run free, knowing that Kyle was now resorting to murder, I never would have been able to forgive myself if something happened to her. Being dumped sucked, but losing a second person I cared about would suck even more.
Still, it was impossible to overestimate how much “being dumped sucked.” That was doubly true considering how quickly things had come together for the two of us.
I sat in the repair shop, smoking a cigar and taking a sip of some whiskey. The shop was closed for the day, but the place was still teeming with activity as Savage Saints from across the country brought in supplies, distributed them, and discussed their plans for the evening. We had an officers-only meeting set up for about an hour from now, led by Trace, Richard, and Marcel. It was a damn good thing that I was not part of the group currently tasked with leading the club.
The club had picked up at the reception pretty fast that something had happened with Lilly and me, but only Marcel asked anything. I just said that we were done and that I didn’t want to discuss it at all. I still engaged with members, recalling fond memories of Uncle, but did it help? Nope.
A loud thunder rumbled, so loud that I could hear it even in the office of the repair shop. It actually drowned out the sound of Marcel entering the office, although my eyes were on the door anyways. Marcel shut the door behind him and drew the blinds, a not-so-subtle indication about the privacy he wanted.
He walked over to me, put his hand on my shoulder, and patted twice.
“I know you’re going through some shit right now,” he said. “I remember what it was like with Christine. I can’t even begin to tell you how much it sucks. I don’t need to, I know. But we need you right now, Jack. I need you right now.”
I looked up at him. Marcel took the cue to pull a chair over and sit before me.
“Jack, I haven’t said this much, but I admire you. And part of the reason I admire you is because of your ability to still see good in Kyle. Or, at least, you did.”
I snorted, but that was it. No smile, no slight chuckle, nothing.
“There’s no good left now, Marcel,” I said. “There was earlier. But at this point…he has to take the initiative.”
“I know,” Marcel said. “But Jack. I’m jealous of you. I wanted to believe that you were right. I wanted to have your optimism. Do you think I take any pride in knowing that we’re about to kill our brother? No. No way. Even if my brother was Hitler, I think I’d want to try and get him to realize his mistakes.”
“Even if?”
“OK, maybe not.”
For the first time all day, I let a slight smile emerge. It was a pretty fucking sad smile, but at least it was a smile nevertheless.
“The point is, Jack, I may be president, but you’re my brother before you’re a vice president. And I need you to be ready to help me however I need it. Just as I promise to be ready however you need it, OK?”
I nodded. A tiny amount of confidence and determination was coming forward. Not a lot, but enough, maybe, to get the engine going.
“If nothing else, do it for Uncle,” Marcel said. “I hate that it took a sucker punch to our collective guts for us to rally around each other like this, but we can’t waste it. Let’s get rid of Kyle and end this madness once and for all, OK? And then we can have all the therapy sessions about relationships we want.”
I let out a short laugh, and this was a real laugh—not a throaty laugh, not a half-hearted laugh, not a laugh that was meant to fill the air, but a real, genuine laugh. Nothing could better indicate how ready I felt than that.
“Alright,” I said. “Let’s—”
“Biggie! Marcel! Guys! Guys!”
We both immediately bolted out of our seats as Fitz ran into the room.
“You guys have to come outside. You’re not going to fucking believe what you see.”
Fitz is swearing like this? This is going to be good.
“Let’s go,” Marcel said. “Cover us, Fitz.”
We both headed to the door. By now, a commotion had formed near the front entrance. A few of the Savage Saints from the West Coast were moving to the garage door, prepared to open it at a moment’s notice if needed. Fitz followed us outside. I looked right. I looked left.
My eyes went wide at the sight.
A single police cruiser had parked about five feet away from the shop, its front facing right toward us.
And standing before it was none other, none fucking other, than Kyle Stone.
“You!” Marcel shouted. “I’m going to fucking kill you, you little prick! You piece of shit, you—”
“Marcel!”
He was already headed over. Kyle wasn’t moving. In fact, he seemed to welcome the fact that Marcel was coming to kick his ass. It was a trap.
“Marcel!”
I had to grab him around the waist and pull him back just inches from Kyle’s face. Kyle never once moved, although he looked tense, like he was about to jump back if someone actually threw a punch that could have hit him.
“You want to get caught on camera punching a politician?”
“He fucking killed Uncle!” Marcel roared. “You’re a dead fucking man, Kyle! You hear me? You’re a dead fucking man!”
“Don’t worry, you may yet get your wish,” Kyle said, walking forward. “But I almost got you to go down with me just there. Luckily for you, Jack’s still too much of an idiot to realize we can never reconcile and find peace.”
I ignored that comment. Kyle wouldn’t have said it if there was sincerely no chance of that, but that wasn’t anywhere on my mind. Kyle had lost his chance to have that be on the table.
“You’re a fucking piece of shit, you know that?” Marcel said, actually spitting inches away from Kyle’s feet. “You’ve got a lot of fucking nerve showing up here. There are about forty people here who would gladly shoot you in a heartbeat.”
“And all of those people are on camera right now, and all of those people would wind up in jail for life. Surely, you’re not willing to sacrifice all of your future freedom for a chance at murdering me, right?”
“It’s a chance I’m seriously considering,” Marcel warned.
I had my own questions for Kyle, most notably why the hell he’d been such a disturbing creep and loser to Lilly. I wanted to know how he felt about the fact that his actions had made me lose her. I wanted to know why the fuck he seemed so unconcerned and so at ease with seeing me.
But right now, I had a more important role to play—making sure Marcel didn’t fall into Kyle’s trap that would land us all in jail.
“You’re lucky as it is,” he said. “I disabled the audio receptors. So nothing you’ve said will get used against you. But you can most certainly be assured that that camera is my insurance to guarantee that if I die right now, you go down with me.”
“Cut the fucking bullshit, pussy,” Marcel sneered. “The fuck are you doing here?”
“Am I a pussy, Marcel, if I’m here in front of forty men who want to shoot me and mutilate my corpse?”
It was still unnerving how easily he spoke. This was not the dweeb that we’d grown up with or even the gnat that had bothered us the last few months. This was something far, far worse, far more unsettling.
“Just fucking talk,” Marcel said.
“About time,” Kyle said. “About time you actually gave me the chance to talk. In any case, now then. Imagine that your whole life, you’ve waited to see something. Imagine that you finally got comeuppance on the person that tormented you for the longest. Imagine that the vengeance and bloodlust you’ve hoped to fulfill your entire life finally came true�
�and now imagine that it didn’t do shit to fulfill you.”
Like if we kill you.
Luckily, I’m not a sicko enough to think that killing you will make me happy. I find fulfillment in the joys of life, not the darkness.
“Now, on top of that, imagine that you didn’t get the girl of your dreams. Imagine, instead, that not only did you not get the girl, the girl pushed you away, told you to fuck off, and then jumped on your own brother’s dick.”
Kyle stared right at me as he said it. There was such little subtlety that even a five-year-old could have connected the dots. Suddenly, Marcel wasn’t the only one who needed to be reined in before killing someone. I had to focus more on myself than I did Kyle just to make sure I didn’t pull a gun out and kill him on the spot.
“What has this world given me other than misery and failure? Everywhere I turn is a failure. I have failed to become the favorite son of the Stone family. I have failed to win the heart of the girl I love. I have failed to find happiness with my biggest life goal accomplished. But, luckily, there’s a new life goal I’ve found.”
“And what’s that?” Marcel said, sneering.
“Oh, simple. Killing you both and taking Lilly for myself.”
The way he said it so casually was the most chilling part. His tone was so lighthearted, he might as well have said he was going to order a Whopper at Burger King and give some fries to a dog.
“You see, I was wrong. Uncle wasn’t the source of my greatest torment. He was just the most obvious person. No, it’s you two. You two, who always seem to have every fucking break go your way, every fucking thing turn out well, and every girl you’ve ever wanted. You two are a daily reminder of what I could be, but because life has fucked me over, I have nothing!”
“Because you’re a goddamn asshole and bitch, that’s why you aren’t that!” Marcel said. “Do you even hear yourself, Kyle? Do you realize how much of a whiny bitch you sound like?”
“It doesn’t fucking matter what I sound like!” Kyle said.
He took a breath, calmed himself, and laughed again.
“I know you all are coming to kill me tonight. I’m well aware of that fact. I’m not stupid. So, I figured I’d just take this right to you. This weekend, at least one of us will die. Either I’ll die and I’ll no longer have to suffer this cruel, unjust world…or I’ll get to kill one, hopefully both of you, and I’ll get a new spot to dance on in celebration.”
“You’re fucking crazy,” I said.
“Oh, thanks for reminding me,” Kyle said with a smirk. “You should probably want to win, Jack. I’ll be balls deep in your woman if you fail.”
My fists clenched, but I reminded myself there would be no Lilly if I wound up in jail for throwing punches on camera. That reminder barely—and I mean just barely—worked.
“I won’t be hard to find tonight,” he said. “You know where to look. You’ll just have to think about it for more than half a second. If you can figure it out, then I welcome your battle.”
Then he glared right at me when he said his final words.
“If not, then someone will have to die. We can’t have a night without a little bit of death, right, Jack?”
He then erupted in laughter as he headed back to the car, doing some sort of stupid dance along the way. This time, Marcel was the one who had to hold me back, although with him, he only needed to put an arm up to prevent me from moving forward. He had figured out what I already knew the second Kyle had opened his mouth.
He had Lilly somewhere.
Somewhere, apparently, that wouldn’t be hard to figure out, but somewhere all the same. And that somewhere…
Kyle got in the police cruiser and drove off, still laughing, delivering a couple of middle fingers as the cruiser blasted in the other direction. I was so furious about everything he said I hadn’t even wondered how he’d gotten the cruiser.
It only seemed to further corroborate the idea that Kyle was going all-in on tonight. If he’d stolen a cruiser; if he was inviting us to come to him, hoping for one of us to die; if he had taken Lilly, then he was truly mad. He’d lost whatever of his mind remained. He certainly wouldn’t have his political career after this weekend.
“He’s mad,” Marcel said.
“He’s lost his mind entirely,” I said. “And because of it, I believe everything he just said.”
I would never have imagined that Kyle would be the one to fall into essentially suicide-by-violence thoughts, but here we were. Kyle really didn’t have anything left to live for; whatever Lilly had said or done to him had pushed him over the edge and turned him into someone willing to sacrifice everything for our deaths.
“This is just fucking unbelievable,” Marcel said. “Unfucking real. He probably has your girl at this point. He’s probably going to cause all sorts of nightmares. Probably going to be a giant bitch. Just fucking stupid…”
Marcel kept ranting. I pulled him inside long enough to then corral the rest of the officers across all the Savage Saints into the office. Marcel kept ranting, but at least now, I had all the decision-makers in place.
“We need to figure out where the hell Kyle is,” I said. “Any ideas?”
Marcel took over, which was a good thing because I got an idea for something I needed to do. It was of slim hope, but it was still something I needed to do just to try.
I called Lilly.
But, alas, she did not answer. At this point, as far as I was concerned, she was being held captive by the Bloodhounds and by Kyle.
“He said it would be somewhere easy,” Marcel said. “Somewhere easy for us to figure out. I don’t know what the fuck that means.”
“Something obvious?” Fitz suggested.
“What places is Kyle known to hide out in?” Trace said.
“Probably just hiding somewhere in the middle of nowhere,” Richard said.
“No, he’s not,” Marcel said. “He’s a coward, but he’s gone mad. It may make him braver in some weird, fucked up way.”
“That is fucked up, Jesus.”
Conversation continued. Someone suggested the old warehouse where we’d run into Damon. I immediately rejected that idea as extraordinarily unlikely; the warehouse was a smart place for a man like Damon, but not for someone like Kyle. No, Kyle was more likely to be in a place that held value to him or to us.
I doubted his office. It was far too public, especially for a man who seemed to crave death as much as—
It clicked instantly. I knew where he was.
“Guys, guys,” I said. “He’s not in any of those places. I know it.”
“You do,” Marcel said dryly. “Then where is he?”
I shook my head.
“He’s home.”
Chapter 18: Lilly
In a very odd way, Kyle had at least lived up to his word.
I was in the kitchen of an old, abandoned home in Astoria. The neighborhood around it was run-down, with only a few occupants that looked like the less they went outside, the happier they were. The only other people in the building were two guards, but they left me alone.
I was “safe” in the sense that I didn’t fear an imminent attack. I had my computer in front of me, Fires of the City open on my screen, although Kyle had taken my phone. No surprises had taken place. No one had jumped out to attack me, no one had destroyed my computer, and no one had tried to come over and gleam my work. In fact, one of the guards had even told me to use a different outlet, stating the one I had plugged my charger into sucked and wouldn’t last very long.
It was kind of surreal to hear him giving me advice. But it was even less surreal than the whole situation.
After the guards had trapped me outside, Kyle had taken me into a small Honda and driven me to the house, where a lone, abandoned police cruiser waited. Kyle escorted me inside, making small remarks here and there about how pretty I was. He had the good sense not to touch me, probably realizing that if he had, I would have smacked the shit out of him. But all the same, even if I
had hit him, my life was not my own at that moment; I was completely dependent upon Kyle.
As soon as I got inside, he said that he had somewhere to be and left me alone, driving off in the cruiser. I overheard him telling the guards not to hurt me under any circumstances, but they didn’t need to worry. Unlike Kyle, I wasn’t going to do something incredibly stupid and suicidal. I was going to do what helped me live.
Naturally, though, no work was getting done on Fires of the City. Instead, I just brainstormed ideas to escape. The problem was, there wasn’t a storm strong enough in my brain to come up with anything that worked.
Physical violence? Please. Manipulation? Nothing that I was willing to do. Trickery? How? Where was I going to go that wasn’t watched by the guards and led me to safety?
Said brainstorming, though, barely lasted any length of time before I saw the police cruiser returning. Kyle looked like he was laughing and dancing inside of the car, cackling to himself like some sort of sicko. He had truly lost his mind, and there didn’t seem to be anything that could be done to bring him back from the brink. But you might as well try.
When Kyle entered, he was humming to himself, occasionally laughing at a joke that must have been in his head. He said something I couldn’t quite hear to the guards and then made his way to the kitchen, taking a seat across from me, utter satisfaction across his face.
“What did you do?” I asked.
I tried to keep my tone neutral, hoping that such a voice would encourage him to reveal information I might be able to use for myself. I didn’t have much hope, but it was better than no hope.
“I set things in motion,” Kyle said, looking mighty pleased with himself. “I went and saw my brothers. You know, your boyfriend.”
“He’s…”
I decided not to give Kyle the satisfaction of telling him I’d broken up with Jack, although I wasn’t against saying it later on if it saved my life. There just wasn’t a reason to do so right now.
“He’s going to make you pay, you know.”
