Chapter 8
Max
While Lacey is upstairs getting ready for work I pull out my phone and open my contacts. It’s not every day I call in a favor. I know they typically come at a pretty steep cost. But Lacey needs her car back and David needs to get served with an ass beating I can’t provide single handedly.
I tapped the name of the only person I could trust with the job.
“What’s up, bro?”
My brother Chris answers on the third ring and sounds as if the call woke him up.
“I need your help.”
I hear rustling in the background before he comes back on the line. “I can be at your place in half an hour. Have a pot of coffee ready or I’m kicking your ass.”
Chris hangs up and I drop my phone back in my lap. That was it. No questions asked. He was on the way.
By the time Lacey climbs back in my car I have a few questions for her. What apartment complex does David live in? What kind of car do you drive, Lacey? What stuff did you forget at his apartment?
I find a way to casually weave my questions in our conversation as I drive her to work. I’m otherwise running on autopilot, my mind working through different ideas of how to orchestrate this. Chris may be around as added muscle but this was my show and he would expect me to lay out the plan.
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Being raised the way we were hadn’t been easy. Looking across my kitchen table at Chris drinking his coffee while I finish my glass of milk, it looked to me like he took our upbringing harder than I had. The dark circles under his eyes weren’t from one night of restless sleep. It was from years of enormous stress and drugs. From constant run-ins with the cops. From living with our dad and his unique brand of parenting.
His twenty-two years looked more like thirty at this point. And counting.
Chris had morphed over the years into a person I hardly recognized. Worse than the physical changes, his personality had darkened. His sense of humor was twisted and his outlook callous the majority of the time. The chasm between us had widened. He changed into a man ready to fill my father’s shoes someday.
I liked to think that wasn’t my path. Some days I wasn’t sure.
“Haven’t heard from you in a while.” Chris comments as he drinks his coffee without any sense of urgency.
“I know. Just busy with classes.”
I keep my eyes on my glass, not wanting to get into this shit with him again. We’ve talked in circles about it too many times to count. He doesn’t understand my decisions and I sure as hell don’t understand his.
I ignore the snort Chris lets out at the mention of school.
“I appreciate you coming.” I say instead.
It had been a month since I saw him or my dad and we didn’t exactly part on pleasant terms. Neither of them was going to ever understand why I wanted to go to college. Or more specifically why I wanted to distance myself from their lifestyle. I could never fully get out and I wasn’t foolish enough to have ever believed that was possible. But distance was much needed.
My best hope was to only be twisted up in the messes they wove a couple times a month. They called me when they really needed me. And thankfully they hadn’t needed me lately.
I suspected they didn’t actually need my help most of the time when they called. It was just dad’s way of reminding me I could never escape him and control he had over me. That I would always be a part of their life no matter how hard I tried to do better and change.
“You’re my brother. Of course I came.” I look up at him and see a brief glimpse of the brother I grew up with. Not the monster he was morphing into with each passing day. “So…” He continues, sighing. “What do you need? You dragged me away from some good pussy to come out here.”
“You were asleep.”
“I was.” He admits. “And when I woke up I planned to get my dick wet.”
“Look. I just need your help for a couple hours tops and then you can get back to it. I need to get some shit back from someone’s apartment. I don’t know exactly which apartment it is so I need you to help me case the place and get inside. I got it from there.”
“Alright.”
I leave out the part where I need to dish out some vigilante justice. He’ll see when we get there and it isn’t like he has any reservations about that sort of thing.
“Let’s go. We need to take your car. I don’t want anyone seeing my plates.”
“The fuck? You want ‘em to see mine instead?”
“I have to go to school around here. I don’t want anyone to recognize my car. No one knows you over there. It’s student housing.”
“Fine.” He shrugs carelessly and finishes the last of his coffee.
He had only been arguing for the sake of arguing. Chris wasn’t against committing crimes in his personal vehicle. The high horse he was pretending to ride in on didn’t exist.
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Chris and I pull up in front of Pine Oaks Apartments. It didn’t take me long to find her hunter green Accord and park at the back of the lot a few spots away. Our placement gives us a good view of all three buildings as we stake out, waiting to spot her ex.
I’m filled with an antsy energy, eager to get my hands on him again without her there to witness it. Now that I know exactly what he did to her I wasn’t sure I could hold back.
That’s where Chris would come in. He would either hold me back or help me clean up the crime scene when I was done with the motherfucker. Either way I needed my brother to have my back on this one.
We can decide how to handle things as we go.
The wait is relatively quiet, neither of us having much to say. Chris hadn’t reached out to me in two months. The last time he did was to recount a story of his latest girl and I was half ass listening the whole time. He eventually sensed my disinterest and wrapped up the call.
I was just grateful he showed up this morning when I summoned him. On some level, I had no doubt my brother would pull through for me when I needed him. He always did despite our differences or disagreements. And there were many of them.
He lights up a cigarette and I fight the urge to tell him not to smoke in my car. I hadn’t wanted to take mine to begin with but the check engine light was on in his and I didn’t want to risk breaking down outside the apartment once things were done.
He rolls the window down to flick out the ashes and I choose to take that as a compromise, flawed as it may be. He knows how I feel about smoking in my car and it isn’t his usual behavior to accommodate that. His car has burn marks on his seats and a tobacco odor that couldn’t be masked.
“Calm your tits.” Chris turns his face toward the window and blows out a breath of smoke. “I’m not going to burn your precious leather.”
I can’t help but smile at his ability to read my mind. “Fuck off.”
Shaking his head he flicks his ashes out the window pointedly and takes another drag. His hand hangs from the window, his head leaning back against the seat. “How long do you think it’ll be before this guy comes outside?”
“Can’t be long.”
He casts me an unconvinced look but doesn’t comment.
Honestly I had no clue how long the guy could hole up in his apartment. Could be hours. Days even. Maybe he was a gamer that didn’t get off the couch during a marathon of World Of Warcraft. I could probably hold Chris out here for maybe a couple hours tops before he bailed on this vigilante adventure.
Just as my thoughts turned to gamers and hermits an upstairs door opens and out walks the ex.
David.
The second I see him I haul ass out of the car and jog to the bottom of the stairs. Chris is hot on my heels. I can faintly hear him behind me cursing as he tries to put out his cigarette and pocket it for later. Blood rushes in my ears, pumping aggressive energy to each cell in my body. It pushes me up the stairs toward him with full force.
Before he can figure out what the hell is going on I barrel into his chest and push him back into the apartment. I slam him into the wall, sending pictures clattering to the floor. Chris walks in seconds behind us and casually shuts the door, turning the lock with a deafening click.
David’s whole body tenses and his widened eyes dart between me and my brother. “What the hell is going on? What do you want?”
Not bothering to answer I sucker punch him in the face. He staggers back and looks shocked when he reaches to touch his bloodied lip.
“Is this about-”
I jab his ribs. Hard. The wind is knocked out of him before he can finish his question. He knows what the fuck this is about.
“Don’t fucking say her name. Don’t even think about her anymore. She doesn’t exist to you. Got it?”
He tries to fight back but he can’t land a decent punch for shit. Chris sits down on the couch looking amused at the guy’s attempts. It’s obvious I’m not going to need his help for this part. He settles in and makes himself at home by propping his feet on the coffee table.
Material rips as I shove him to the ground by the collar of his shirt. Weak punches pummel my chest and face. Little does he know I’m quite accustomed to being beaten on by much stronger, scarier people than this cowardice piece of shit.
My fist connects with his face over and over. Again and again.
Blood slicks over my knuckles making it hard to land a punch anymore. He moans beneath me but his struggle to get away drains from him as he floats on the edge of consciousness.
“Fight me back you weak piece of shit.” I demand, landing another forceful punch to his ribs.
A new surge of rage boils inside him. It’s written plainly on his battered face as he shoves me back. We grapple on the ground, overturning the table Chris’s feet were resting on. It crashes on the tile floor sideways as we have a power struggle. With the table tossed to the side Chris walks over to the fridge, opens it as if he owns the place and pulls out a beer. He pops the cap on the edge of the bar, letting it fall to the floor.
This is much different than the fight we had in front of Lacey’s apartment. I hadn’t intended to fight at all that night. I had just been trying to hold him off and get him to leave. Now I knew what he had done to her and couldn’t hold back my seething rage.
Hatred.
I wanted to kill him with my bare hands and I wanted him to put up a fight back. If he could hold her down and violate her then he deserved to be held down and pummeled into a fucking coma.
Chris sips his beer, looking on without concern for a moment before going to the window and peeking out the blinds. Checking to see if the noise drew any unwanted attention.
We crash back into the discarded table and my back slams into the leg painfully. I relish that pain and let it fuel my fire. It’s time to finish this. I land a knockout punch to the side of his head and his eyes roll back. His body goes limp and I shove him away, rising to my feet.
One last kick to the ribs and I’m done.
“You know I’m all for beating the fuck out of somebody but...what the hell is this all about? That wasn’t like you.”
I look up at him but ignore his question. I don’t want to explain this to him. Wouldn’t know how even if I wanted to. I just met Lacey yesterday and here I was beating the shit out of her ex. I wipe a trail of sweat from my forehead with my sleeve.
“Grab that purse behind you and let’s get the hell out of here.”
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I pick Lacey up from work right on time, pulling up to the curb and waiting patiently for her to clock out. When she climbs in I reach to the backseat, grab her purse and hand it to her with a victorious smile. She lights up when she sees it and throws herself across the console. Her arms wrap around my neck in an enthusiastic hug.
“Oh my god. How did you get this back?”
She riffles through the contents of the purse and appears satisfied that everything is accounted for. Her keys jingle at the bottom of the purse as she sifts through, pulling out her phone.
I wink when she looks at me expectantly, waiting for an answer. She shakes her head in bewilderment and clutches the purse tightly to her chest.
“Thank you so much.”
“You’re welcome, angel.” I pull the car onto the main street and head for her apartment complex. “I brought your car back to your apartment. Keys should be in the purse.”
“You got my car too?” She sounds amazed and it feels good to play the hero for once. There’s also a hint of curiosity in her tone that could become dangerous if she pushes for answers I can’t give. “Max...?”
“Don’t. Don’t ask how.”
Silence builds for the rest of our ride as she watches houses and restaurants passing by. She seems to accept my unwillingness to share more and I’m grateful for that. I’m not used to answering to anyone for my actions and hadn’t anticipated today being any different. Even so there’s a feeling in my gut that I owe her more of an answer than what I’ve given.
She got her car and belongings back. I got them for her. That was all I could admit to.
Lacey doesn’t speak again until I park in front of her apartment. She doesn’t immediately move to get out and I shift to face her.
“Your knuckles are bleeding.” She softly points out.
I glance down and I’ll be damned if she isn’t right. How had I not noticed it until now? Chris didn’t point it out when I dropped him off but the sight probably didn’t alarm him too much. After I ignored his probing in the ex’s apartment he followed me back to the car and drove us home. My hands had been shaking too badly as I came down from my adrenaline rush.
“Come on.” She opens the passenger door. “Let me doctor you up. Again.”
Knowing she can imply what I did from the bloody hands and thankful beyond belief she isn’t demanding to talk about it, I climb out of the car and follow her upstairs smirking the whole way.
We go straight to her spare bathroom exactly like the night we met. She busies herself cleaning up my hand and I sit patiently as she does it, enjoying the feel of her hand gently holding mine in place.
It isn’t a romantic act. The peroxide stings. Her focus is solely on her nursing duties. But I find myself laser-focused on her soft skin brushing against my battered knuckles. Against the callused pads of my fingers as hers gently graze them. I’m hyperaware of her sugary, vanilla scent as she leans in closer. Her warm breath fans over the top of my hand and tickles the hairs on my arm as she cleans the last traces of dried blood from my hand.
Thank fuck I didn’t break anything. It would be hard to explain this sort of injury to emergency room staff. They’ve seen it all before and would know exactly how my hand ended up this way. I didn’t need that kind of drama right now. What I needed was the get home and finish studying for my asset management exam tomorrow morning.
Lacey fusses over me without any judgment. Plus she’s much hotter than any nurse or doctor I’ve ever seen in real life.
I clear my throat and tilt my head to get a better look at her face. “How was your day?”
“Exhausting. Long.”
“Sorry I kept you up so late.”
“Don’t be. It was worth it. I needed that I think. Besides I had plenty of coffee around to keep me going.”
I laugh. “How many cups did you have?”
“At least five. I reached a point of delirium halfway through my shift and wasn’t sure I could make it.” My laugh grows at the mental image she paints. She lathers a generous amount of ointment on my knuckles and uses her middle finger to gently rub it in. “I’d ask how your day was but judging by your hands I could guess how it must’ve been.”
“You aren’t mad…Are you?”
Blond brows crinkle in confusion. “About what?”
I shrug a shoulder and listen to her dig through the first aid kit. “Overstepping.”
“You didn’t. No one else would’ve done that for me.”
My eyes glance down to her lips. They apparently have a mind of their own. It’s only for a split second but that’s enough time for me to see the pink curve of her lips looking more soft and delicate the closer I get. Definitely kissable. I lean back to put some distance between us.
“Get some sleep, Lacey.”
Blond strands of hair bounce as she nods in agreement and walks me to the front door.
“Goodnight, Max.”
“Goodnight.”
The door closes behind me and I pause until I hear the sound of her locks softly clicking into place. It isn’t until I’m home in bed chasing sleep that I realize I never got her number.