I KNOW WHO IT IS before I even answer the phone.
“What’s up, Jimmy?”
“Your boy is at it again. Gettin’ belligerent and disrupting my customers.”
“Awesome,” I groan under my breath. “I’ll be there in ten minutes.”
“Five minutes. This is my last courtesy call. Next time, I’m calling the cops.”
“I hear ya loud and clear.”
“Good.” Click.
Fuck. I shrug on a pair of jeans and run my fingers through my hair. The first time I can sleep through the night in six years and this jackass repeatedly picks three a.m. to self-destruct. If it were anyone else, I’d have told Jimmy to toss him in the gutter and let him sleep off his load. But I can’t do that, not to Kayne. At least not this time, but possibly the next. This shit is getting old.
It takes me exactly seven minutes to drive to the hole Kayne has taken up residence in the last three months. Transition into the civilian world has been significantly harder for him than myself. Losing Ellie destroyed him, more so than even I could have predicted. He was fucked up when it came to women to begin with, and getting wrapped up with her only magnified his issues twentyfold. Sometimes I worry he’s reached a point of no return.
I walk into the dark little bar with a rainbow of shady characters. No, Kayne couldn’t just pick any bar to get drunk in; he had to pick the one where the baddest motherfuckers in town hang out. A place where the wrong look can get you stabbed or the wrong word will earn you a bottle smashed over your head.
I spot him in the corner being corralled by two linebackers in motorcycle jackets. Just fucking great. He’s swaying on his feet with his bottom lip busted wide open. But it’s the look in his eyes that has me worried. His stare is dark and removed like his soul has disappeared.
“You’re late,” Jimmy sneers from behind the bar.
“Keep your shirt on. I’m here, aren’t I? What happened?” I ask as we walk the length of the room side by side toward Kayne.
“What happened is your friend came, got shitfaced, and started a fight. Again,” he snarls. “I’ve had it. He’s out, and if he shows his face in here one more time, I’m not going to intervene when he gets what’s coming to him. Got me?” the burly man asks with his arms crossed and a glare that can make the average person piss themselves.
“I got it.” I wave my hand. I’m sure if I was anyone else, I’d be intimidated. But I don’t have time for hard-asses who think they’re tough shit. If Kayne wasn’t fucked up, we could wipe the floor with every douchebag in this entire place.
I squeeze through the two mountains blocking him. “Excuse me, fellas. I got it from here.” I grab Kayne’s arm, and he growls at me. “Easy, killer. Just taking you to get some air.” I pull him through the bar, stumbling drunk, and cursing like a sailor. To be honest, I’m impressed he has the ability to speak given the condition he’s in.
Once outside, I haul off and punch him in the gut. Why? Because the last thing I need is a ticking time bomb. Which is exactly what Kayne is at the moment—what he’s been since the moment Ellie walked out of his life. And the only way for him to come to terms with what he’s feeling is to face it head on. I have learned this about him the hard way.
Kayne hunches over, caught off guard for a second, and then retaliates by tackling me against the car. “Come on, cocksucker, get it all out.” I continue with the kidney shots as he crushes me against the driver’s side door. “She’s gone! She’s gone! And you have to fucking accept that!” I scream at him.
“I can’t!” Kayne howls like a wounded animal then slumps to the ground, trying—and failing miserably—to hide the emotion leaking out of his eyes. Ughhhh, messed-up motherfucker. I prop him up on the sidewalk. He hits my soft spot every time.
“You can’t keep doing this to yourself.” I clasp his shoulder as he clumsily sits on the curb, pulling his legs up to steady himself. “You’re going to wind up getting hurt, or worse, getting dead. Is that what you worked so hard for? Sacrificed so much of your life for?” I shake him. “To be buried six feet under?”
“I’d be better off dead.” He wipes his cheeks roughly with the palms of his hands, his elbows resting on his knees.
“That’s the alcohol talking.”
“No, it’s not. What’s the point of living if you have nothing to live for?” He looks up at me with bloodshot eyes.
My flesh actually heats.
“You selfish scumbag. You have nothing to live for? What the fuck am I? I don’t count just because you can’t fuck me?”
“What?” His expression falls. “No . . . That’s not . . . You’re my best friend. My brother . . . The only family I have.” He stumbles over his words.
“Well, how do you think your brother would feel if you end up dead?” I get in his face.
Kayne shrugs. “Shitty?”
“Yeah. Pretty. Fucking. Shitty,” I snap.
Kayne stares at me blankly. I know he’s in there somewhere. Then he drops his head in his hands pathetically. “I just miss her so damn much.”
“I know.”
“Is there ever going to be a woman in my life who doesn’t break my heart?”
Aww shit, he’s going there. “You can’t blame Ellie for breaking your heart. We both knew the possible outcome when we took her.”
“I just can’t stand her being gone. It’s killing me.” His voice cracks as he buries his face in the crook of his arm and recoils into a ball.
“For now,” I assert. “She’s gone for now. That doesn’t mean she’ll be gone forever.”
“How can you possibly know that?” He raises his head and sniffs.
I roll my eyes. “Haven’t you learned yet? I know everything.”
Kayne actually chuckles. It’s a deranged sound, but at least he’s connecting with me on some coherent level.
We stare at each other for some time before I concede. It’s late, I’m tired, and he’s smashed.
“Come on, big man. Let’s get you home and cleaned up. You bled all over yourself.” Splattered red stains are covering his white shirt.
“Not my blood.” He grins up at me. “It’s the fucker’s who was stupid enough to fight me. He never got a shot in.”
“Then what happened to your lip?”
“Fell off the barstool.”
“You what?” Oh, for Christ’s sake, he can throw down in a bar fight, but he can’t take a damn leak.
“Let’s go.” I hold out my hand exasperated.
Kayne teeters a bit before his palm finally connects with mine. I haul him to his feet, and it feels like I’m pulling on a steel anchor. Once standing, I rest him against the car and manually unlock the doors. My 1966 Chevelle didn’t exactly come equipped with keyless entry. After I dump him in the front seat, I slide behind the wheel and start the engine. My red devil purrs to life, and I can’t help but think there’s only one other kind of hum that’s better than this car’s.
I glance over at Kayne; he looks green and is barely conscious. “Listen man, you puke in here, and I’m tossing you out while we’re still moving.”
Kayne smirks, his head bobbing all over the place as I pull away. In no time at all, he’s passed out and breathing loudly.
What am I going to do with his dumbass? He’s a wreck.
I can’t fault the guy completely for all his fuckedupness; he’s had a rough life. Abused, neglected, and cast aside; not to mention abandoned by the one person who was supposed to love him the most. It’s tragic, really. And then, when he finally gets one tiny flicker of happiness, what happens? It’s corrupted by evil and shrouded in darkness. Sometimes, you just can’t win for trying.
“Ellie,” Kayne moans miserably beside me while grabbing his crotch in his drunken sleep.
All I can do is shake my head.
Oy, what a fucking hot mess.