Page 13 of Tyrant Blood

Happy old couple? Check.

Bullish young bucks in a pickup truck? Check.

Prissy school mistress? Check again.

But there was something undeniably different about Ridgeback Falls too. Amongst the cozy storefronts and smalltown folk right out of Casting 101, Joaquin picked up on a slightly edgier vibe too.

There were bars, tattoo and piercing parlors, and plenty of motorcycles and muscle cars. The atmosphere was still wholesome, and it certainly wasn’t a scuzzy neighborhood vibe either. But there most certainly was an edge.

Rather than spending his time analyzing Ridgeback Falls’ admittedly unique aesthetic, Joaquin knew that what he should really be doing was working out a plan for how to get out of town and find somewhere that was totally out of reach as far as Rohan Katsen was concerned.

It wouldn’t be easy, that much was for sure.

Other than the money that Joaquin had stolen the night before, he didn’t have a penny to his name. So foreign travel was immediately ruled out. And the problem was trying to find another town or city to settle in was that Katsen had contacts across the country. He might not have been a mafioso or affiliated with any of the generationally established mobster families, but Rohan Katsen was building a far reaching network – and Joaquin felt very uneasy about the prospect of keeping off his radar for long.

‘I wish…’ Joaquin whispered, his mind throwing back to his early childhood, before everything went to shit. ‘Nah, wishing’s for kids…’

After everything that had gone down the night before, Joshua simply wanted to work out what the hell he was going to do and then make it happen as quickly as he could. This wasn’t the time for dreaming, and it certainly wasn’t the time to open up pandora’s box on his childhood troubles.

Joaquin pulled the coffee mug back close to him and took another sip. Unsurprisingly, it didn’t taste any better than it had the first time. If anything, the over-roasted beans just tasted more acidic than before.

If it hadn’t been so tragic, Joaquin might have laughed.

Here he was, lost and penniless, complaining that his coffee didn’t taste as good as the stuff he was used to back in the city.

But before Joaquin could spend another moment bemoaning the quality of his beverage, he felt a dark shadow suddenly tower over him.

‘You?’ Joaquin said, his heart skipping a beat and his entire nervous system going into high alert. ‘What do you want?’

‘Cole… you mean like Cole Tyrant?’ Joaquin asked, suddenly realizing precisely where he recognized the strange, gruff man from the bar from. ‘What the hell…’

Joaquin couldn’t quite grasp how and why he was sitting across the diner’s corner booth from a decorated, if not controversial, former hockey star. The years may have aged Cole’s face, but now that he knew who he was dealing with, Joaquin could see that Cole was still something to be reckoned with.

But it was more than simply a case of being slightly starstruck by a faded sports star.

There was an aura to Cole that Joaquin couldn’t shake off. Despite the fact that they were far from friends at this stage, Joaquin couldn’t take his eyes off Cole as he spoke.

It was like each and every word that came out of Cole’s mouth was utterly compelling to Joaquin – and try as he might, he couldn’t break the spell.

This is weird.

I don’t like it.

He’s good looking, but it’s not like I’m into guys…

‘Hey, are you listening to me, kid?’ Cole asked, impatience in his voice as he leant over and placed his big, heavy hand on top of Joaquin’s arm. ‘I’m trying to help you. And I wasn’t born yesterday. I know trouble when I see it.’

‘Ummm…’ Joaquin uttered, clueless as to how to respond. ‘I’m not into dudes. Sorry.’

‘Don’t flatter yourself,’ Cole barked, clearly unimpressed with Joaquin’s riposte. ‘This is fucking serious. Tiffany said you were on edge this morning, couldn’t wait to haul your ass out of the tavern. Someone’s chasing you, aren’t they?’

Joaquin was still cringing from his idiotic comment about not being into guys, but it was clear that Cole wasn’t going to give up until he got at least some kind of a response out of him.

‘I… I… I…,’ Joaquin said. ‘I’m… not going to tell you.’

Joaquin felt adrenalin surge over his body as the words spilled out of his mouth. He knew that he was turning a helping hand away from him, but Joaquin struggled to trust people and had been burned so many times in the past.

As far as Joaquin was concerned, he was going to do what he always did – and that was look after himself.

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