Page 64 of Deceit

“Kyson,” I warn slowly. “Come get your boys, or I’m gonna make them part of the ground.”

“They have a point,” my best friend relays. “You’re the only one that treats Em like…dude, you’re all over the place with her.”

I am because no one else got to experience her as I did. No one learned what it was like to sleep with her in your arms or listen to her breathing as she dreams.

“Is this the consensus?” I look them over as they apparently all team up on me. “I’m a piece of shit, and Emmy is the queen that rules B723?”

She’s also the heartbeat.

Emmy is the girl who brings you soup when you’re not feeling too hot and never forgets your birthday.

Once upon a time, I got to participate in it. I looked forward to getting off the clock and spending every spare moment I had with her.

Her smile drew me in every fucking time. Her body was something I could never get full from, and I might be a complete fuckhead for letting her go, but I keep telling myself it was for the best—for the both of us.

“You’ve always been a piece of shit,” Marty complains. “But she did nothing to deserve it.”

I mean…depends who you ask.

“Look who’s acting arrogant,” I muse off a smirk. “I believe I was the one who taught you this gig. Who took you under his wing. Don’t start to play all high and mighty on me now, Shelton.”

“Again, get fucked.”

My lips heave higher. “I did.”

Marty’s fist flies into my face before I can blink, impeding another fight where he starts it, and I sometimes end it.

Normally it finishes up at a stalemate, though.

However, instead of hitting Marty back, I slam my own fist into Mills’s nose for always throwing his two cents in.

He’s the annoying sidekick that has to chime in but never meets the consequences for it.

Mills stumbles backward, giving me room to respond to Marty with my five knuckles. He’s ready for it, takes it like he always does, then bends over to ram his broad shoulder into my stomach.

I barely stagger, digging my heels into the dirt and shoving him to regain my space.

This exchange sounds familiar. The last time we fought was over his blonde, and now we’re throwing blows over another. I told him to release his now wife, after he kept her hostage for weeks.

And speaking of messed up, Marty grabbed the wrong girl, found out she was innocent, and still retained her because he couldn’t let her go.

Kyson suddenly steps in between Marty and I before I sucker-punch him in the ribs, getting back at him for ratting me out to everyone and blurting out my shit like a fucking child.

My best friend doesn’t retaliate, hitting me with dark cautionary not to touch him again. His brows are knitted so tightly that I wished he’d hit me. He and I have a lot of unfinished business when it comes to hiding things from each other while we’re both guilty of it.

“Move,” Marty rages, shoving him aside to come at me again.

I like Marty.

I really do, even though he and I are the two that argue the most. He’s loyal as hell, and if you’re within his realm of people he likes, you’re set for life with a friend that’ll go to the ends of the Earth for you.

We just like to talk a lot with our fists along with our words.

My jaw rattles as Marty hammers his weight into his next throw. Using my height to my advantage, I grip the shoulders of his shirt and fling him to the side, tripping him to get him on the ground and out of my way.

He wants to make me feel small when it comes to Emmy, but he doesn’t need to.

I already do.

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