Page 71 of Eight Second Hearts

Tripp picks up on it, and his face twists with confusion. I’ve never heard Beau sound angry. In fact, he’s always happy,always teasing, so to see this man angry on my behalf hurts my heart.

“Uh. . . I woke up in my room at some point. Everyone was asleep.” Tripp rumbles. He rubs his chest, his confusion growing. “I came out to the kitchen. I. . .” His face twists. “I pulled out a bottle of whiskey. And then. . .” He shakes his head. “I drank just the one I think.”

“Try three,” Beau grunts. “Three bottles.”

Tripp blinks. “Three,” he repeats. He wiggles his toes and winces. “What happened to my feet?”

Ram steps around the couch and crosses his arms. “You woke everyone up rummaging through the kitchen, breaking all the plates while you looked for the ring.”

Tripp frowns. “But. . . I tossed it.”

“Which was exactly the problem,” Ram grunts. “Because you were past the point of understanding. You kept looking for the ring.”

“The glass? My feet?” he asks. “How bad did it get?”

Beau’s face twists. “Why don’t you ask Indie, fucker?”

Tripp’s eyes widen. “Why? What. . . what did I do?”

Ram reaches for me where I stand in the kitchen, lingering back in the shadows, knowing that this isn’t going to be an easy conversation. I hesitate before slowly padding out to the living room and into the lamp light.

Tripp’s eyes latch onto my face first, taking note of my somber expression. I’m not angry with him. That would be wasted, but I am disappointed that he’s gotten this deep. Pain demands to be felt, and pushing it aside, pushing it away, it does nothing but build up. He’s going to have to face it soon.

Ram flicks the light back on and Tripp winces, shielding his eyes like the sun is overhead. But the light is necessary for him to see.

His eyes drop to my neck, and I know he sees them, the large finger marks there. He drops his hand, and a look of true horror covers his face. “Your neck?—”

“You almost fucking killed her!” Beau snarls. “She was seconds away from passing out before we got you away from her!”

He leaps to his feet clumsily and takes a step back. His eyes well. “Idid that?”

I nod. “You were incoherent. I got too close. I’m not mad?—”

“I fucking hurt you!” he shouts. “Don’t make excuses for me!” He slaps his hand to his forehead. “I could have killed you,” he whispers, horrified.

Ram tilts his chin up. “I think it’s time you get help,hermano.”

“Help?” Tripp repeats. His eyes trail to the kitchen shelf where liquor bottles line them. His expression changes from horror to resolution. “Get them out.”

“It’s not the flip of a switch—” Ram starts.

“I understand that!” Tripp snarls. “Get them out first. I can’t be trusted around them. We figure the rest out as it comes.”

He starts to hyperventilate, and I realize the strength it took for him to say that. He can’t pour it out. He doesn’t trust himself.

The next few hours, Tripp sits on the couch, his back ramrod straight as he listens to us pour out bottle after bottle into the sink. Thirty bottles of whiskey. Thirteen bottles of rum. Three bottles of vodka. The last ten beers in the fridge. Naomi’s moonshine.

The fucking rubbing alcohol goes in the safe in the living room after Ram changes the combination. That was at my request. I’d watched my dad struggle with this, watched him try it when there was nothing else in the house. This is the beginning, but at some point, things will become more of a challenge.

When we finish, we all sit back down in the living room, silent. Tripp’s eyes flick to me and hold, his gaze haunted by his actions.

“I’m sorry I hurt you,” he whispers. “I’m so sorry.”

“I don’t blame you,” I admit. “Not really.”

He shakes his head. “How can you be so calm?” he croaks. “I’m a piece of shit?—”

“You weren’t choking me. It wasn’t me you saw,” I say, shrugging. “You thought I was your dad.”

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