Page 40 of Sparrow

“You didn’t do this to your face. He did this. Let him be responsible and let us teach him how wrong he was.”

She closed her eye and nodded. Breathing in a deeper breath than before was easier. It’d take time for her to fully feel as though she hadn’t played some role in his fate, but for now, she’d process Bowie’s words.

“Thank you,” she said, opening her eye and meeting Bowie’s. “For all that you offered and everything you’ve done.”

He smiled. “Your dad was a good man. I should’ve done more.”

“You did what you could.”

“So did you.”

Chapter 25

Romeo

One Week Later

Pressing his teeth into his fist, Romeo winced every time. Dash did not have a gentle hand. He was a goddamn sadist. Snickering with each tug, he took his sweet time snipping and pulling the threads out of Jacob’s skin. He felt every little bit of those things as they slid through his flesh.

“Seriously,” he grit out, “did you use a fuckin’ spool?”

Chuckling, his brother slapped his hands on his knees. “You’re done, you big baby.”

Twisting, Romeo looked to the pink three-inch line of shiny skin that went from the bottom of his ribs toward his back on his left side. “You know, you could have made it straighter.”

“I’m not a plastic surgeon,” Dash quipped as he stood up, grabbed a shot from the table, and threw it back. “You ain’t dead. Most people would thank me for that.”

Romeo regarded his brother, and he probably should. “Most people don’t know you get your rocks off this way. Maybe you should be thanking me.”

Rolling his eyes, his sponsor shook his head in exasperation. “Other people’s children,” he mumbled.

Laughing, Romeo shook, and it didn’t hurt. For the first time in a week, he didn’t have pain when he moved. Optimism bloomed in him as he realized the potential of what that meant.

The two men moved from Clark’s room and headed toward the bar. Dash had stayed behind with Romeo after the Montana men left three days ago. The patch over had gone as smoothly as a patch over could go. Now, it was on Bowie’s and Clark’s shoulders to weed out the rats that were left and build up their club.

With an exaggerated groan, he slid his ass onto the stool. While he wasn’t in pain, he was still stiff from being laid up. Jacob waved the brassy-haired woman tending the bar over. She had a haggard look about her, dressed in skin-tight jeans, and a bikini for a top. When he got a good look at her face, it dawned on him.

“You’re Dixie,” he said.

She smiled knowingly. “And you’re the boy who used to write my little bird.”

In the week of unfettered access to Sparrow, Romeo had learned a lot about her, and by extension, Dixie. He’d expected an older looking woman. While the one in front of him looked like she’d been ridden a few hundred miles, she still had a beauty to her. She held a resemblance to Sparrow in the shape of her eyes and her smile. The sadness about her was unmistakable.

“And I’m Dash, a thirsty man,” his brother broke into the moment. “What do you have in the way of craft beers?”

Rolling his eyes, Romeo shook his head. “Jameson for me, and piss water swill for the bald guy.”

She smiled at them. “You’ve grown into a good man,” she said as she poured his glass and placed it in front of him.

Giving her a nod, he accepted the compliment. Not many people called him a good man anymore, so he wouldn’t argue with those that did. Once the two of them had been served, Dixie left them alone at the bar to tend to whatever it was she did in the afternoons for the good men of the Ohio chapter of Odin’s Fury.

Looking down into his glass, he swirled the amber liquid. “He still kicking in there?”

Dash nodded. “Detoxing from the shit,” he said. “Luckily, he wasn’t into heroin, so he ain’t puking and shitting everywhere. He don’t move much though. Talks crazy. That shit really fucked with him.”

Romeo would like to think that he was the kind of man that if it were anyone else, he’d have had some pity for the experience. He’d like to think that he’d have had some sympathy or even mercy. This wasn’t any other man, though. Instead, he tilted the glass up and took a deep swallow of the whiskey. “He with it enough to understand I’m going to kill him?”

“Killing is not on the menu,” Bowie wheezed from behind them.

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