Page 17 of Beautiful Ruins
Scout ducked his head, giving me an apologetic smile as he passed. “She’s all yours, VP.”
Great. No-one wanted to deal with a pissed off Sadie, least of all me. But it was reckless, dangerous, her showing up at the clubhouse like that.
“Not here.” Jaw tight, I grabbed her arm—not hard, but enough to make her stumble. If I didn’t get her out of there, I was going to say something I couldn’t take back. I dragged her back through the door. “We’ll talk outside.”
Everyone kept their heads down, but it didn’t take a rocket scientist to feel the tension brewing between Sadie and me.
The late-August air clung to my hungover skin, thick and warm as regret. I released Sadie’s arm and stepped back, putting distance between us. Behind her, another of our patched-up bastards lit a cigarette. The scent hit me just as hard as her glare.
“What the hell are you doing here?” I said, glancing around for any other eavesdroppers. “This ain’t a place for you.”
“What the hell is this?” She slammed a piece of paper into my chest, like it was the only thing keeping her from hitting me instead.
I caught her wrist, just enough to stop her pulling away. “A piece of paper, by the looks of it,” I said, snatching it from her grip fast—too fast.
I needed something to hold on to.
Her glare was relentless, burning through me like she didn’t care what was left behind. “Don’t be a smart arse, Rowan.” She nodded to the item in my hand. “Read it.”
My chest clenched. I couldn’t meet her eyes. She had every right to be pissed.
I’d grilled her pretty hard last night after me and Bear polished off a bottle of Jameson around the fire pit. It was more of an inquisition than an interrogation. Not my finest of hours, but Sadie Cooper had a way of turning me inside out, especially after six years of silence.
Exhaling, I pulled my focus to the crinkled paper. I frowned as I read over my brother’s handwriting, messier than his usual scrawl, as though he’d scribbled it right before running out the door. The slant of his Ls, the half-smudge on the bottom corner—I’d seen it a thousand times. But, not like this.
“How should I know what he was talking about?” I said,shoving the paper back into her hands and crossing my arms over my chest.
Maybe if I focused on anything but her, I’d feel more in control.
Fucked if I knew what Logan had wanted to tell her. Maybe he was finally going to tell her he was in love with her. It could have meant a million and one things, but what stood out for me the most was the fact he’d asked Sadie to go to me.
He’d come to me that night, eyes darting around like he couldn’t keep a thought still. I’d laughed it off, thought nothing of it. Christ, I hadn’t even asked what was wrong. Not until I’d found him in his room hours later.
No-one knew I’d snatched his phone, even before Sadie had arrived. I’d had my suspicions, and the messages to our old man had confirmed them—he’d been working for the club.
I’d figured he’d gotten in too deep and couldn’t see any other way out. If only he’d come to me sooner. I’d have made sure he remained safe. If it was money he’d needed, I could have helped him there too.
“What truth, Rowan?” Sadie said, her eyes darting between mine, desperate, raw. She was hurting. Reaching for something in me she didn’t fully understand yet. “He said you would know what to do.”
The faint thrum of music pulsed through the thin walls of the clubhouse, but out here, in the small parking lot, there was only the sound of her breathing—and mine, heavier than I wanted her to hear.
She smelled like memory, like the house before everything went to hell. And it made thinking straight a goddamn chore.
“I know what it says, Sadie.” I shoved my hair back, sweat beading on my forehead. “Doesn’t mean I know what it means.”
Hollow Creek wasn’t somewhere Sadie should have been sniffing around.
“You must know something.” She shifted onto the opposite leg and crossed her arms over her chest. She tapped her foot like it might force the truth out of me. As though the entire mystery would unravel in the time it took for her patience to last.
The truth she wanted, though? I wasn’t willing to hand over. She’d blame herself, I know that much. But the only person who should have held the blame was my dead-beat father, the one who could barely look at me after Logan had died, his guilt etched into every line of his face.
Him dying of a heart attack only justified what I’d already known—he let Logan get in too deep, and the guilt finally killed the bastard.
My gaze landed heavily on that goddamn bruise spreading like spilled ink under Sadie’s eye. My fingers itched to trace the purple and blue pattern, but more than that, everything inside me told me to go to her, to pull her against my chest.
But that would have been a mistake. I felt like shit and probably looked like it, too. Add that to the hangover, my general appearance, and it wasn’t a surprise she thought I wasn’t taking her seriously. I wouldn’t take me seriously, either.
“Are you going to tell me who did that?” I said, deflecting.
