Page 16 of Zeke

“Hey,” I say as I approach them.

“Hey,” greets Rosa, her long, dark ponytail swishing behind her as she faces me. She has this bronze-colored skin that makes her look like she’s always glowing. “Business calling?”

“Nah,” I reply, plopping into an armchair behind her. “Just hanging out. You guys?”

“Nothing today,” Tia answers without looking at me. She aims a dart at the board and lets it fly, getting almost a perfect bullseye. She’s almost Rosa’s opposite looks-wise. With skin so pale I’m surprised she hasn’t melted in either Florida or Texas, where our last and current clubs are based. Her hair is shaved down on the sides with a pouf of blonde in the middle. The style could look butch, but she manages to skirt that line between masc and femme because she has eyelashes for days and lips so pink, she doesn’t need lipstick. Not that it ever stops her. She rocks a blood-red lip like no one else.

“Is this the plan for the day?” I ask as Rosa pulls a beer out of the fridge.

“Damn straight,” Tia says.

“Anyone else want one?” Rosa asks, and both Tia and I say yes. She tosses them to us. While Tia opens hers the way it’s intended to be, I pull out my pocketknife, stab a hole in the side, press my lips around it, and open the tab.

The bitter, foamy liquid rushes into my mouth, and I take down every drop before tossing the empty can in the bin next to the dartboard. It goes right in, and I hold up my hand to Rosa, who hasn’t moved away from the fridge yet, signaling I want another.

This time, I drink it slowly, not interested in getting trashed, not this early in the day. I could be convinced to drink myself into oblivion later, especially if I’ll keep running into Eden.

She can’t put much of a damper on my mood right now. With Bastard in the house and the new prospect that Kira offered me, I’m in a better mood than I have been since I first joined up with the La Grange chapter of the Ruthless Kings.

Back before I knew what happened to Walton.

While Tia continues to throw darts, I go to the pool table and rack the balls. Rosa’s attention shifts quickly away from darts as she comes over to play with me. Tia continues to throw, though, her aim perfect. Her aim is always like that. Even with a gun, or if she ever throws a knife. She rarely misses a target.

“Solids or stripes?” Rosa asks as I put the balls in the right order.

“Solids.” I pick up my cue stick and aim.

I’m good at pool. Like, really good. I can beat most of the men in the house, though I have a sneaking suspicion Country lets me win. Rosa almost always beats me, but I don’t mind. Just playing is as much fun as winning most of the time. Sometimes I need the win to feel like I’m good at something, but today, I already feel like I won the lottery.

We play for another hour or so, then sit around the TV, drinking beers and watching some reality show about people who buy storage units to try to find valuables. I nearly lose my shit when they open one unit and there’s a vintage Harley right at the front. That unit went for a fuck ton of money. I bet the club could afford to buy it, though. Our chapter has an incredible budget thanks to Eden and her brothers’ time in Miami, where they made more money than I could fathom.

All the money in the world can’t bring my brother back.

Goddamn it. I nearly went the whole afternoon without thinking about him.

After drinking more than a six-pack, I wander the house, looking for a distraction, but decide to go to bed. It’s late enough that half the house has already done just that.

I hear Savage and Eden going at it in their room, which I’m annoyingly close to. I rush into my room and slam the door behind me, hoping they hear it and know I’m still not okay with them.

I know. I know who Walton was and how he did those things. Savage doesn’t think I do, or he must think I don’t care. Walton was broken beyond repair and no amount of my love could have saved him from becoming a monster. I believe he would have killed Eden, that he nearly did, and he would have stopped at nothing to track her down if she let him live.

Savage doesn’t realize I know about the bodies he cleaned up for our third triplet. He thinks I’m blind, but I couldn’t be if I wanted to. Walton would tell me what he’d done. My brother was broken, fucked up to a degree I couldn’t stomach. He would call me after he got Savage to bail him out of a mess, crying that he’d “done it again,” and I didn’t know what to do. It wasn’t like he was killing an enemy because a job went sideways or because he’d been betrayed. He was torturing innocent people and killing them.

I always hoped he would get better. That I could somehow fix him if I loved him hard enough. But there was no “hard enough” to fix Walton. His death was the only thing that could have worked.

I nearly laugh at myself. Eden probably did Walton a favor. It was always going to be someone, and I never knew how many more confession calls I’d get before that happened. With that logic, I should be thanking her. But I’m not. While he’s better off, it doesn’t change how much I loved him and how much it hurts not only that he’s gone, but that I have to spend every day with the people who made it happen.

The thoughts of his last moments, of Eden breaking his neck, keep me awake. By three in the morning, I’m still unable to sleep. Anger propels me from the bed. I throw on some PJ shorts over my panties, tug on a cami, and walk downstairs.

I head straight for the kitchen, hoping to spend time with the dog. I loved having a dog growing up, and it always made me feel safe when I’d cuddle up to him. Bastard had the softest fur I’d ever felt, probably because it was supposed to be long, but he’d been shaved down until he felt like a stuffed animal made out of velvet.

When I walk in, I see Country hanging out in there. He’s by the coffee pot, and I smell the brew from all the way over in the doorway.

“Hey,” he says, noticing me walking in. “Can’t sleep?”

I shake my head no. I’m not usually shy, but there’s something between Country and me that I can’t quite place. It feels like maybe he likes me, and I hate to admit the feeling is mutual since it creates a tie to this club I probably won’t want at some point soon.

“Want some coffee?” he offers, holding up the cup he just finished making. “You can have this one and I’ll make another.”

---