The older men arrived first, but only by a couple of minutes. That was all it took.
The bottle of scotch dangles from my fingertips between my knees. My back bows forward as agony sweeps through me. We had barely walked in the door, so something was wrong by the time we got there.
Voices raised. The sound of bodies shuffling. It happened so fast, but when I think back on it, it really wasn’t. It was slow. Calculated. Executed with precision.
I didn’t see it then, but now that I’m looking at it through pain and inebriation, I can see it. Why didn’t the man shoot Richard? Elias? Did he miss me on purpose?
It was a setup. It had to be.
My pulse beats at a dizzying pace as the memory assaults me. The images of him lying there explode in my mind, and I know I have to stop. I have to stop thinking. I can’t keep reliving that moment over and over. It’s going to drive me to insanity.
I’ll drink myself there instead.
A bottle of liquor, a quiet room, and a chair. That’s how I deal. That’s how I always deal.
***
The door thuds against the wall with an almighty bang, and Elias’s voice booms across the room. “Man, Sin. What can I do?” he asks, and if I weren’t already six sheets to the wind, I would swear his voice cracks.
A creak releases from the old wooden chair I’m sitting in as I gently rock it with my heels on the floor. “Not a goddamn thing.”
Christ, was that my voice? After I left Genna by the bar, I took my bottle of scotch to the office for some peace and quiet. Some mind-numbing silence.
If someone could mute the damn ghosts in my head, that’d be fuckin’ great.
Literal fuckin’ ghosts because I swear to God, I can hear Molly screaming at me. Just like she was the last night I saw her. Screaming at me to leave her alone. To get away from her. I embarrass her. I control her.
Get away.
Give her space.
Leave.
Her.
Alone.
So I did, and she died. And Jesus Christ.
“Who the hell is screaming?” I groan, pushing myself to my feet and then immediately falling back into the chair. The old bolts screech in protest to my deadweight.
“I don’t hear anything,” Elias replies while scrutinizing me.
“Don’t look at me like that, asshole. I hear screaming.”
Elias immediately raises his hands in surrender. “Okay. Stay here, and I’ll go check it out. Take a little nap and sleep that shit off. I’m not carrying your ass home.”
I may or may not have responded with my mouth, but both my middle fingers give his retreating back a salute before I slip into an uneasy doze. The next thing I know, my door is slamming once again, and Elias is yelling at me to wake up.
As I pry open my heavy eyelids, I swear I must still be dreaming. Elias cradles a woman; her frame wrapped so tightly into a ball she almost looks like a child. But it’s the paleness of his face that gives it away. He wouldn’t look that way for just anybody. Sure, he’s a decent guy, and he cares about his fellow human beings, but this is different. I can feel it.
“Brother,” I choke out, the word rough like the quiet grate of sandpaper along the uneven grain of wood. I slip out of my chair and onto my knees, scrambling in my rush to get to my feet.
His arms tremble as he carries her toward the black leather sofa. When I step forward in approach, he pauses, his eyes lifting to meet mine.
“I-I’m not sure.” He answers my unspoken question. “I found her in the alley propped against the building. She needs help, but brace, brother.”
My heart thunders against my rib cage as he tenderly lays her down. It’s now that I notice the almost black hair covering her face is matted with dirt and what looks to be blood. A rage so fierce consumes me, and I almost snap. A blackness coats my veins in the vile oil that’s tainted my blood for so long, and I don’t think it’ll ever come out.
“Molly?”
Elias sweeps her hair from her face, and all the alcohol I’ve consumed today rises up my throat with a vengeance. I howl in fury and fall to my knees, choking on the putrid taste while at the same time trying to contain the urge to crawl to her. As much as she may need me, I need to go after those fuckers. There’s hell to pay, and after all these years, it can’t wait another second.
All thoughts of retribution wipe clean away when she retches violently from the sofa, and I get the first and last glimpse of her face that I ever want to see. Bloodied and bruised. Scrapes and cuts cover every single beautiful inch. Dirt smears and fluids crusted.
Time stops as the image of her face tattoos itself into my mind. Each beat of my heart is the pierce of the needle inking her image onto my soul. The battered and broken face of my single worst failure in life.
Her face is so swollen, it’s unrecognizable. Her eyes, two puffy black creases, and the lashes are hardly visible. The left cheek is disfigured and misshapen while the right has a long cut from eyebrow to ear. Smears of dried blood and dirt color her otherwise pale skin.
What irony that the day our father takes a bullet to the head, my sister’s broken body lands on the doorstep to his bar?
Obviously none.
But what do I do about it? Trade one revenge for another? The vengeance I held an eternal flame for passes onto his torch?
Do I let his death go silently now that I have Molly back, or do I avenge my father as tirelessly as I hunted Molly’s kidnappers?
Can’t say I had much respect for the fucker.
“Sin,” Elias calls, and I stop debating shit that doesn’t matter right now. “I need to go down and talk to Richard. See what to do. Stay with her, and I’ll be right back.”
I try to speak, but there’s a lump in my throat. I clear it and try again.
“Yeah, you go. See what he says. I’ll stay here.” Crawling to the sofa, I turn and sit with my back against the edge. My head is near her stomach where the scent of the leather couch barely masks the putrid odor of an unwashed, soiled body. The vomit I only just choked down comes crawling back up again.
In my peripheral, I can just make out her face. Not that I want to. God, the sight is like a punch to the gut. I deserve it. My mind is screaming, Stare at her, fucker. Look what you did.
So I look.
Then I look away.
And look again.
How can one person be so close to heavenly while at the same time look like hell?
Forcing myself to breathe deeply through my nose and relax, I drop my head back onto the leather seat and close my eyes. She’s here. That’s enough for right now. When Elias gets back, we’ll take her to the hospital, then home. We’ll clean her up and care for her injuries. I swear on my fucking life that I’ll do whatever it takes to heal her.
Chapter Two
Sin
“You got a room at your place? It’s the safest. I have a doc I can call to make a house visit.” Richard’s voice breaks through my alcohol-induced fog, but the words don’t register.
“You hearing me, Sin?”
Joints pop and creak as I shift my useless ass off the hardwood floor of the office. I must have slipped down when I fell asleep.
“No.” I scrub a hand over my face.
“Got room for Molly? It’s best we bring her to your place.”