Blood & Rust (Lock & Key #4) (68 page)

“See what?”

“That happy glaze that’s barely half an inch deep. That lazy smile on your face. Lost Boy.” He returned his attention to the ocean.

“What? What did you call me?”

“Lost Boy.” He took in a breath of air to deal with his impatience with me, I was sure of it. “Come on, you don’t know Peter Pan?”

“Oh, right. Yeah.” I shifted my weight.

Dig rested his hands on his hips, perfectly still, listening to the waves breaking, as if they offered him advice. The sea air rustled his dirty blond hair against his face, and he took in a long inhale. “So, what’s the plan?”

“Plan?”

“You looking for something out here?”

“Um…nah.”

“Why the fuck not?”

My spine stiffened at his words, his sharp tone. “Right now, I’m just—”

Those eyes shot to mine again, and an eerie feeling crawled through my veins. Like he was inside me, reading my fears, poking at my cracks.

“Just
what
?” he asked. “You gonna stay on this strip of beach forever? Surf in a competition here and maybe another one there? Keep pushing dope and whatever else you can scrounge up for kids and yuppie losers? Yeah, you’re their idol now, sure. But, in a couple of years, that’ll all be over. And none of them are gonna be giving you the time of day, not even the girls. Then, how are you going to eat? Where are you gonna live? How are you gonna look at yourself in the mirror?”

“Wh-what? I don’t know.” I crossed my arms against his onslaught.

“You don’t know. You don’t know.” He faced the ocean again. “When are you gonna know? You waiting for someone else to know? Because, man, if there’s one thing you definitely need to know, it’s that nobody gives a shit about you, except for you.”

I didn’t answer. I didn’t know how. He was right. What the fuck
did
I know? I was just a jumble of self-doubt, denial, bravado, and balls. He saw right through me, the asshole.

“Tell me, what do you get out of it?” He motioned toward the ocean with his chin. “What’s out there for you?”

I took in a breath, my eyes on the rolling waves I loved so much. “You’re out there, and it’s like you go into a kind of oblivion. Suddenly, all your life is in this long, long, stretched out wave. You’re removed from your past, your present. Everything that’s on your mind becomes insignificant. You feel completely removed from the world around you. Nothing matters but you and the board and the wave and the right-the-fuck now.”

Dig grinned. He recognized the crazy. “Sounds like how I feel about riding my bike.”

“Yeah.” I met his penetrating gaze. “You’re right. It is the same.”

“Me and my brothers have all that, but we also create something new for ourselves on our own terms, something more than just tripping and survival. Something significant. This beach won’t give you that. We could, though. I could teach you things, like I’ve been taught by my brothers,” he continued. “You’ve got good instincts on the water, and you already got good bike skills under your belt.”

“I’ve been working on bikes and cars for years.”

“I saw that; it’s great. There’s more to learn though. Always more to learn.”

I wasn’t quite sure what he was referring to, but the sudden press of his jaw told me it was serious, something other than, say, construction.

“Why don’t you come with us?”

“To South Dakota?”

“Yeah, prospect for the One-Eyed Jacks. Give it your best shot.” His lips twitched. “You got a best shot to give?”

“Sure. Of course I do.”

“We make our own rules. Live by ’em our way. But with that freedom comes responsibility to each other. We don’t break our own rules, because that only leads to death or prison. We ride together, we fall, we pick each other up. That’s what brothers do.”

I swallowed past the clump of wet sand in my throat and averted my gaze. “That, I know. I know what brothers do.”

His hand patted my chest. “Ah, you’ve got a heart in there, huh? You’re trying to hide it, is all.”

“It got ripped up,” I breathed. “Blood fucking everywhere.”

“Yeah, there’s always lots of blood. Life sucks ass, Markus, and it’s up to you to hang on and ride through it. For me, it’s only bearable with good men at my side and at my back. You know what that’s like?”

My eyes followed the delicate pinks and soft blues staining the early morning sky over the water. “I used to. Not anymore. Not for a long time now.” I glanced up at his hard profile. “What’s it like for you?”

A slight smile curled his lips. “One word.” Dig leaned into me. “Fearless,” he whispered roughly.

A sharp shiver tore up my spine like a razor blade, and I met his gaze. Thrill, danger, unpredictability.

“There’s a big raw world out there.” He gestured in the opposite direction of the ocean. “And you can be and do whatever you want in it. That makes me fucking high every morning I wake up and realize I’m still alive.” He let out a small laugh. It was dark; it was hopeful.

I swallowed, not knowing what to say to that.

“Anything or anybody keeping you here? Except for these waves, that is,” he asked.

Keeping me here?

I had no brother, no mother, no father. No girlfriend I cared about. A few pals I hung with, but no one I’d miss—or, more importantly, no one who’d miss me.

No one.

A grin split his face, and he dropped his head back, as if begging the first rays of the sun breaking through the pink-blue sky to bless him. “Out in the Dakotas, we’ve got plenty of lakes, waterfalls, reservoirs, swimming holes. Which means plenty of girls in bikinis. You wouldn’t be missing that, not by a long shot. If that’s what’s really keeping you here.”

“Shit, you read my mind!”

We laughed.

“Well, we got to roll,” he said. “Liked hanging with you, Markus.”

We shook hands. He slapped me on the back, and I thumped his. My fingers sank into the thick leather of his patched jacket with that incredible star-eyed skull on it.

“Thanks again for the good time and for getting that bike part, man. You saved our asses, done right by us. Appreciate it.” He squeezed my arms.

“Yeah, sure.”

“We ever come back this way, and you’re still around…” He shot me a look.

Was that a veiled insult? A provocation? A challenge?

Dig flicked a hand at me and strode off toward his bike.

My stomach dropped.

Would they ever come back? And where would I be if they did? Still here? Paddling out, hunting the waves, the ride? Working at the 7-Eleven?

He swung on his bike, his crazy-eyed buddy with the wacky nickname and the long dark hair revving his engine next to him.

My chest squeezed, and my skin got clammy.

Wreck, the big guy with the bandana who took care of their bikes and navigated, was at the rear, and their prez, a heavy-set older man, was up at the front. Shit, they rode in a formation. They were a unit. Order, respect, honor.

Dig glanced at me, slid his Ray-Bans over his eyes, and fit his gloves on his hands. Every hair on my body stood on end, as if jolted by electricity, by a once-in-a-lifetime last chance. A signal flare of hope in a dark sky over the ocean, and I was alone on a leaky raft.

He started his engine and hit the throttle.

That blare of disruption, of arrogance, that noise of protest, that declaration of everything he was, that the Jacks were, right there, ripped through the tender dawn and through my soul.

“Hey!” I charged toward him, my heart banging in my chest. “Wait! Wait up!”

Dig grinned from behind those shades.

He knew.

Dig leaned back in his saddle, a hand planted on his thigh, his engine rumbling thunder. That grin of his only grew wider. “You coming?”

I closed my eyes and made a wish on this very same beach. The beach where it’d all begun and ended for me three times over—when I’d given up, when I’d chased after hope, and now, when I was carving that hope and new dreams into a solid reality.

My fingers brushed over the silver hummingbird skull that hung against my chest.

I held Tania’s hand in mine and made that wish of thanks, of gratitude, to
him
, my friend, my brother. I prayed for his peace as the relentless waves of the vast blue crashed and broke before us.

“Butler, you okay?” Tania squeezed my arm.

I held her eyes, which squinted in the sun. Her face was flush with heat. Her white dress billowed behind her in the wind, her bare toes in the sand.

Fuck you, Romeo, and your dagger and your poison. I unlocked that gate myself, I got back into Verona, and got my girl.

I crushed Tania’s mouth with mine and kissed my wife.

The next day, I took Tania to see my parents. It had been almost twenty-five years since we’d last seen each other. They were shocked. They were pleased. Tania did all the talking until Mom, Dad, and I got a handle on the situation.

As we sat together in that same living room on that same furniture, my mom offering us those same Italian cookies that were her favorites on those same daisy-trimmed dishes, we relaxed and began to talk.

Tania held my hand and didn’t let go.

I took Tania south along the California coastline. We swam in the cold ocean, Tania’s body sliding against mine in the water. I got her on a surfboard, and she didn’t do half bad for a first-timer.

We’d run on the sand in the mornings, and she'd watch me as I hit the waves. I’d lift the board out of the water and make my way back to her on the beach where she waited for me with a towel, a huge smile on that gorgeous face.

Our last night in California, we hung out on the beach checking out the stars in the night sky, enjoying the sound of the surf. I sang her favorite ballad to her as she nestled into my chest. When I got to the end of “Black,” Tania joined in with the background vocals, and we laughed.

In that full, rich laugh of my wife’s, the sadness and loss and longing of that song had been erased. There was only joy, because we had that beautiful life together, and Tania was that star in my sky, and I was hers.