I slipped away and left the room without a word.
The heavy bass of the music hit me as I made a straight line for Knox.
“What, you done already?” Knox asked.
I put a hand to his chest and drove him against the wall. “Listen to me, brother. I need to talk to you tomorrow. First thing. No fucking around. I didn’t get out of this mess by accident. You enjoy your night tonight, brother, but tomorrow shit gets real.”
“Where are you going?” Knox asked. “We worked this out for you.”
“This isn’t for me, Knox. None of this shit it. I’ve got somewhere else to be.”
“I hope you know what you’re fucking doing,” Knox said.
“You know what? I have no fucking clue what I’m doing. But I don’t care.”
We hugged and I bolted out of the strip club.
Some outlaw, huh?
Running away from a strip club where there were women willing to do anything to me and I was climbing back on my motorcycle to go back to an old flame.
“A ring,” I whispered.
I had fucking got pissed off over a ring? I took off when Linds was showing me her heart because of a ring. A fucking tiny little diamond that meant nothing other than ooh’s and aah’s of those who saw it.
But we both knew the truth.
We didn’t need a fucking ring.
We were meant to be together.
15
(Lindsey) *THEN*
AUNT JANE CAME WALKING into the kitchen. She put down a clothing magazine in front of me. “Almost time for school shopping again.”
“I’m too old for that,” I said. “Well, to go with you.”
“So you can take my car and use my money but I can’t go with you?”
“Exactly,” I said with a smile.
“Teenagers,” Aunt Jane said.
“Hey, I’m a legal adult now,” I said.
“But you still have one more year of high school.”
Jim appeared in the kitchen, a buttoned down shirt tucked in, his black hair slicked back like he was about to sell something. He opened the fridge and took out a bottle of water.
“Mail?” he asked.
“Yeah,” Aunt Jane said. She casually slid the clothing magazine to me. “Nothing good though. All junk.”
“Junk is good,” Jim said. “Better than fucking bills.”
“Language,” Aunt Jane said.
“What?” Jim asked. “Lindsey needs to learn about bills anyway. Living free and large in this house won’t cut it for much longer.”
“Stop it,” Aunt Jane said.
I pushed the clothing magazine away. “I can just go to the mall and look at clothes.”
“No,” Aunt Jane said. “Check out this stuff first.”
She eyed me.
Something was up.
I casually looked back and saw the look of confusion on Jim’s face.
If I knew something was up, so did Jim.
I stood at the counter and blocked his view. I opened the cover of the magazine and saw there was a letter from King.
My mouth went bone dry.
That’s why Aunt Jane had shoved the magazine on me. She was helping me. If Jim had gotten the mail and found a letter from King, he would have shredded the letter and then punished me.
I grabbed the magazine off the counter. “I guess I’ll go check out the magazine.”
“Good,” Aunt Jane said. “Spend with your eyes and not my wallet.”
“Your wallet is empty,” Jim said. “I’m the one fronting everyone’s life here.”
I smiled. “Thanks, Jim. You’re the best.”
He curled his lip, always in a nasty mood.
I moved from the kitchen like normal and then took the steps two at a time.
I ran to my room and shut the door. Jim disabled the lock on my door a while back after I locked myself in my room. He was drunk and saying things to me. Aunt Jane was at work. He ended up almost breaking down the door.
Sometimes I hated Aunt Jane for not listening to me about Jim. She had to know he wasn’t a great guy. Yet she stayed with him. I really didn’t care about the house. Sure, it was big and comfy and in a nice neighborhood. But the danger was inside the house when Jim was home.
I grabbed the envelope and slid my finger to open it. I got a small paper cut but didn’t even care about the stinging pain. I just wanted to read the letter. See the words. Shut my eyes and imagine King’s voice.
We were still forbidden from seeing each other and since it was yet another summer, he wrote to me when he could. He was spending time with his brother somewhere upstate. At least that was the last I heard from him.
I opened the letter and read: