Bang bang bang! “Open up!”
I heard Brooks banging on my front door as my head jerked up from the couch.
“What?” I groaned.
Bang bang! “I know you got drunk last night! Open this fucking door before I shoot the lock!”
I rolled my eyes. “Shut up and give me a second!”
Brooks stopped banging on my door as I heaved myself off the sagging couch. I cracked my back and tweaked my neck, feeling my vertebrae pop back into place. I cracked my knuckles and stretched my arms over my head as I made my way for the front door.
But when I opened it up, Brooks wrinkled his nose. “Are you kidding me? Tequila again?”
I shrugged. “It’s a great drink, you know. Knocks me out like a light.”
He shoved his way into my place. “Yeah, so does melatonin. Have you even opened the bottle I bought for you the other day?”
I closed the door. “Not really a ‘vitamins’ person.”
“Yeah, just like you’re not really a sober person.”
I glared at him. “If you came over to give me a lecture, then you can—”
He held his hand up. “I’m not here to bark at you. I know it doesn’t work. Just know that I’m here to listen if you wanna talk. All right?”
I nodded. “Good. Now, what the fuck do you need?”
I watched him pull his phone out of his pocket. “Got a second? I finally downloaded the full recording from Raven’s wristwatch. And it’s got a lot more on here than we originally thought.”
I blinked. “Let me go put on some coffee.”
“Yeah and hold the Bailey’s.”
I chuckled. “Party pooper.”
“Drunk.”
I shook my head. “So, how long is this recording?”
“Well, the entire thing is about four hours. She hit record and never turned it off. But me and the guys only listened to about the first fifteen minutes of it before we had to get the fuck out of there. There’s still another twenty minutes of conversation that tells a very, very bad story.”
I poured coffee into the maker and turned it on. “All right, hit me with it.”
We leaned against the kitchen counter as Brooks pressed play, and the two of us listened to the shit we already knew. The shit we already heard. I swallowed down my anger when I heard Raven and Sid going back and forth. The slaps, the growls, and the curses. Brooks was lucky that he got to blow that man to bits because if I had him in my crosshairs? I would’ve made his death a lot slower than that.
Guess Sid should be lucky that I wasn’t the one to kill him.
“What the fuck!?”
Sid’s voice exclaimed from the recording and Brooks chuckled. I crooked an eyebrow at him as chaos rang out in the recording. Just like we had heard before.
“She head-butted him in the dick,” he said with a smirk.
I nodded. “Strong girl you got there.”
“Resourceful, too. Listen up.”
And after I heard the crashing of the door, Raven’s voice piped up once more.
“Now, your boss is going to kill you for being taken down by a girl. What say you to that?”
I heard Raven choking before Sid sounded again. “I think he’s going to pay me well when I kill you.”
Raven gasped for air. “Then, your secrets die with me, right? Might as well unload your sins while you’ve got the chance.”
The coffee pot dinged, filling the kitchen with its wonderful smell. But I was too entranced with the silence on the recording to care.
“Is that it—”
“Shh!” Brooks hissed.
Then, Sid’s voice sounded again. “Maybe your crew buddies shouldn’t be so blind as to who’s leading them. Maybe your idiotic mounds of meat should be more concerned with their own ranks instead of ours. How about that?”
My jaw unhinged. “Chops.”
Brooks nodded. “Keep listening.”
Raven wheezed. “That all you got? Are you really that much of a coward to admit it? You really can’t admit what’s going on and then expect me to believe that you’re going to actually kill—”
Sid interrupted her with an exclamation that confirmed everything I feared. “Chops was the one who planned it, you stupid bitch! And when he’s done ripping your little crew apart, we get to swoop in and pick up the pieces. We get to be the heroes of Santa Cruz for once. And Hyde? Gage? Oh, their funerals were luscious.”
I growled. “Turn it off.”
Brooks ended the recording. “That’s all there is anyway before the explosions happen. Sid gets called back by one of his guys, and not too soon after that my grenade goes off.”
I ran my hands down my face. “Holy fucking hell, have the other guys heard this?”
He shook his head. “Thought it best to keep that between us for now, since you’re the only one I truly trust at the moment.”
I reached for the coffee pot. “I’m gonna need a cup and a half after that bullshit.”
“Sign me up for the same.”
I poured us massive mugs before we made our way onto the porch. Well, it wasn’t really a porch. Just a small space that didn’t quite fit the two of us comfortably. We stood shoulder to shoulder as we gazed out over the rickety, dead apartment complex I lived in that was practically crumbling at the seams.
Then, Brooks sighed. “You know, I still own my parent’s place.”
I rolled my eyes. “You’ve already offered twice.”
“I wouldn’t charge you rent or anything. I’ve kind of been thinking about moving back there myself.”
I slowly looked over at him. “You hate that place, though.”
He shrugged. “I hate my apartment more.”
I pivoted to get us off the topic. “So, the whole damn thing was a setup by Chops. Do we really believe he’s the President of the Black Flags as well?”
“I don’t know. Tanner and Archer seem to think that, but I’m not convinced. It’s hard running one crew, let alone two at once.”
“So, we got not clues as to who the fuck runs the gang coming after us?”
He snickered. “Ever thought you’d see the day?”
I took a long pull from my coffee. “Not during my lifetime.”
Brooks chugged his back until it was gone. “We’re going to need more than just that to take Chops down, though. If that man really is this invested into ripping us apart, we’re going to need concrete, hardcore proof.”
“Which that recording doesn’t give us.”
He shook his head. “Nope. It gives us a place to start, but not a place to end.”
I threw back the rest of my coffee. “So, where do we go from here?”
Brooks made his way back inside. “I thought about having the two of us change off on keeping tabs on Chops. Detailing his frequented places. Following him out of town. Having Finn use his technological mumbo-jumbo to find him on cameras and see who he’s meeting with and shit like that.”
I walked inside behind him and closed the porch door. “Yeah, that could work. Especially if Finn can tap into traffic cameras.”
He pointed at me. “Exactly.”
I held up my empty mug. “Want some more?”
Brooks pulled out his vibrating phone. “Oh, boy.”
I blinked. “What?”
He turned the phone around to face me. “Astrid.”
Memories came rushing back. “So? Answer it.”
“Not that simple,” he murmured.
I paused. “Holy fuck.”
He snapped his head up. “What?”
I balked. “She doesn’t know you’re out yet? Are you insane?”
He rolled his eyes. “Gimme a sec, let me just—”
I reached for him, fisting his jacket. “Oh, no no no. You put that shit on speaker. I wanna hear her chew your ass off for this.”
His face fell flat. “Thanks.”
“Hey, what are best friends for?”
He chuckled as he picked up the phone, putting it on speaker. But I didn’t even get our mugs refreshed with coffee before Astrid cussed his ass out.
“What the ever-blessed fuck is wrong with you, you selfish bastard?”
Hearing her voice—no matter how angry—made my heart flutter in my chest.
“Surprise?” Brooks said.
Astrid scoffed. “The last thing I get from you is a voice message about how your fucking parole hearing is coming up, and then nothing for weeks? Do I really mean that little to you, man?”
Brooks ground his teeth together. “You know damn good and well that’s not true. It’s just been a shitstorm ever since I got out.”
“I don’t care if literal shit is falling from the skies! I’m your sister and you didn’t think to call me when you got out?”
Brooks looked over at me. “I—got a little busy.”
“What? With some decent pussy?”
I whistled lowly to myself as she called him out. And when Brooks didn’t respond right away, Astrid shrieked into the phone.
“You prioritized some bitch over me!?”
Brooks drew in a deep breath. “She’s not just some girl, Astrid. It was Raven. She was in trouble with the Black Flags.”
She paused. “Wait, is she okay?”
“I mean, now she is. But she wasn’t there for a while.”
Astrid didn’t speak for a few seconds. However, once her voice sounded again, the words pouring forth from her lips jolted my soul back to life.
“Well, since you’re out of jail, I guess I should move back home and help you get settled. You still own Mom’s house?”
Brooks snickered. “You don’t have to do that.”
“I can, and I will. You’re the only ounce of family I’ve got left, and I’d like to spend time with you before you toss me to the wayside again.”
“Astrid, you know it’s not like that.”
“Well, it gets like that sometimes. So, find a way to fix it because the way I’m fixing it is moving back to Santa Cruz. Which brings me back around to Mom’s house: do you still own it?”
He groaned. “Yeah, I do.”
“Good. Leave a set of keys for me in the mailbox or some shit. I rent this apartment month to month, so all I gotta do is inform my landlord that this is my last month. I’ll start packing my stuff up tonight.”
“Astrid, you really—”
She sighed curtly, if that was even possible. “Brooks, is there a reason you don’t want me around?”
He stared at me and I shrugged my shoulders. If the Black Flags really wanted to get to her, then they would. It didn’t matter where she was.
“She’s safer with us, that’s for sure,” I whispered.
Brooks nodded. “Things are still rough with the Black Flags. But I know you’re safer if you’re closer. So, no. There’s not a reason that I don’t want you around.”
“Great. Wonderful. I’ll have to finish out this week of work, but then I can take a long weekend. See you Saturday!”
He grinned. “See you then, sis. Love you.”
“Love you, too.”
I smiled, feeling it grow a bit too big. “So, the little sis is moving back home. Can someone say, ‘family reunion?’”
His grin fell quickly from his face. “Don’t cheese so hard at the fact that Astrid’s coming back home. You know that promise you made me is always going to stand.”
I rolled my eyes. “Yeah, yeah, yeah. No hands on your sister.”
“And I mean it.”
“Yeah, dude. I know. And you know you’ve always got my word.”
He nodded. “Good. I’m glad.”
But even though I’d made him that promise all those years ago, it didn’t stop me from being happy. It didn’t stop me from getting excited. It didn’t stop me from admitting to myself exactly how much I missed her.
And it sure as hell didn’t stop me from longing to see her the second she got back into town.
