The second we walked into the house, I knew. I knew that while Remi and I were in paradise, secluded away at the beach house, everything had gone to shit here. I didn’t need James to tell me that. I sensed it. Dread had filled my veins faster than I could control.
My heart aches as I watch Remi walk away with Sarah, but it’s the right thing to do. I know she’d willingly follow me to the ends of the Earth to help, but she doesn’t need to go to some of the places I know we might have to, to find him.
Fuck.
Cole is terrifying when he’s angry, and I don’t mean because I’m often on the receiving end, more so that even I don’t know what he’s capable of. His eyes go black and this blank expression covers his face. He’s totally unreadable, even to Conner and me. He could literally be doing anything right now, which is why we need to find him. And as soon as possible.
With one last glance in James’ direction, I race from the room.
“I’m sorry, Ace,” he calls behind me. I know that he is. He’s just as worried as I am, I can see it in his face, but that doesn’t mean I’m going to hang around and have a chat about it.
I race up the stairs three at a time and crash through into Conner’s bedroom. He’s lying on his bed, staring up at the ceiling. He doesn’t even look over at me.
“Con? We need to go and find Cole.”
He remains as still as a statue.
“Conner?”
“You knew, didn’t you?”
“Con, don’t,” I warn.
“You knew, and you didn’t tell us. Didn’t you think we deserved to know?” he hisses. “This is our life too. Not just yours.” He climbs from the bed and stalks over. His jaw pops as his teeth grind in anger.
I don’t move as he stands toe-to-toe with me, anger rippling off him in waves.
“We might be your little brothers, Ace, but we’re not fucking kids.”
“I know. I wasn’t hiding it on purpose. I needed to get my head around it, then I was going to tell you.”
“Not good enough,” he spits. “You should have told us the second you found out.”
I swallow, feeling guilty for not doing just that but knowing I wasn’t in any fit state to do so then.
“What else don’t we know?” I think of Dad—Uncle Charlie, as he apparently is.
“A lot,” I admit, much to his frustration.
His fist shoots out, connecting with my face, making me jerk back. “This is bullshit, Ace. We’re meant to be a fucking team. We’re meant to look out for each other, not going behind our backs and keeping fucking secrets. Important, life-changing fucking secrets.”
I rub my jaw, giving him a free pass. It isn’t anything I don’t deserve, but it doesn’t stop the sting. “I’ll tell you both everything, but we need to find Cole first.”
Conner’s nostrils flare. He’s desperate to hear everything I have to say, but he knows I’m right. I’m surprised he’s not already out looking for him, to be honest.
“Where do you think he might have gone?” I ask as we run down the stairs to my bike.
“Fuck knows.”
“I was hoping for some sudden twin voodoo shit.”
He gives me a side glance. “I think we both know he’ll be in the Heights. It’s just where.”
“Get on. Let’s go.”
Conner climbs on behind me. It’s nowhere near as enjoyable as having Remi’s thighs around me, but there’s not a lot I can do about that right now.
I gun the engine and we fly toward our old hometown. Trepidation fills me as I think about Donny and what his intentions are, but my focus needs to be our brother right now. I’ll deal with Donny later.
“Where first?” I ask Conner when we come to a stop at a junction.
“The clearing? The park? The field?”
“Fucking hell, Cole.” He could be fucking anywhere.
Since the park is the closest, I head there first. The last remaining decent park in the Heights, never destroyed by the residents of this shithole. It’s the one place I remember coming as a kid and actually letting go and having fun.
Conner is off the back almost before I bring the bike to a stop. He jogs over the small hill that hides the park from us and comes to a stop. His shoulders drop in disappointment. I don’t even bother getting off the bike, because I know what he’s going to say.
“Next,” he says, walking back over to me.
“Okay, Heights High to check the field?”
“Yep. Let’s do it.”
I make the short journey to our old school. The place is just as run-down and depressing as the last time I was here… which was quite a while ago, seeing as I rarely turned up.
Leaving my bike in the parking lot, we make our way toward the football field. Pulling my smokes from my pocket, I offer one to Conner, who immediately pulls one out and places it between his lips, waiting for me to pass a lighter. He doesn’t usually accept my offer and generally sticks to weed, but today seems to be the exception.
The place is deserted, the field is empty, and the bleachers abandoned.
“Fucking hell,” Conner grunts, spinning on the spot, hoping to catch a glimpse of Cole. “Where are you, motherfucker?”
“We’ll find him.”
Conner turns on me, his eyes sad and defeated. “You didn’t see him, Ace. I’ve never seen him like that. Ever. It was like he was possessed or something. This black cloud descended and he just lost it.”
I swallow nervously. This was exactly what I was hoping to avoid, but it seems my attempt to figure out how to tell-all and stop it from happening failed at the first hurdle.
“We’ll get him. He’ll be fine. Let’s go to the clearing. If he’s not there then maybe we can get some of the others to help, or they might have already seen him.”
Our journey across town takes longer than I’d like. Conner is a ball of nervous energy behind me. Both of his legs bounce with anticipation, not helping me focus at all.
As we pull up to our old trailer park we’re both on the lookout for his car, but as we make our way through, it’s nowhere to be seen. Out of habit, I park outside our old trailer and we both climb off the bike.
I’m hit with memories of my last time here. Of Kelsey—a shudder of regret runs down my spine there—and of that fucker, Bruce. I can only hope this trip ends a little differently.
“What are you waiting for?” Conner calls over his shoulder when he notices that I’m frozen, looking at our old trailer.
“Nothing. I’m coming.” I shove down the bad memories.
A few people acknowledge us as we make our way out to the clearing, but thankfully no one stops us. We don’t belong here anymore, and the looks on a few faces as we pass make that very clear.
Conner doesn’t seem to notice as he marches toward the break in the trees to where we all used to hang out.
There are a few people sitting around, smoking and drinking, but none of them is Cole. I stand back as Conner walks up to our old neighbors and asks if they’ve seen them, but I don’t need to hear their answers. The slight shakes of their heads and the defeat in Conner’s stance tells me everything.
“No one has seen him. No one knows anything,” he says on a sigh when he rejoins me. “Where else would he have gone?”
Shaking my head, I try to come up with any sensible answer to that question as we make our way back to my bike.
“I never thought this place was so bad, but coming back here now… It really is a shithole,” Conner muses as we pass each dilapidated trailer.
“Something about this place will always be home though. We’ll always be the boys from the Heights. It’s in our blood. Fuck,” I grunt and take off running.
“Ace,” Conner calls. “What is it?”
I come to a stop outside our old trailer. The doors and windows are all boarded up. Apparently no one wanted to move in after I found our mother with a needle hanging out of her arm and dead on the floor.
Reaching out, I pull at one of the loose planks of wood someone has haphazardly nailed on. It comes away easily. I continue until I can squeeze inside.
“You can’t be serious,” Conner says, bending down to look in.
“You wanna risk not checking?”
“Nah, bro. It’s a good shot, I guess.”
Once I manage to get myself inside, I find a similar kind of devastation to James’. I know we left this place in a mess, but it wasn’t like this.
“Cole, are you here?” I walk down the narrow hallway, taking in the holes in the walls and the blood stains surrounding them.
Please be okay. Please, for the love of fuck, be okay.
A whimper sounds out a second before I get to the living area, and there, curled in a ball in front of the built-in couch is Cole. “Fuck, Conner. In here,” I call dropping to my knees in front of my brother.
His hands are totally busted up and dripping blood onto the already stained carpet. He’s got scratches all up his arms. But none of that shocks me. It’s nothing I’ve not dealt with before. It’s when he looks up at me that my world crashes to a halt.
His eyes are dark, soulless, but they’re full of tears that are tracking down his cheeks.
“Fucking hell, Cole,” I wipe his cheeks before pulling him into my body. He trembles in my arms as I hold him tight.
“Fuck. Is he okay?” Conner comes stumbling in and drops beside us, his arms wrapping around both of us.
It’s a haunting image, and it’s not the first time something similar has occurred in this hellhole of a home.
I spent countless nights with one, or both of them, in my arms as I tried to get them to sleep, tried to shield them from the reality that was our lives.
“It’s okay,” I say, my body automatically rocking back and forth.
After long minutes of silence, Cole lets out a shaky breath. “Is it true?” He looks up at me, his eyes begging for me to tell him that everything he knew about his life wasn’t a lie. But I can’t.
“Yeah, bro. It’s true.”
“Motherfucker.”
“I’m so sorry. I’m so fucking sorry.” Grasping the backs of both of their necks, I press my forehead to theirs.
“It’s not your fault,” Conner says, his tone totally different from his angry one when I first found him earlier.
Releasing them both, I sit back against the couch and they both follow my move.
“You ready to hear all this?”
They both look a little skeptical but agree.
I tell them everything I know, everything I’ve discovered.
“This is one massive fucking head fuck, bro. Our dad is our uncle and our uncle is our dad. Fuck my life,” Conner mutters, resting his arms over his bent knees and dropping his head as if he needs a moment to figure it out.
“And he’s still alive,” Cole adds.
“He was a few months ago. Fuck knows what’s happened to him since.”
“He’ll be back,” Cole says with absolute certainty.
“How’d you know that?”
“He blackmailed you for money. He’s clearly not making any of his own. He’ll spend all of that and then come looking for some more. History will just keep repeating itself until something changes.”
“Something has changed. We know the truth, and now we live with James. He won’t put up with Charlie sniffing around. He got rid of him once”—or at least, he tried to—’he won’t hesitate to do it again, and properly this time.”
“This is fucked-up,” Conner says again, as if he just can’t believe what he’s hearing.
Silence hangs heavy between us for achingly long minutes.
“We need to get you cleaned up,” I say to Cole when his knuckles catch my eye.
“I’m fine, just a few scratches.”
I raise a brow at him and he shrugs. None of us are the type to make a bigger deal out of self-inflicted injuries than necessary.
“Conner, can you take him home? Sort him out?”
“Yeah. You’re coming though, right?”
“I’ll be behind you. I’ve got something I need to do while I’m here.”
They both stare at me, I can feel the weight of it without actually meeting their eyes.
“I won’t be long. Go straight to the pool house and I’ll meet you there.” Getting up, I wait for them to join me.
As I knew they would, they follow me out of the trailer. We don’t bother putting the boards back up; anyone who’s brave enough to live in there is welcome to it.
I throw my leg over my bike as they both climb into their car. I follow them out until they turn toward the Bay. I go in the opposite direction and directly into the heart of the Heights. Right into Donny’s domain to find out the fucking truth once and for all.
