Echo(38)

“You don’t even know him,” I snarled. “And you’re full of shit. You can’t possibly think what happened was justified. Frankie murdered that entire family, Brayden! And for what, some money?”

“I didn’t know,” he snapped. “And I didn’t fucking care. I was only thinking of Frankie. Of how I wanted my old man to be proud of me.”

The callousness in his words gutted me. Because when I looked into his eyes, I didn’t see my brother anymore. I saw a stranger. He believed what he said, even though I didn’t.

“You mean you wanted to be like him,” I accused. “A low life fucking criminal?”

“Why not, Brighton?” He threw out his hands and shot me a scathing look. “What the fuck else am I gonna’ do? Live in this shit hole for the rest of my life? Frankie said he lived like a king, and yeah, I’ll admit it, I wanted a piece of that too. I wanted something better than this life.”

“And what about now?” I asked. “What are you going to do now?”

“The only thing I can do,” he replied. “Sit here and twiddle my fucking thumbs until I can get a job flipping hamburgers for the rest of my life.”

His words made me realize something. Something that hadn’t occurred to me before.

“Why didn’t they come for you?” I demanded. “If they killed Frankie, why didn’t they come for you too?”

“I don’t know.” He shrugged. “I guess Frankie never told them what happened. Maybe it was the only honorable thing he ever did.”

It sounded too easy, but it was a lie Brayden and I both readily accepted. I needed to believe for my own sanity it was true.





Chapter Twenty-Six

Six agonizing days had passed since I’d felt Ryland’s presence near me. He’d continued to text me, to tell me this wasn’t over. That he needed me. That he would come and get me if I didn’t answer him soon.

There were voicemails too. I couldn’t listen to them. But I’d kept my GPS bracelet on. I wanted a reason to feel close to him because he wasn’t there. I looked at it every day, wondering if he thought about it too. If knowing where I was kept him at bay. And if I were to take it off, would he show up at my door?

It was too painful to think about, so I made myself stop. I wasn’t really dealing with anything, I was just surviving on autopilot. I’d been tempted to take a page from Norma’s book and drown my pain in alcohol, but I still wanted to believe I was stronger than that.

Besides, Brayden was doing enough of that for the both of us. And I’d been treading on eggshells as I thought about how to bring it up with him. I was a stranger in my own house, living with two people who didn’t even look at each other but claimed to live by some code of family.

I couldn’t talk to Brayden the way I used to. He was a changed man. One I was afraid I would never really know again. After our conversation that first day, we’d barely spoken at all. I had yet to bring up the subject of Norma though I’d been trying my best to keep her at home as much as possible. She was already sick of me too, asking when I planned to go back to California.

My presence wasn’t a comfort to anyone anymore, and I wallowed in the self-pity. I started sleeping in. Sitting on the couch and shoveling pizza in my mouth while Brayden watched the Discovery Channel. Norma passed out on the laminate table in a plate of cold spaghetti. It had been five years and nothing had changed. I had no idea what I was doing anymore. But I couldn’t stay here in this smoke-filled, poisonous environment. The walls were closing in on me and I couldn’t breathe. So I stood up and started pacing.

“What the hell is wrong with you now?” Brayden grumbled.

“This!” I waved my arms around the room. “How can you live this way? How can you sit here all day and watch your life go by in this shitty existence?”

“Well, excuse the fuck out of me,” he snapped. “I didn’t realize it was so goddamned horrible here. You see, I just spent the last five years behind bars… so to me, this is mother fucking paradise!”

“Don’t you put that on me again!” I pointed a shaky finger at him. “I know what you think of me, Brayden. I know you resent me for it.”

“Damn straight I resent you.” He glared. “I went away so you could have a better life, and what do you do? You run straight into the arms of the one fucking man I despise. You fall in love with the sadistic bastard, then you come back here with your tail between your legs, expecting me to feel sorry for you. Well, it ain’t gonna’ fucking happen. So if you don’t like it here, misses high and mighty, go back to your castle in San Francisco. I won’t stop you this time.”

“I can’t,” I snapped.

My eyes burned with tears because I hated fighting with him. I hated that I lashed out instead of telling him the truth. So finally, I collapsed onto the couch and unburdened myself.

“He’s been sending Norma money.”

Brayden blinked as if my words hadn’t registered. But one glance at Norma’s slumped over form in the kitchen was all he needed to put the puzzle together.

The vein in his forehead throbbed as he swung his gaze back to me. “How much money?”

“Enough.” I stared at the floor. “Whatever she asks for I guess.”

He stood up and shook his head in disbelief. “Goddammit.”

“He’s waiting for her to... overdose I guess. Or die from liver failure. Whatever’s quicker.”

Brayden glanced at Norma again, his eyes filling with a rage I’d never seen in him before. It fizzled out a moment later as he collapsed back onto the sofa beside me.

“We can’t compete with that,” he said. “What the fuck are we gonna’ do?”

“I don’t know,” I admitted. “But I thought maybe we could talk some sense into her, together.”

A dry laugh squeezed from his chest as he dismissed my suggestion entirely. “She isn’t gonna’ fucking listen to us, Brighton. Are you even hearing yourself right now? When has she ever chosen us over any damn thing?”

“Well, I don’t know what else we’re supposed to do,” I bit out. “We can’t force her to go to rehab. And I can’t babysit her for the rest of my life. I’m going to have to get a job soon.”

A strange calm washed over Brayden’s face as his head fell back against the sofa and he closed his eyes.

“Just let me think on it for a while,” he said. “That’s what we’re going to do.”



***



I woke up in a cold sweat, clutching my pillow against my chest.

I had dreamt of Ryland again. The same dream I’d had every night since I’d been back in Illinois. His hands on my body, his lips on my skin. The heat of his chest pressing against my back. I called out for him, but he didn’t answer. I reached for him with my hand. Usually, I could feel him, somewhere in the darkness. But not this time. I didn’t feel him at all.

I reached for my phone and looked for one of his texts. There weren’t any since yesterday morning. My stomach clenched.

I opened the messages from Nicole that I’d been avoiding all week, scrolling through them. She said she was worried about him, and he looked really bad. He was snapping at everyone around the office, missing appointments, and forgetting things. Important things, from the sounds of it. But I couldn’t do anything else for Ryland. I had to remind myself and her of that. He needed to get help. Help I wasn’t qualified to give him. I didn’t know how to deal with grief on a small scale, let alone a catastrophic one. I didn’t know how to be torn between him and my family. Because no matter what I did, someone would get hurt.

I wiped my bleary eyes and dragged myself from the room. As I walked down the hall, Norma’s tiny frame came into view. She peered out the curtains, tapping her foot anxiously.

“What are you doing?” I headed straight for the Fruit Loops and grabbed a handful before I sat down on one of the rickety kitchen chairs.

Her gaze swung to me and I could see the wheels turning in her brain before she even opened her mouth.

“I gotta get out of this house,” she snapped. “But I need some money. You got any?”

I narrowed my eyes. “Why?”

“What does it matter why?” she asked. “I just do.”

I shrugged and went back to eating my cereal, knowing that the argument wouldn’t end there. I never had to push with Norma. For a master manipulator, she was actually quite easy to manipulate herself, when she was desperate enough.

“I had some in my purse,” she said sourly. “I know I did. I didn’t go nowhere last night. But this morning it was gone.”

I snorted at her predicament and mentally reminded myself to thank Brayden later. I was surprised he wasn’t up already since it was past eleven. I didn’t usually sleep in this late myself, but it was becoming a habit lately.

I polished off the rest of the cereal I'd shoved into my mouth and walked down the hall, ignoring Norma’s grumbling.

When I knocked on Brayden’s door, he didn’t answer. I pushed it open quietly, expecting to find him asleep. But one glance at the bed and my mouth went dry. He hadn’t slept in it last night. And his backpack was gone too.