“And yet I get the feeling you haven’t said it all, since you and Jax seem to be talking about me behind my back.” Anger is a quiet pulse in my lower belly. I can feel the heavy frown line between my eyebrows. What the fuck is this all about?
Today is supposed to be a chill-out afternoon, unwinding before the craziness of Thursday nights, our weekly ritual. Drink some beer, what whatever the fuck is on TV, bust each other’s balls, and so on.
This feels like more than just busting my balls. This feels like I’m being ganged up on.
Asher sighs and puts his beer on the side table. “Look, we’re just….You’re not acting like yourself.”
“Maybe I’m too fucking tired from running the bar to act like myself.” The words fly out before I can stop them.
Jax stills. “Complain much, tough guy? No one is asking you to carry the weight on your shoulders. But you act like we’re still little kids and you have to herd us into place. News flash, Smith—we don’t need you to be our parent anymore. Maybe we can, oh, I don’t know…try to be brothers or whatever.”
The pulse is throbbing at the base of my throat, and I struggle with my words. “Maybe if you guys, oh, I don’t know…pulled your own weight with managing the bar, I wouldn’t have to parent you.”
“Fuck you,” Jax says, standing and glaring down at me. The change in his attitude hits me hard. He’s not normally one to get this angry. He’s the jokester, the charmer, the guy to smooth things over. But apparently not today. No, Jax is letting me feel the brunt of his anger. “We’re trying to do our best if you’d chill the fuck out a little. And maybe if you weren’t distracted by Aubrey, you’d see how we’re keeping the bar running just as well as you are.”
Asher sighs and holds up his hands. “Shit is getting too out of control right now. Let’s all relax and take a moment before things explode. Our Beckett tempers are raging.”
Jax sits back down and drinks his beer with a purposeful casualness that irritates me. Fucking dick. It’s nice of him to throw out a bunch of shitty opinions then not have to answer for them.
Aubrey isn’t a distraction. At least, not in a bad way. Spending time with her has become the bright spot of my day. She reminds me what it feels like it have a real life outside of parenting my brothers and running the bar. She reminds me what it feels like to be a man—not just hooking up, but more.
With her, I feel like all my troubles slip away. Aren’t as important. I get an absurd amount of joy just watching her be happy.
Silent tension bubbles between the three of us for several minutes. The soccer game is still raging on in the background, the crowd cheering on the big-screen TV. We’re all staring blindly at the game but not really giving a fuck. Nursing our drinks and our injured feelings.
Jax exhales hard and smooths a hand over his jaw. “Okay, this is fucking dumb. I don’t want to argue right now, especially when we have bigger shit to worry about.”
“Like what?” Asher asks.
“Like the fact that the town is ganging up on us,” he says.
I ask, “What do you mean?”
Jax hops off the chair and moves to my kitchen, whipping open the fridge door. I hear another beer crack open. “So, I was driving yesterday and got pulled over by the police.”
I roll my eyes, and a little of the tension from earlier leaks from my shoulders. Jax getting pulled over for speeding is not an unusual occurrence. About as unusual as the sun rising in the east. That fucker loves the gas pedal a little too much. “Is this the part where we’re supposed to be shocked? You being pulled over for speeding isn’t some kind of town conspiracy.”
Asher laughs. “Seriously.”
“Very fucking funny,” he says, moving back to the living room. He swigs his drink and exhales. “I wasn’t even speeding when they pulled me over. The cop claimed I did a rolling stop when turning right on red. Total bullshit claim. He gave me a ticket and then told me that our bar is bad news and he has a few ‘friends’ working on driving us out of business. The cocksucker didn’t even try to be smooth about it.”
I sigh and rake my free hand through my hair. “The guy was probably just talking shit,” I say, knowing somehow that it’s not the case. Our bad rep is getting worse every day and I’ve been aware of the rumors and whispers around town for awhile now.
But this takes things to an entirely new level.
“I guess they’re stepping up their game,” Asher comments.
A couple of months ago, we had two police offers saunter into Outlaws, making a big show of looking around. They eyed all our customers to the point of making them nervous; several even left. It was easy to see what they were doing—trying to psych us out.