All the Inside Howling (Hollow Folk #2)(27)

I swore and started towards the house. “I’m going to kill that little prick.”

Austin grabbed my arm, dragging me to a halt. “Vie, let it go.”

“Like hell.”

“Vie, I’m telling you to fucking let it go.”

I managed to wrest my arm free, which sent a flash of pain along the fresh cut, and I darted towards the house. Austin was faster, planting himself between me and the door and settling both hands on my chest. The touch sent another wave of pain through the cut on my side, but I barely felt it.

“Listen to me,” he said. “Listen to me. Right now. It’s my business. It doesn’t have anything to do with you, and I’m telling you, let it go.”

The first, irrational flare of anger subsided, but all that meant was that now the fire was burning low and steady and hot enough to boil steel. “It’s not my business that your little brother is beating the shit out of you?”

“He’s not beating the shit out of me. God, you don’t even know what happened.”

“Oh, I know what happened. Your jackass cowboy younger brother got sloshed with his buddies, and somebody said something, and Jake came home and started pounding on you, and you—”

“What? I let him? Is that what you were going to say?”

“You don’t have to take that crap from him.”

“Trust me, Vie. You don’t want to keep picking at this.”

“What does that mean?”

“It means I got in a fight with my brother. Yeah, he’s being an asshole right now. But if you don’t want me getting in your business at home, then you’d better return the favor.”

Neither of us said anything for a moment, and then I turned his head again and traced my fingers over his battered face. “Jesus, Austin.”

“It’s fine. He’s going to get over it eventually.”

“How can you say that?” The question escaped me before I could stop it. My eyes were burning, and the most important thing in the world seemed to be knocking down that door and tearing that little shit apart piece by piece, but everything seemed to have condensed to the stubble on his cheek, and the roughness of the scabs, and the coarseness of his hair.

He laughed, and one of his callused hands closed on my upper arm. “Vie, he’s my brother. We got in a thousand fights, some of them as bad as this, some of them worse, long before I came out. Jake’s, well, he’s just always been a hothead. He does everything like he’s only got a minute left to live, so he’s going to do it as hard and as fast and as best he can. Once, when we were really little, my dad mentioned, just in passing really, that he liked the Giants, and the next day at school Jake said he liked the Giants, and this kid named Doug Holver made a big deal about it. Kept saying the Giants were losers, the Giants were retards, the Giants ate their own farts.”

“He said what?” I asked, laughing in spite of myself.

“They were seven, I think. Anyway, you get the idea. And Jake beat the shit out that kid. I mean, it was ridiculous, especially for a seven-year-old. So of course Jake got in a ton of trouble at school, but it was really at home where the shit hit the fan. My dad let it happen, and Jake was crying, and finally he explained why he’d done it. They were in the living room, and of course I was eavesdropping because I was so fucking freaked out, and my dad said, ‘Who gives a shit about the goddamn Giants?’ I remember it clear as a bell because my dad never swears.”

“And what did Jake do?”

“He bawled all night. And the next day, he walked over to Doug Holver’s house, and he apologized. He did everything he could think of to make it up to Doug. You know where Jake is right now? Doug Holver’s house. They’re best friends.”

“So Jake was a bully back then too.”

“He’s not a bully. A bully wouldn’t have changed. He’s just, I don’t know, this special kind of stupid.” I wasn’t buying any of it, and as far as I was concerned, Jake Miller was worth about as much as old dog shit. Some of that must have shown on my face, because Austin laughed and squeezed my arm, “You don’t have to believe me, but you do have to stay out of it. Brothers fight, Vie. It’s just what they do.”

I shrugged. “I guess I don’t know anything about that part of it.”

Austin’s hand rode up, and he slipped both arms around my shoulders, pulling me in until our foreheads touched. “You’ve never told me anything about your family.”

“There’s nothing to tell. No cute stories about Doug Holver. Sorry, that was a stupid thing to say. I just mean there’s nothing worth telling.”

Austin tilted his head, his lips brushing over mine. “Nothing?”

My hand slid up his back, gathering droplets of sweat across slick, toned muscle. “Ask me again.”

This time, his lips settled firmly on mine. The kiss wasn’t aggressive, not really, but it was insistent, and that suited the new Austin to a T: all the machismo I’d seen in him before he came out, all the posturing, it hadn’t vanished, but it had been transformed into this quiet, solid, persistent strength, like he could move the Bighorn Mountains stone by stone if he had to. His fingers loosed a button on my shirt, and then another, and his hand slid inside to rest of my chest.

When he broke the kiss, he whispered, “Nothing?”