Game (Gentry Boys, #3)(63)

“I know,” she said and took my arm in a sweet, friendly way. “So let’s go home, eat gallons of ice cream and watch people behave badly on reality television.”

I stopped myself from glancing back to where Chase and Creed were. I sighed. “Doesn’t your boyfriend need you?”

She smiled gently. “I think you need me more right now. Besides, the Gentry boys will sort things out among themselves. They always do.”





CHAPTER TWENTY TWO


Chase



“Fuck,” I muttered, staring after Stephanie as Truly followed her. I wanted to ram my fist into something. When I saw Creed standing there, looking like the stubborn dick he was, I considered how nice it would feel to crash a good hit into the side of his face.

“You happy now?” I asked him.

He didn’t answer but to his credit he looked slightly remorseful.

“You’re my brother,” I told him, struggling to control my fury, “and I love you, but holy shit you can be a pain in the ass sometimes.”

I was just going to leave him there in the alley with his guitar and his regret but he called my name.

“I’m not using,” I answered and turned around to look him straight in the eye so there could be no confusion. “I’m sure as hell not dealing. I was gambling. It was a shitty idea and I know it, but it might have just cost me my girl so could you please lay the f*ck off?”

He coughed once and slowly walked toward me. “Look I’m sorry about all that. I just can’t stand to see you get dragged down.”

“Goddammit Creedence, she isn’t dragging me down!” I shouted. A couple was passing by, strolling down the sidewalk in cozy affection. They looked up, startled by my shout and then moved on quickly. “She isn’t,” I said softly.

“All right,” he said but I could tell he wasn’t convinced. Actually he looked kind of miserable standing there awkwardly with his guitar.

“You got the keys?” I sighed.

He threw them to me. If I wanted to take the truck and leave him there he would have let me.

“I’m driving this time,” I said. “You can ride along if you need to.”

I was glad Truly had run after her roommate. Stephanie shouldn’t be alone right now. I kept hearing the way she told me not to follow her. She said I wouldn’t want to know what she was thinking just then. And the way she’d looked at me…anger mixed with a broken-hearted realization that I might not be exactly who she thought I was.

Believe in me, honey. I meant everything I ever said to you.

Stephanie wasn’t dragging me down. Creed had his head up his ass.

He sat in the passenger seat with his guitar between his legs. That first awful day in June when I was in the hospital, still delirious with fever and post-op agony, I’d opened my eyes and saw Creedence next to me, clumsily filling a hospital chair. He wasn’t doing anything, not reading a magazine or watching the mounted television screen. He was just waiting. I’ve heard it said that no matter how strong and invulnerable a man believes himself to be, when he’s feeling the cold fingers of death all he wants is his mother. In that moment five months ago, terrified and confused, I’d called for mine.

My brother had reached for my hand and through the haze of pain meds and fear I saw the little boy I remembered in the man who was trying to comfort me. “She’s not here, Chasyn. I’m here.”

I never asked Cord or Creed if they’d called our parents during that bleak time. I assumed the answer was no. I still wasn’t going to ask because if the answer was yes then it would confirm that both of those people were too lost in themselves to give a damn what happened to any of us. It didn’t require much soul searching to realize I already knew that.

“What are you doing?” Creed asked when I pulled into a drive thru.

“Using some of my ill-gotten gains to buy you a hamburger.”

That made him smile a little. “Everything on it. Bacon too.”

I ordered a mountain of food, just in case anyone was hungry at home. Creed dug through the bag and started inhaling his burger before I even pulled out of the drive thru.

“Pig.” I shoved him.

He tried to hand me one but I shook my head. I wasn’t hungry. I felt empty and sad. Stephanie had been wronged by men before. I’d figured that out from the beginning, although it wasn’t until the night she cried in my arms that I got the uneasy hint that whatever she wasn’t saying might be more tragic than I’d assumed. But I would never hurt her. Surely she knew that.

Saylor was lying across Cord’s lap when we got home. The television was turned low and Cord appeared to be watching a documentary about art restoration. His right hand was stroking his sleeping wife’s hair and his left was draped over the back of the couch. He waved casually, the light glinting off his wedding ring.

Creed held out the bag of hamburgers and the rustling noise awakened Saylor. She smiled when she saw us.

“How did it go?” she yawned. “Do I smell hamburgers?”

“He was magnificent, as always.” I tossed her a burger.

Saylor caught it and then looked around. “Where are the girls?”

I shot Creed a look, hoping he would recognize that I didn’t want to hash everything out again. “They’re having a slumber party. Pillow fighting, hair curling and other female rituals presumably to follow. We weren’t invited.”