Hold (Gentry Boys, #5)(58)

Then without warning he stopped, drew back and punched a solid metal light pole. The sound of bone meeting metal was terrible.

“Conway,” I called sharply.

He hadn’t cried out although the hit must have been agony. He held his hand out in front of him and stared at it dumbly as if he couldn’t guess the reason the knuckles were split and the skin was turning purple.

“He took her before he took her,” he said blankly and I had no idea what the hell he was talking about. It must have been the grief and the shock of losing his girl and then moments later finding out his brother was responsible for her death. Although there was something strange about it. No one had yet answered the question as to why Stone had chosen to take his brother’s girlfriend on a crazy joyride in a stolen car.

Chase got a firm arm around Conway and led him to a nearby bench. The kid just sat there kind of dazed and silently allowed Chase to take a closer look at his hand.

“That’ll mean a trip to the hospital,” Chase said, wincing as he gently turned the hand over. Conway didn’t make a sound or even acknowledge that he’d heard.

Cord came to my side. Our eyes met and he nodded tiredly. Of course there was no way we could just take off now and leave our young cousin sitting here on Main Street with his shock and his broken hand.

As for his brother, even I had to admit that there was nothing we could do for Stone at this point. I recalled the night we drove down here to rescue the brothers from petty trouble that landed them in a jail cell. The last thought I’d had as we left them behind was a hope that they’d step back from the ledge that straddled the good world and the bad. I was sorry that Stone hadn’t been able to find his way. His reckless actions had cost a young girl her life and would change the course of his.

“Want me to take a quick look at that hand?”

A female paramedic with smile lines around her eyes and white blonde hair coiled atop her head had appeared out of nowhere. She had a very maternal look about her. Conway stared at her dully as she gently prodded his swollen hand.

“That has to hurt something fierce,” she clucked but there was soft kindness in her voice. She opened up a black bag that had been slung around her shoulder and removed a tan elastic bandage. “I can at least get it immobilized and protected until you can get to the ER.”

She wrapped the hand up carefully while Conway continued to stare at nothing.

“You think he’s all right?” I asked Cord in a whisper.

Cord looked at me like I was cracked. I winced.

“I mean, I know he’s not f*cking all right. But you don’t think he’s going to go run in front of a bus or something, right?”

Cord shook his head. “We won’t let him.”

I glanced around and noticed the cops were starting to shoo everyone away. After all, this was the scene of a fatal car accident. I avoided looking too closely at the wreck site, trying not to imagine that poor girl spending her final moments there. I hoped it was over before she had a chance to realize it was coming.

Conway was slumped on the bench, awkwardly holding onto his bandaged hand while Chase kept trying to comfort him.

“We should probably ask if anyone’s called his mother,” I said.

Cord nodded. “If they did she might have decided to go to the police station first.”

“At any rate we ought to get him off the street. Maybe take him home and wait around there until his mom shows up.”

“Not a bad idea. He doesn’t need to be sitting here looking at this all night.”

I pulled my phone out of my pocket. “Guess we should tell our wives not to expect us home real soon.”

My brother’s mouth was a tight line. “No, we won’t be home soon.”





CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE


CHASE



If I could pick him up and cradle him against my shoulder until he stopped shaking then I would.

If I could soothe him with promises that everything would be okay then I would do that too.

But it all would be a lie. And it would cheat him out of the chance to feel what he needed to feel.

I knew from the harsh master of experience that the only way to handle pain was to let it run its course. Numbing it, dulling it, hiding from it, all of that only lead to a volcanic buildup.

Conway refused to call his mother and he refused to go home, becoming even more agitated every time we mentioned it. From what little I’d gathered of Tracy Gentry, she wasn’t close to her sons but even a distant mother was probably better than none right now

“I told you,” grumbled Conway. “She won’t give a shit.”

Most of the onlookers had dispersed. A few had paused, watching us on the bench we’d been sitting on since Con hammered his hand into a metal light pole. They looked like they wanted to say something to Conway. If he knew any of them personally he gave no indication. There was one strange moment where I locked eyes with a thin, attractive woman who was probably in her mid forties. She seemed very familiar but it wasn’t until she sneered and turned deliberately away that I realized I was looking at Saylor’s estranged mother. I glanced over at Cord to see if he’d noticed her but he hadn’t. He stood on the sidewalk with his hands in his pockets, consulting quietly with Creed.

“We’ll wait with you,” I told Conway, again trying to convince him that a bench on Main Street was not the best place for him right now. “We’ll stay there with you as long as you want. You don’t have to be alone.”