Paradise Found: Cain (Paradise #2)(16)

I needed to get my SUV back from Abel. Wasting no time, I headed to his place the following morning. He lived in a newer complex of townhomes built near the campus. I paid his rent. I paid his tuition. The labor of the fight over the years kept my family comfortable. Abel hadn’t asked for anything, however. He wasn’t like my father. He intended to pay his own way, once his fighting career took off. The fight world was hard, though. It was every man out for himself. Just ask my father. He’d been selfish all his life.

When Atom Callahan couldn’t win it big, like he hoped, he trained another fighter instead: me. I was going to be the breadwinner, he told me. I would reap and he would sow the benefits. It worked while I was underage in local competitions. It became harder when I turned eighteen and he officially declared himself my manager. It was increasingly more difficult as I’d surpassed twenty-one and wanted to take decisions into my own hands. At twenty-four, fighting was all I’d known, and the death of Montana a year ago put many things into perspective. Especially when that death forced me to run to a peaceful Eden and discover a fruit I’d never known I wanted to taste: Sofie Vincentia.

Abel’s help was a necessity in my search for Sofie, and it’s how I first found myself in the area of Preston. She attended the university, as did my brother, and she went abroad for a semester. Other than that, I knew nothing else about her. Once Abel confirmed he’d found her on campus, I had a private investigator search for her home, follow her social life, and discover her patterns. It made me a stalker of sorts, but I needed to know what happened to her. Abel, however, was my link to learn more about her. Was she dating? Did she mention me? Was she interested in others? It was the first time I ever felt I needed his assistance. It had been a complete role reversal for us as brothers.

Knocking on his door, I waited what seemed too long for Abel to appear. His hair stood out like fingers had worked their way through it in an intimate way. His sweat pants were low and he didn’t wear a shirt.

“Cain,” he laughed, glancing over his shoulder into his place. “What are you doing here?”

“Let me in,” I demanded, ready to remind him I owned his place, but the door swept open farther, and I brushed past him without an invitation.

Looking around his living room, I realized I’d never been here. We were brothers, and yet, I never visited him at school. I didn’t want to draw attention to myself outside of the fight circuit. Actually, I was a selfish bastard, and I just didn’t take the time to see my brother. It was the same with our sister, Evie. I’d been to the East Coast where she was imprisoned in a private school, and I didn’t visit her. I didn’t think she’d want to see me anymore than our father wanted to see her.

“Is Elma here?” I asked, scoping out the place.

“Why?” Abel asked, both defensively and with perplexity. It had only been a couple of days since we cleared the air. I didn’t want his girl. I hadn’t f*cked her. I had my own woman to be concerned with.

“Because I figured you took my SUV and brought her home with you,” I quipped. He ran a hand through his dark shaggy hair and sighed.

“Yeah, she’s upstairs,” he said, sitting down hard on his couch and stretching out his long legs. He looked tired. His mind was always working as a kid, and those blue eyes that matched our mother’s, were spinning.

“I won’t hold you up then. I just want my own truck,” I said, sliding my hand in the jacket I wore. I pulled out Kursch’s keys and tossed them to Abel. His instinctive reaction allowed him to catch them quickly.

“I have my own ride,” he said.

“I know, but Kursch will come here to get his.” Abel stared at me, wondering, questioning, but I didn’t want to explain myself. I wanted my own vehicle and I wanted to go home. I’d stayed too long at Carrie’s then hit an all-night diner in the early hours of the morning. I needed a shower.

“Are you going back?” Abel asked, implying Vegas. He didn’t know my full connection to the Valley, although he recently learned my ties to Sofie. Prior to telling Abel, the only one who knew the truth was Kursch, and the private attorney who drew up the divorce papers. My father refused to believe it was real when that minister lady told him about our marriage, and I didn’t clarify the specifics. I denied it in fact, like the traitor that I was.

“Not yet,” I sighed, looking left. On a mantel to a fake fireplace sat a framed picture of two young boys. Drawn to the shelf, I stared at the image. My left arm wrapped around a scrawny kid with longish, black bangs. His blue eyes looked scared, but a dimple dipped in his forced smile. I, however, smiled big, with large teeth and a fat lip. A red-wrapped hand hung under Abel’s chin and I remembered the exact moment: I’d won my first approved fight. I looked so young; it had been so long ago.

Abel, look at the goddamn camera. Be happy for your brother. Our father’s voice rumbled through my head.

“You have a fight this weekend?” Abel questioned, bringing me back to the present. I did, but he would have more soon, too. Our fight, and his win, had propelled him to a whole new level of attention. He was going to have to prove himself, over and over. Our fight didn’t prove anything.

“Yeah,” I replied, taking one last look at the image of us as young teenagers. I turned to face him, finished with our little family reunion.

“Got a place to train before you go home?” he asked, surprisingly concerned for my workouts.