He became a repeat visitor to the apartment in Sacramento, spending his time equally between Gram’s house and mine whenever he was home. The minute he finished his classes each term, he’d be on the first flight to California, even refusing to attend graduation. I loved it. It made me feel like my family was back together, finally.
I was happy to be reconnecting with my brother, but the rest of my life seemed to be in some sort of limbo.
Asa had stopped asking me when I was moving, but he visited more that year than he had before, averaging about six weeks between visits. It had to have been exhausting, making that drive so often, but he didn’t complain and he wouldn’t let me drive north instead. He said he wasn’t comfortable with me driving so far by myself, which I thought was ridiculous, but not worth causing an argument over.
Those visits were also different than they’d been before. In the past, every visit had become an event that I planned for, but I no longer had time to worry that the apartment was spotless or his favorite foods were in the fridge. Farrah took up all of my extra time, stopping by the house at all hours to do nothing but watch TV or help me make dinner.
I slowly watched her heal, and refused to allow myself to become impatient at her progress.
It was odd, but Farrah and Cody rarely crossed paths. She seemed to know that I needed time with my brother, and would make herself scarce whenever he was in town without my Gram. I hated that she was so weird about it, but I didn’t push it until one summer night when she was almost back to normal and Echo called and asked me and Cody to go out with them.
The bar we went to was run by the Aces; I swear they had their hands in so many things I didn’t know how they kept them straight. I wasn’t complaining, though, because Cody and I walked in without one person looking our way. It was in a strip mall, one of the old ones built in the seventies, and the floor to ceiling windows in the front made me assume it had been a Laundromat at some point. It just had that look.
I greeted Chucky and Echo, introducing them to my brother while I searched for Farrah. She was standing near the bartender with a hand on her hip, the pose making me smile. I was so glad that she finally resembled the girl I’d met two years before, that I was grinning wide as she handed something to the guy behind the bar.
The music cut off with a screech as she made her way to the middle of the floor, and men around the room yelled out their annoyance as the music started again. It was some sort of Pop music that I hadn’t heard before, but the beat blared out of the speakers so loudly that I could feel it in my chest. It wasn’t something they wanted to listen to, and they were complaining loudly, but I couldn’t take my eyes off Farrah, and soon everyone else was staring silently, too.
She was dancing.
Her hips shook as she put on a show for the guys at the bar, and I glanced across the table nervously, imagining how Asa would feel if I were shaking my ass in the middle of a bar.
Echo was relaxed back in his chair, a little smirk on his lips as he took a sip of his beer. He must have felt my eyes on him, because his eyes shot to mine for a moment, winking, before going back to Farrah.
“Holy shit,” Cody sighed next to me, making me laugh.
“Close your mouth, little brother,” I teased him as Farrah bent at the waist so her hair was brushing the floor.
His chair screeched across the floor as he ignored me and tried to stand, but a hand on his shoulder stopped him.
“That one’s mine, son,” Echo told him with a smile, standing up from his own chair. “Get your own.”
My eyes had moved back to Farrah as Echo sauntered up to her, and I couldn’t drag them away as she started dancing on him while he stood relaxed, still drinking his beer. He wanted her; I could see his struggle to let her dance instead of dragging her off. But the pride in his gaze was apparent as he let her do her thing.
“Why are you crying?” Cody asked, perplexed. “That’s hot as hell.”
“Yeah,” I mumbled back, never taking my eyes off the couple on the dance floor as I smiled. “She’s back.”
Chapter 51
Callie
I loved it when Cody stayed with me. He not only did things around the house like take out the garbage, but it was nice to come home to someone—even if it was my stinky brother with his feet on the coffee table. Our shared history was like a security blanket for both of us, and we understood each other in a way that no one else ever would.
We were packing up my apartment, laughing over kitchen gadgets that looked like torture devices, and I couldn’t remember the last time I’d felt so happy. I was giddy with excitement to be moving to Oregon after so long, one of my favorite people in the world was sitting on the floor of my kitchen, and my best friend was on her way over. It was bliss.
Some people go their entire lives without facing tragedy. They live every day as if nothing bad would ever happen to them, because they have no experience to draw from and no reason to be weary. Others are always waiting for the other shoe to drop. They don’t assume that nothing bad was going to happen, but wonder when it would.
I forgot for a moment that I was one of the latter.
When I heard a bike pull up, I ran to the door and flung it open, racing down the stairs so I could walk Farrah up. I didn’t need to do it, it’s not like she needed the direction, but I wanted to say hi to Echo before he took off to take care of some club crap. Farrah smiled at me, pulling off her bright pink helmet, and I waved as I jumped down the last two steps of the stairs.
I didn’t notice the car at first. I wasn’t paying attention to the road, because even though it was a quiet street, cars passed by all the time.
It wasn’t until Echo shoved Farrah at me that I realized something wasn’t right. I caught her and we went stumbling into the stairwell, barely catching our balance before hitting the stairs. I watched over Farrah’s shoulder, my arms wrapped tightly around her waist as Echo glanced over to where we were hidden by the wall of the stairwell and met my eyes.
Then his eyes shifted to Farrah’s and he winked.
“Hey, Ace!” someone called out.
It’s funny how the human brain works. Or is it the speed of sound that makes memories seem just a bit off?
Echo’s body started jerking before I heard the gunshots.
Or maybe it was after.
I can’t remember, because the minute he winked, I had to tighten my arms around Farrah and use all of my body weight to keep her from running to him.
I held back a scream and wrapped my legs around her hips, my back digging into the cement stairs as I fought her.
I managed to get one hand over her eyes as she gouged my arms with her nails, making me the only one who witnessed Echo turn his eyes to Farrah as he dropped to his knees and fell forward onto the pavement.
Neither of us made a sound.
And then, with squealing tires, it was over.
Chapter 52
Callie
I lost my grip on Farrah as Cody came barreling down the stairs.
“What the fuck?” he asked me, pulling me up as Farrah started scrambling toward Echo’s body, not even taking the time to stand.
“I don’t know,” I whispered back, watching as he ran toward the couple only a few feet away.
I should’ve been screaming. I should’ve been running for Echo the way Farrah and Cody were.
But I wasn’t. I was back in my crawlspace, and I knew not to make a sound. Instead, I pulled my phone out of my pocket and called Asa as I walked slowly to where my brother and Farrah were rolling Echo onto his back.
I wanted to scream at them that there was nothing they could do—that he deserved to keep a little of his dignity.
“Hey, Sugar,” Asa answered lazily, completely unaware of the scene unfolding before me.
“Asa,” I rasped, “I’m scared.”
“Talk to me, Callie!” he ordered, all complacency gone.
“There was a car,” I looked up the quiet street, but nothing was ther
e. “Echo brought Farrah over.”
“You have to tell me what happened, sweetheart,” he prodded urgently.
“I don’t know,” I told him vaguely, the world becoming hazy as I watched Farrah push Cody’s hands away so she could kiss Echo sweetly on the lips.
“Calliope, I can’t understand what you’re saying. Is your brother there?”
“Yeah. He’s with Echo.”
“Give him the phone.”
“But his hands are all bloody…”
“Give your brother the phone!” he roared.
I lifted my phone in Cody’s direction, and he must have been watching me, because he grabbed it right away.
“Grease, fuck! It’s bad, man,” he spoke into the phone softly, taking a few steps away from where Farrah and I were huddled over Echo.
The next few minutes felt like an eternity as we sat guard over Echo’s body. Farrah was still surprisingly silent, but she reached out and grabbed my hand as we waited. I wasn’t sure what we were waiting for, but the minute I heard the roar of multiple Harleys, my entire body sagged in relief.
As the men parked their bikes and came toward us, sirens began to fill the air.
“You call the cops?” a large biker I’d never seen before asked Cody.
“Nah,” he answered, pulling the phone away from his ear to gesture with it. “Grease. It was probably the neighbors.”
I watched the faces of the men around me as they took in the scene, and only a few were successful in maintaining their stoic expressions.
“You know who did it?” a man with tattoos on his face asked Farrah and me, kneeling next to Echo and pulling something out of the chest pocket of Echo’s shirt.
“No,” I answered, shaking my head a little.
“Good. That’s exactly what you tell the cops,” he told me ominously before standing back up and disappearing into the crowd.
I sat there in a daze as an ambulance pulled in with its lights flashing, and I didn’t move a muscle when two policemen ordered everyone to put their hands up.
They treated me like a threat, and as they took Echo away, I lay handcuffed, face down on the ground, less than a foot from his blood.
The rest of the day and into the night was a blur of giving statements and listening to apologies from weary policemen. They’d eventually uncuffed me, realizing that I was a victim, though I didn’t feel like one. I was just a bystander to something horrific that I was unable to talk about but would never forget.
Late that night, after the police had left the apartment and the place was quiet, Farrah finally spoke.
“I never thought that I could feel worse than the night I realized my mom would never love me,” she told me quietly. “I was wrong.”
“Things can always get worse,” I told her seriously.
“I don’t know what could be worse than this.”
“Me, either,” I answered, wrapping my arm around her shoulder.
We were quiet for a while, listening to Cody pace back and forth in the kitchen. After all of the trauma of the afternoon, there was nothing for us to do. There were no papers to sign, no questions to answer, just… nothing.
Eventually Farrah stood, pulling me with her, and headed toward the bathroom.
“We need to take a shower,” she told me flatly, pushing the door open and ushering me inside.
She stripped down to her underwear, throwing her clothes out the door as she took them off, while I turned on the water. I assumed she wanted me to stay with her, so I made no move to leave, but was surprised when she came over and started pulling at my t-shirt.
“What are you doing?” I asked curiously as I let her pull it over my head.
“You need to take a shower.”
“Okay, I’ll take one when you’re done,” I told her gently, trying to pull her fingers from the front of my jeans.
“You need to take one now,” she mumbled urgently, looking into my eyes. “You’ve got bloo—you’ve got bloo—you need to take off these clothes. You need to take a shower right now!”
I looked down in surprise, realizing for the first time that I was covered in dried blood.
“Okay, baby girl. I’ll take a shower now,” I answered her quietly, moving her hands so I could strip off my jeans. “Climb in.”
The shower ran red when we climbed inside, and Farrah kept her eyes pointed toward the ceiling as she grabbed my body wash and started scrubbing. We passed it back and forth, washing our arms and torsos until the half-full bottle was completely gone. Then we started on our hair.
Farrah was rinsing her hair for the second time when Asa walked into the bathroom and slowly pulled back the curtain. I could see the questions in his eyes, but he didn’t say a word as he reached out a hand to me.
“We need towels, baby,” I told him quietly, ignoring his hand.
“Okay,” he answered hoarsely, looking between Farrah and me before walking back out.
“Okay, Farrah, that’s enough,” I told her gently as she started to pick up the shampoo bottle. I reached behind her and turned off the water as her arms dropped down to her sides. I wrung out her hair while she stood quietly, her eyes vacant.
“Here’s your towels, Sugar,” Asa called, pulling open the curtain. “You need some help?”
“No, I’ve got her,” I assured him. “I’m going to get her into some clothes and then I’ll be out.”
“Okay,” he answered, searching my face as he put a hand on my wet cheek. “Call if you need me.”
I gave him a nod and turned back to Farrah, wrapping one of the towels around me and using the other to dry her off. I held her hand as I led her to my bedroom, but her grip was nonexistent.
“Farrah, I grabbed you some clothes,” I called out, rifling through my dresser for underwear and pajamas. When she didn’t answer, I turned to find her standing exactly where I’d left her in the middle of the room. “You want some pajamas?”
She was looking at me—aware of everything that was happening—but it was like her body had just stopped working, except for the tears running down her face.
“I’m going to help you into these, okay?” I asked, hoping she’d push me away and ask if I was a lesbian. “Okay, well if you don’t mind then neither do I,” I told her with a shrug of my shoulder.
I unwrapped the towel and ran it over her head once, but she was beginning to shiver, so I dropped it on the floor behind her and started stripping her. I unclasped her bra and pulled the straps down her shoulders, leaving it stuck to her breasts with water as I pulled the oversized sleep shirt over her head. When that part was done, I finished stripping off her bra and pulled her underwear down her legs, thankful she stepped out of them with little prompting.
When I’d just finished getting my smallest sweatpants over her hips, there was a small knock on the door. As I turned toward it, a familiar head popped through, taking in the scene before walking completely into the room.
“Gram,” I sighed in relief before rushing to her. “Did Cody call you?”
“Yep. Told me my baby needed me, so here I am,” she told me gently, kissing my forehead before turning to Farrah. “Get some clothes on, Callie Rose, you’re gonna catch a cold in that towel.”
I hurriedly threw one of Asa’s t-shirts and a pair of yoga pants on as I watched Gram lead Farrah to the bed. She’d grabbed my hairbrush off the dresser on the way over, and once Farrah was seated, she stood behind her and started brushing.
“Asa’s out there climbing the walls, Callie,” Gram informed me, running her fingers through Farrah’s hair. “I’ve got things handled in here.”
Oh, God. I’d forgotten how good it felt to have Gram take control of a situation.
“Thanks, Gram,” I told her quietly, walking out the door and shutting it quietly behind me.
Chapter 53
Grease
“Give your brother the phone!” I yelled at Callie as I stomped into my boots and left my room.
I’d been lying on my bed i
n my underwear, looking at fucking apartment ads, when she’d called. I’d immediately scrambled into some jeans when I heard her scared voice on the other end of the line.
“Grease, fuck! It’s bad, man,” Cody hissed, his voice low. “Echo was bringing Farrah over and Cal went out to meet them. I didn’t see it. I was in the bathroom when I heard the shots and came running.”
“Is your sister okay?” I asked as I raced through the clubhouse looking for Poet or Slider. Where the fuck was everyone?
“Yeah, she wasn’t hurt.” He paused. “Echo’s dead, though.”
“What the fuck?” I roared, pausing in disbelief. “What the fuck happened?”
“I have no goddamn idea. When I came out of the apartment, Echo was fucking down, and Callie was wrestling with Farrah on the stairs.”
I finally found Poet and Slider outside having a smoke. I wasn’t sure why they did it, but if they were smoking together they always stepped outside to do it.
“Prez, we’ve got fuckin’ problems,” I yelled, practically running toward him. “Cody, I’ll send some boys to you and call you back.”
I hung up the phone as I reached the men and took a second to control my emotions.
“Some fucker killed Echo in Callie’s parking lot, with Farrah and Callie fuckin’ watching,” I told them as I flipped open my phone. “I don’t think they knew who it was.”
“Are the girls okay?” Poet asked calmly, but the twitching of his fingers gave a different impression.
“Callie’s brother says they’re fine,” I answered, listening to Michael’s phone ring repeatedly before hanging up.
“We need to get some of our boys over there—Echo’s fuckin’ dead in her driveway,” I told them both, but Slider was already on his phone.
“We’ll get some men over there, boyo, calm down.”
“Fuck that! Some fuck just shot down a brother in my woman’s fuckin’ driveway!” I roared back, completely losing my shit. “She fuckin’ watched it go down, and she’s not strong enough for that shit!”
“I think the girl will surprise you,” Slider commented as he shoved his phone back in his pocket. “I’ll head out with you and we’ll take some of the boys. Be ready in ten.”