Always For You (Books 1-3) (18 page)

I picked up my phone and dialed a
number. It rang twice and then picked up.

“
Any
news?” I asked immediately.

“
Nothing
new.” It was Brad.

Brad had lived in West Norton all his
life, and knew people from all walks. He'd been keeping his ear to
the ground for me, listening in for anything about the John Avery
murder and arson. Murder, that's what they were calling it. The
autopsy and cracked skull would have given that away.

I'd told Grace it was me, that I'd
killed him. I didn't want her dealing with that guilt, carrying that
burden. I could take it, I'd have killed that fucker if I could have.
He deserved to die, it was karma.

“
And
Grace?” I asked Brad on the phone.

“
All
good mate. She's back at college, still with that Chase guy. Don't
know much about him, but he seems safe. You don't need to worry about
her.”

I had asked Brad to keep an eye on her,
just check on her every now and then to see if she was OK. She must
have been scared, scared that someone would come knocking at her
door. But things were more settled now. She'd be OK.

I asked one final question of Brad
before hanging up. “How about Emily?”

He went quiet for a second on the line.
“Sorry bro, she's seeing some other dude now. I saw her in the bar
with him, some college dickhead.”

I
sighed.
What
did I expect.
I liked her, I still wanted her.

“
So
mate, when you coming back, we miss you round here.”

The sides of my mouth began to crack
into a smile. “Soon bro, soon.”

September 28
^th
2013

Grace

A light wind brushed past my face as I
stood there looking at the coffin. It was being gently lowered into
the grave, the cloudy skies above echoing the sombre mood. There were
dozens of people around me, all of them dressed in black, all of them
with sad eyes, their thoughts on the man in the wooden box, the man
who'd had an impact on their lives.

He'd certainly made an impact on mine,
but probably in a different way to the rest. I'd hated him, hated him
to the core. I had wanted him to die, wanted him to leave me alone,
to disappear. The way it happened, however, wasn't what I had wanted.
I was directly involved in his death, and I couldn't shake that
feeling of guilt as I stood there.

Chase was by my side, and he made it
even harder. He'd been devastated by the news, devastated by the loss
of his mentor. His family were around us, a family supported by the
man in the coffin when they lost their father, a family so grateful
for what he'd done for them. It was so hard meeting them, looking
them in the eye, offering my condolences. It wanted to run away,
break free and escape, but I couldn't.

I
kept it together. For all the suffering around me, I knew that John
deserved what he got. The public persona that everyone knew, that was
his mask. I'd seen his real face, and it was vile. He'd shown me the
man he really was, and that man deserved this fate. He'd tried to buy
me for sex, he'd left me to die, he'd drugged me, and he'd attempted
to kill Cain, stab him through the heart with a knife.
Yes,
he deserved exactly what he got.

I'd
only ever been to one funeral before this one, and that was a wholly
different occasion altogether. It had been for my
mom
,
killed in a car accident, her life fading away right there next to me
as I lay caught in that prison of twisted metal. Cain had saved me
that day, like he had so many times, but he couldn't save her, as
much as he tried.

Where
was he now? I'd
gone to see him that morning, the morning after he'd woken, but he
wasn't there. He'd gone, disappeared, and I hadn't seen or heard from
him since. I had gone to see Brad but he told me nothing, said he
didn't know. I suspected he was lying, but I wasn't going to get
anything from him. I thanked him though, thanked him for helping us,
for saving us that night. I don't know what would have happened
without him.

I looked over to see a tear roll down
Chase's face as he brushed it aside quickly. His expression was
stern, angry almost. He'd been finding it so hard recently, knowing
that John had been murdered. That's what the cops were saying –
that it was murder, that his wounds suggested a fight, perhaps a
break-in at his mansion.

They'd
concluded that he tried to fight the attacker or attackers off, and
was killed doing so. They'd then burned the entire house to hide
their tracks, but his burnt body had told the police all they needed
to know. Chase had talked about it often, talked about it with fury,
with a burning anger. It was so hard hearing him break down and vent
over it, all the while knowing it was me. I'd have to live with that
now, live with it forever.
I really hope it gets easier.

November
22
^nd
2013

Cain

Fuck
me that hurt. I
hit the floor with a thud, my brain rattling away in my skull. I
pulled myself up onto my knees and put my hand to my face. Blood was
already beginning to spurt from my eyebrow, the familiar feeling of
warmth spreading down one side of my face.

My
head settled as I stood back up. Crack.
Another punch caught me in the back between the shoulder blades. I
tumbled forward once more into the cage, rattling the makeshift
structure as the jeers of the crown grew louder.

I turned around as a fist came flying
at my face, and quickly ducked under it, stepping back into the
middle of the ring as my opponent went crashing into the wall of the
cage. I jumped about lightly on my feet, shaking the pins and needles
out of my arms and legs as the man turned around, his bulky frame
lumbering back towards me.

He swung again, his heavy arm slow, his
movement so obvious. I arched my body and his arm missed, bringing
his soft stomach right into the path of my flying fist. I caught him
right in the gut, sending the air straight out of his lungs as he
crumbled to his knees, gasping for breath.

I took my chance as he struggled to
recover, connecting with the side of his face with a vicious punch
that cracked his jaw. I saw his eyes wobble in their sockets as his
jaw went limp, his large frame falling to the deck with a heavy thud.

Half
the small crowd around me erupted in cheers as the other half started
jeering and throwing their beer glasses towards the ring.
I guess only half the people here bet on me tonight.

“Nice, very nice finish Cain.” It
was Dax, the organizer. He opened the cage and stepped in, announcing
me as the winner and holding my hand aloft.

“Thanks,” I said. “Nice to please
at least half the crowd.”

“Think half of them are the guys
friends. Tread carefully when you leave. I'd go out the back if I
were you.”

Fucks
sake, not again. If
someone's gonna sign up for a no holds barred cage match then they
can expect that, I dunno, maybe they might catch a beating. It's not
my fault the guy was so slow.

I stepped from the cage and snatched a
towel for my bleeding eye. “You're gonna need a few stitches there
Cain,” said Drax, taking a quick look. “Here,” he passed me an
envelope, “your winnings. Now get yourself down to ER, or that's
gonna scar bad.”

Another
trip to the hospital. I
was getting used to it, even moreso than before. Since I'd been
getting into this underground fighting thing, it was almost a weekly
event. Nothing major yet, thank God, but you never know what's round
the corner.

Frankly, I didn't care. The last couple
of months had been a nightmare: living on the road, staying where I
could. I needed cash, so started doing anything possible to get it.
What were my skills? Bar work? Fighting? That's about it.

I'd been working a few shifts in a bar
in this dusty little town out in the desert. You know, the kinda
place where truckers come through and stop off for the night. It was
a mecca for those passing through this isolated part of the state,
somewhere to get some RnR before getting back on the road. I'd
stopped by looking for work in the local watering hole, and managed
to snag a couple of cash-in-hand shifts. That's what I liked about
this place: no questions asked, no official employment. Do the work,
get the cash. Just the way I liked it.

I'd only been working there a few days
when I found out what went down in the cellar. This was back in early
October, about a month after that night in the mansion. My wound was
getting better, but I wasn't ready for a fight. I watched though,
saw these passing bikers and truckers step into the ring to see if
they could win some money. There were no professionals down there, no
real fighters. They were all scrappers, hard men looking for an easy
paycheque. It looked to be right up my street.

I wasn't ready to go back though, back home to West Norton. Not yet,
not until things were calmer. I kept an eye out to see what was going
on: watching the news, reading the papers, finding out from Brad
whether he knew anything. It was a high profile case, so the press
were all over it. One of the richest guys in town murdered in his
country mansion. It didn't look like something the police were going
to drop for a while, but it didn't seem like they had any leads, had
anything to tie it all to me, to Grace.

By late October I'd stepped into the
ring for the first time. I'd never had a structured fight like this
before. Every fight I'd ever had had been driven by alcohol or my own
rage. This was different. This was staged. I had no idea how it would
go down, but I knew one thing: I knew I was excited by it, my nerves
enlivened by it. I felt a rush as I stood in that cage, my opponent
clambering in with me. And the money, well, that made the risk of
injury well worth it.

I don't know whether it was the fact
that I was so conscious of protecting my abdomen or whether I was
just born for it, but the guy never even touched me. I was so quick
on my feet, so aware of his movements. I ducked and dived like Ali,
cracking the guy round the face and putting him to the floor within
minutes. Maybe he was just a shit fighter.

Two minutes work, one hundred dollars
in my pocket. I could get used to this.

And I did. I kept going back down into
the cellar, kept fighting. My first few bouts were so easy, I just
took the guys out like they were nothing. I was so much younger and
fitter than they were, bouncing around on my feet, swerving around
their punches, connecting with my own.

They got harder though – the fights.
By early November word seemed to have spread about me. Some serious
fucking thugs were coming at me, trying to take me down. For all
their size though, they were still so slow, so damn stupid on their
feet, swinging like wildmen, opening themselves up to my fists. I
took every window, every chance, cutting them down each time.

The wagers went up, and so did the
money. I was totally hooked.

I looked down at the envelope in my
hand and flicked through the notes. Three hundred bucks. Worth the
cut over my eye. “Cheers Dax,” I said, before pacing off quickly
out the back towards my bike, half the crowd still baying for my
blood as my opponent was dragged from the ring unconscious.

Go
to ER.
Sure,
like there was an ER round here.
I knew what he meant though, and knew that half my winnings would
soon be settling in the hand of someone else. The local 'doctor', if
you could call him that, lived off these fights. He'd set up his own
little practice to fix up any minor cuts and scrapes that people had.
Trouble was, if you lost and didn't get paid, his rates would really
put a dent in your savings. Good thing I kept winning then.

As I cruised through the dusty town my
thoughts returned home. Brad had told me only a couple of days ago
that Emily was seeing someone else now. Emily, the only girl who I'd
actually felt something for, the only girl I could truly call my
girlfriend. I'd left without saying anything, without saying goodbye,
without so much as a letter, a text message. Zip, nada.

It was no surprise she'd moved on,
apparently with some dickhead college guy. I still wanted her though.
I wanted her now more than ever.

Soon. I'll get her back soon.

November 24
^th
2013

Grace

“Chase? Chase? Did you hear what I
said?”

Chase looked up at me from the table,
his mind clearly elsewhere. “Oh, sorry honey, what's that?”

“I asked you how work was going?”

He shook his head
absentmindedly.
“Oh, it's good actually. I told you I got that promotion, right?”

“Yeah, that's why I'm asking.”

“Ah, OK. Well, yeah it's all good,
really busy.”

“Are you – OK. You seem a bit
distant tonight?”

“I'm fine, no. You know how it's
been, it's still in the back of my head, you know.”

I did know. Chase had been like this
for weeks now, months even. Sometimes he'd be fine and then at
others, well, he'd be lost. He was always waiting for some news,
something to come out about John. But nothing ever did, and I was
thankful for that.

I had been living in fear the whole
time. It was making it hard for me at college, hard to settle back
in, hard to concentrate. I never knew if I'd suddenly get a knock on
the door from the police, dragging me off to a questioning room. The
longer it went on, though, the more comfortable I'd begun to feel. I
felt sure that if they knew something, they'd have found it by now.
If they knew about me, if John had left any paper trail that could
lead to me, they'd have known.