misunderstoodebook (27 page)

The moment Christopher got to him, Johnnie came to his feet.

“What the fuck you doin’ here, John Boy?” Christopher growled.

Balling his fists at his side, Johnnie narrowed his eyes, hiding his wince at Christopher’s speech. He’d dropped out of school, three years ago, and from that moment on he’d taken a class in ignorance. Every time Johnnie tried to correct the way he spoke, Christopher got angry, just too stuck the fuck on stupid.

“Obviously, I’m here to welcome you home. And my name isn’t John Boy. It’s John Peter Donovan.”

Christopher slapped his hand on the counter and Rack slid a cold bottle of beer to him. “Your name whatever the fuck I want it to be. Thought you might prefer John Boy to Preppy Assfuck.”

K-P and Rack sniggered and equal amounts of anger and hurt surged through Johnnie. Of all the things Christopher had ever been toward him or ever said about him, none of it had ever been derisive.

“That’s the way it’s going to be between us, huh, Christopher? Grandda told me you didn’t want me coming with you on your trip. I don’t need Europe when I have so many other opportunities.”

Not responding right away, Christopher lowered his lashes and a muscle ticked in his jaw. Vindicated at his cousin’s hurt, Johnnie watched with impatience as Christopher pulled a pack of cigarettes out of his shirt pocket. “Yeah, you do,” he said quietly, then lit the cigarette. “You don’t need to hang the fuck around me. All it’ll fuckin’ get you is your dick sucked and plenty of free pussy.”

Johnnie squinted while Christopher took a few puffs. “And the problem with that is…? Because I’m not quite sure honestly. Sounds like every man’s dream.”

Christopher laughed and turned his head to release smoke from his mouth, before he pulled Johnnie in a headlock. “You still a fuckin’ smart ass.”

Johnnie knocked a fist into Christopher’s stomach, earning his freedom. “And I’m still your cousin,” he said as he straightened his body, then repaired his tie.

Another puff as Christopher studied him. “Don’t gotta keep claimin’ me. I ain’t no prize, especially for a man like you.”

That his cousin saw him as a manmade Johnnie stick his chest out and stand taller. But as Christopher’s words dawned on Johnnie, he found himself at a loss for words. “I wouldn’t be a man if I denied another man who I consider a best friend and a brother.”

Swallowing, Christopher looked away. “Listen to me, John Bo…Johnnie,” he amended with a puff of his cigarette and another swig of beer. “I did what the fuck I thought I needed to do. Hear me? You don’t wanna hang around with a piece of shit like me. You got your whole life—the life Logan want you to have—and—“ He paused and shrugged, rubbing his eyes. “I’m me and you’re you and that’s e-fuckin-nuff I gotta say cuz that shit says it all.”

“Christopher!” an unfamiliar voice called. “We doin’ a fuckin’ train back here. Come get your dick in some good pussy. We’ll let you go first since you an international fucking traveler.”

“And I got a lotta international pussy, too, motherfucker, so go fuck yourself with your train. Ain’t interested right now.”

“Aww, c’mon—“

“Go kiss some fuckin’ cod balls,” Christopher snapped, “and stop fuckin’ interruptin’ my fuckin’ conversation with my fuckin’ cousin.”

“Yo’, Christopher,” Joey called, the wild light in his eyes matching his wild laughter.

“What?”

From Christopher’s tone, Johnnie knew Joey and Christopher didn’t get along.

“Cod have balls?”

Christopher shrugged. “Don’t give a fuck one way or the other. Cod’s my new fuckin’ favorite fish. Had some in London. Best fuckin’ fish and chips ever. You know chips are French fries?”

“Dad’s taking me next year,” Joey said, bristling, and not answering the question, “so I don’t need you giving me London lessons.”

“What the fuck ever. In that case, step the fuck away so me and Johnnie can talk.”

Joey smiled at the two of them. “I wonder how it feel when you two look at each other. One of you not good enough to run his granddaddy’s empire and the other one’s too good. Logan’s putting Dad in charge next year, so I’m gonna be heir to all this.” He pointed to Christopher. “You enjoy it while you can because I’m gonna take my father back and before it’s over I’m gonna have you on your knees.”

Christopher rolled his eyes, although Johnnie wondered if he was as unaffected as he pretended. Joey had gotten to the heart of the matter, the very thing that was dividing Johnnie and Christopher. “The day come when I bow down to you is the day I start suckin’ dick for a livin’, you little snake in-the-grass motherfucker.”

“Go play with yourself somewhere, Joey,” Johnnie ordered. “We don’t want children around when two men are talking.”

Joey narrowed his eyes at Johnnie and stepped closer to him. “Say that again, Pretty Boy,” he challenged.

Johnnie shoved him back. “You fucking heard me the first time, Joey. I never made a habit of repeating myself and I’m not about to start now.”

“Trying to show off in your granddaddy’s club? You won’t get a pass here. I’ll beat you to a fucking pulp and Logan’ll be looking for pieces of you all over the fucking place.”

That…that threat was pretty new to Johnnie, and one he didn’t particularly like considering the source. While he searched for something to say, he jumped when a fist slammed into Joey’s mouth.

“You try me, motherfucker,” Christopher snarled. “You fuck with Johnnie, you fuck with me and from every fuckin’ piece of him I fuckin’ find, Big Joe’ll find two fuckin’ pieces of you. Better yet, I won’t even make him
look
for you, fuckhead. I’ll cut you the fuck up and serve your fuckin’ parts on a fuckin’ platter to him. How’s that?”

Silence. Christopher’s rant had brought the entire club to a standstill. Johnnie noticed Big Joe and Rack across the room, staring in their direction, and he figured they were about to get their asses beat. Even if Joey bordered on lunatic-status, he was Big Joe’s son and Christopher had just threatened to serve the man pieces of the boy.

The crunch of onions and the smacking of K-P’s lips turned Johnnie’s stomach, the feeling intensified when Big Joe strolled over and asked, “You just threaten Joey, Christopher?”

Christopher looked over his shoulder and K-P slid a bottle of tequila to him. “You fuckin’ heard me. Take your fuckin’ cum squirt the fuck away from me and Johnnie, Big Joe. Joey always runnin’ his fuckin’ mouth and I’m fuckin’ sick of it.”

“This asshole insulted me, Dad,” Joey argued, pointing at Johnnie and making him the center of attention. “Told me to leave while men were talking.”

Johnnie scowled. If he was going to get his ass beat, he wanted the facts straight. “That isn’t what I said. I told him to go play with himself because we didn’t want children around when two men were talking.”

“Get out of here, Joey,” Big Joe ordered in that implacable way he had, then put his hand on his shoulder when the boy opened his mouth to protest. “I need to talk to these two motherfuckers alone.”

“Okay, Dad,” Joey chortled, turning away, the look in his eyes saying
you’re fucked now
.

Christopher downed half the bottle, then called, “Joey?”

“What, asshead?”

“First, that’s a stupid fuckin’ name to call me, so if you think it hurt my feelins, it fuckin didn’t, especially considerin’ it came from your fuckin’ brain.”

Big Joe’s expression turned inscrutable and Johnnie scratched his head, sure their ass beatings had just morphed into bone breaking. “Uh, Christopher—“

“Second,” Christopher continued, giving no indication he heard Johnnie, “you a dumb fuck. Just cuz Big Joe gonna be boss, don’t mean you gonna fuckin’ end up as boss. You shootin’ out his dick don’t give you a fuckin’ advantage. You just gotta look at Uncle Simon as proof, you stupid bugfuck.”

“Bug fuck?” Johnnie whispered.

Flipping Christopher the finger, Joey disappeared toward the private rooms.

“You boys need to get it together,” Big Joe growled. “I’m not dealing with this shit next year when we go overseas.”

Christopher raised a brow. “Bugfuck said you takin’ him.”

“We’ll talk about it,” Big Joe said after a moment. He rubbed his bloodshot eyes, then clapped Johnnie’s shoulder. “Congrats, high school graduate.”

Frowning, Christopher turned away and sat on the bar stool, chucking more alcohol. No matter what he said, Johnnie knew the different paths their lives had taken bothered Christopher.

Before he could follow, Big Joe pulled him off to the corner. Slowly, conversation was filling the air again, the big confrontation warded off by Big Joe’s no-nonsense style.

“Leave him in peace, Johnnie,” the man said now, his tone low. “He has a place here. With me.”

“And he doesn’t with me?”

The biker shrugged. “So you can tell him how to talk? Show him your superiority?”

“I don’t do that to hurt his feelings. I just want him and me to be equals.”

“That’s it right there, John Peter. His equality isn’t
your
equality. You want to turn him into you—“

“That isn’t true!” And, even if it was, was it so bad being him?

“It is. You being you is fine. Excellent, as a matter of fact. You’re a smart kid. You want to hang around Christopher? Go to school out this way? Let Christopher be himself and stop being a gentler version of Logan.”

Horrified at the mere thought he’d treated his cousin like their grandfather did, Johnnie reeled back. “I don’t—“

“You fucking do.”

Johnnie thought back to all the times in the past year he’d seen Christopher. Big Joe had a point. No wonder Christopher had turned away from him. He’d placed himself above his cousin, subconsciously buying into Grandda’s hateful words. He glanced at his blazer and adjusted his tie. “Should…should I take this off?”

“I don’t know. Should you?”

“Er…maybe?”

“You like that bullshit?”

Johnnie looked at his neat clothes. In them, he felt like he was a high-powered CEO, so, yes, he loved his attire. He nodded.

“Then keep them the fuck on. Throw out whatever the fuck else I might say. Throw this the fuck out if you want, but I’d prefer if you listened to me now, if you never listened to anything else I say: part of being a man is staying true to yourself. Being loyal to your brothers. Christopher will accept you however the fuck you come as long as you accept him the same way.”

“Why didn’t he just say this to me himself?”

“He loves you, Johnnie. And if you thought you needed to place yourself above him to better yourself, then he wasn’t about to stop you.” He stared into his eyes. “On the other hand, why should he have had to tell you anything? You love him and you’re loyal to him? Then do that shit through the good and the ugly.”

“Okay.” Another thought hit Johnnie. “What about Logan?”

“Don’t know,” Big Joe responded, motioning someone over with his hand. “What about him?”

“What do I tell him?”

“That’s up to you. Just remember you’re gonna be eighteen in two months and no man can do to you anymore than you allow him.”

“But I want a degree. He’s paying for it, so he gets to choose where I go.”

Big Joe chuckled. “Bullshit, boy, and you fucking know it. Logan won’t be sitting in fucking class. It’ll be you and your brain, so fucking use it. You wanna go to college out this way, get a fucking job and pay for it yourself.”

The girl Johnnie had noticed earlier sidled closer to Big Joe. His gaze fastened on her breasts, reddened with more handprints than a DNA crime lab. Her nipples were swollen and glistening. Big Joe wrapped his hand around her throat and kissed her, their tongues twisting together in a very visible display. Johnnie’s entire body tightened, his heart rate speeding up, his dick hurting. A groan reached his brain and he turned towards the sound. A biker was sitting at a table with a girl kneeling between his legs and sucking his dick.

Drawing in a sharp breath, the scent of sex reached him and he thought he might come. This was a real, live orgy in the making. The kind he’d only seen in pornos. He glanced over his shoulder. Two girls surrounded Christopher, a pretty blonde and a Black girl with long braids. As Christopher stood up and the blonde dropped to her knees, assisting Christopher in unbuttoning his jeans, he wrapped his arms around the Black girl and kissed her.

A three-fingered nerd could get pussy in this environment. Johnnie had finished high school, remained focused on his lessons. Only kissed girls because he didn’t want to get one accidentally pregnant. He’d promised his grandfather that he’d keep his head on his shoulders.

“Get all the pussy you want in college, Johnnie,” Grandda had always said. “Back East no one can see who you’re fucking. You’ll always seem beyond reproach if you keep your shit private.”

Now, his grandfather’s words seemed hypocritical, designed to further come between Johnnie and Christopher. Why he had such an attachment to his cousin, he’d never know. At least he understood why Zoann loved Christopher so much. She was a female. But him, Johnnie? He didn’t think he was gay, like Grandda said whenever Johnnie talked about Christopher, because all he ever did was fantasize about fucking girls. Lots of them. As many as he could handle at one time. A girl on his mouth. A girl on his dick. A girl on each hand licking two other girls. While he was blissfully in the middle.

Big Joe’s voice pulled him from his shocked anticipation. “Johnnie, this is Candi.”

Johnnie blinked to clear his head, his balls tight. Like when he came while jerking off. Fuck, if he came in his pants right now, he’d never, EVER forgive himself. He nodded to her, unable to do anything else, afraid even moving his throat to talk would make him blow his load.

“She wants to give you some pussy tonight. A little congratulations.”

Pussy. He was getting pussy. God, he had to move, go to one of the private rooms and—

Candi dropped to her knees and unzipped his trousers.

“Here?” he asked on a strangled voice, her soft, feminine fingers on his aching dick the best feeling in the world and going straight to his head. Just then, he wouldn’t have given a fuck if it was in Vatican Square during weekly mass.