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“Iamyour family, asshole. You can try to deny it, but that’s what we are here. Like it or not, you’re a part of that. I’m not letting you do this.”
He glared at me with an expression that probably would have had me withering on the spot if I hadn’t known him as well as I did. He had all his defenses up, pushing all of us away so he could destroy himself without any of us trying to stop him.
“I have no family, Lyric. All I have is parents who never gave a shit. A brother who hates my guts, and rightfully fucking so, after the things I did to him. And this fucking shithole.” He motioned around the room. “This fucking club that’s falling to pieces because someone fucking took the only ray of sunshine in it.”
He slouched down on the bench seat, some of the fight and anger going out of him.
Which dulled a little of my fire too. I sat back down beside him, shoulders slumped. “You never told me your brother hates you. Or that your parents weren’t in the picture.” I knew a little something about that, after being left to my grandmother when I was a kid.
He shrugged. “They were right to dump me. Bad shit happens to anyone I get close to. Banjo. Fawn.”
I put a hand on his leg and squeezed. “I don’t know what happened with your brother, but Fawn wasn’t your fault.”
He shook his head. “I should have been there to protect her.”
“You couldn’t be with her twenty-four seven.”
His eyes turned anguished. “I knew her ex was bad news, but I thought she was being paranoid. I should have just fucking listened when she said she was scared.”
“We all should have listened,” I assured him. “This isn’t all on you.”
He scrubbed his hands over his weary face. “She was in love with me, wasn’t she?”
I peered at him curiously, surprised he’d brought that up. “I don’t know that she was in love with you. She definitely had a crush.”
He sighed.
“Do you love her back? Is that why you’re beating yourself up over this so bad?”
He sighed heavily, gaze tortured. “It was never like that for me. It still isn’t. She’s barely more than a kid, Lyric. She actually reminds me of Banjo and how fucking good and sweet and innocent he is.” He groaned, dropping his face down into the palms of his hands. “She felt like a second chance to be the brother I wasn’t to him. But then I found out about those fucking dildos you guys got…”
Months ago, I’d dragged Fawn into a sex toy store, and the attendant had talked us into buying personalized vibrators. He’d suggested that most women put the name of a partner or crush on their toy. I’d refused, putting my own name on mine because I didn’t need no man to get me off. But Fawn had put Augie’s, and we’d laughed as we’d bought one for Eve with Boston’s name on it.
But both had caused problems we could have never anticipated at the time. “I wish we’d never done that now.”
Augie shook his head. “I should have just talked to her about it. Explained the way I felt and let her down gently. She deserves a good guy, someone who can give her everything she needs.” He glanced over at me with tears in his eyes. “I really wanted that for her, Lyric. I can’t handle the thought of her not being happy.”
I put my arm around him, realizing exactly what he was. “You’re a parent, Aug. That’s how I feel about Amelia.”
He nodded miserably. “I swear, if I’d just been in love with her, it might have been easier to get over. But I do feel fatherly toward her and I swear that’s a different sort of love. One I can’t let go of just because I know she’s probably dead. I let my brother go, because I could see he was happy and safe and I was only dragging him down. But it’s not the same with Fawn. I can’t just give up or accept she’s not coming back.”
We sat side by side in silence, with muffled music from the club seeping through the walls. Eventually, Eve came back, frantically searching for us because there was no one on the stage, and Augie and I had no choice but to get our shit together and go through the motions. But that’s all it was.
The Strip had lost its sunshine, and without her, none of us were going to be okay.
* * *
Itexted Peggy on my way out of the club as the sun was rising. I was late, because I’d stayed back to help Eve clean up a bunch of glasses that some visiting college frat boys had smashed. We’d moved practically in slow motion while I’d spilled out everything Augie had said in the locker rooms, and Eve tutted over how worried she was about him. Then accused me of being no better, because apparently, I looked like shit too.
Eve was bossy, especially when she was tired and overwhelmed. Especially when it came to those she considered family.
Peggy replied to my message instantly and with an enthusiasm I wasn’t sure anyone but her could truly feel at five-thirty in the morning.
Peggy
Sure, hon. I’ve got nothing on, and your g-ma is still asleep. See you in an hour or two.
I tucked my phone away and got in the car, praying it would start because I couldn’t afford an emergency mechanic’s bill. Terry had fixed it for me after it last broke down, but he’d warned it was basically held together with duct tape and really needed to be sent to the scrapyard one day soon.
