Distraction: An underground kings novel (16 page)

“Morgan,” my dad whispers a second later with worry etched in his tone, and I look across the hood to see that Morgan has gotten out of the car and is staring up at the front porch at both of them.

“Oh my,” my mom gasps, stepping down the stairs, only to pause on the last step and cover her mouth with her hand.

“Can we go inside?” I ask, slamming my door, probably a little harder than I need to, but I’m angry. I’m angry they didn’t care when I told them that Morgan was missing. I’m angry they didn’t send out the troops like most parents would and search for their troubled daughter. But I’m
pissed
they left all of this to fall on my shoulders while they pretended like everything was hunky-dory.

“Come on, we just sat down for dinner,” my dad mutters, his eyes going hard in a way that’s surprising. My parents are passive; they’ve always have been passive, never letting much of anything bother them, so seeing the look of anger and disappointment my dad is directing toward Morgan is more than a little startling. “Do you have any bags?” he asks, turning his eyes to me.

“No,” I tell him, gaining a nod before he takes my mom’s elbow and leads her inside. Following behind them, I take Morgan’s hand and head in, letting her know silently that she’s not alone.

My parents’ house looks the same as it did when I was a kid. Three long steps lead to a large covered porch that has been white-washed every winter since I can remember. On one side of the porch is a hammock big enough to hold two people, a two-seated white wicker couch with brightly colored pillows, a wicker coffee table with a large metal plate full of different sized candles, and a bright red outdoor rug, where my mom always does her yoga.

Walking through the front door is more of the same vibe. The living room is small, but is done in bright floral colors with live plants on almost every flat surface. The kitchen is old but well kept, the wood topping the counters is the type you would find on a cutting board. Instead of cabinets, there are open white shelves holding dishes, and more plants, but these are herbs and things my mom cooks with. Stopping with my dad, I notice the round four-seated table is set for two, with a big covered pot in the middle. One of my mom’s big things has always been family dinners around the table, and even with my sister and me long gone, she has still stuck to that tradition.

“Get two more plates, Maisy,” my dad orders my mom, who hasn’t looked at my sister or me again. Nodding, she goes to one of the shelves in the kitchen and grabs two more plates, along with silverware.

“I’m not hungry,” Morgan tells Dad, and his head turns, his eyes pinning her in place then dropping, taking her in, and I know he sees what I see when I look at her.

When his eyes meet hers again, I can see his unchecked anger as he commands, “You’re gonna eat.”

“Okay,” she whispers, shifting on her feet.

Dropping her hand, I take a seat. I know she’s as surprised by Dad’s behavior as I am, but I have to say I’m happy this is his reaction. When my mom comes back to the table a second time, she has two glasses full of water and sets them both down before taking a seat.

When my dad sits, Morgan does the same, and my mom opens the large pot in the middle of the table. Scooping out some kind of rice and vegetable mixture, she places some on each of our plates, the whole time avoiding looking at Morgan or me directly. I have no idea what that’s about, but it’s starting to annoy me.

No one says anything. I don’t really eat; I push the rice mixture around on my dish, but am happy to see Morgan clean her plate and take seconds. My dad, who is across the table from me, is glaring at his food like it’s the cause of all the problems in the world, and my mom is doing much like me, moving the food from one side of her plate to the other.

“Can I stay for a few days?” I ask. I don’t know why that’s my question, and not, ‘What the heck are we going to do about Morgan?’ but that’s what comes out, and that’s when everyone’s eyes come to me.

“You know you can, MoonPie,” Mom whispers, and my dad grunts something I can’t decipher, with a nod.

“I thought you would be going home to your boyfriend,” Morgan chimes in, but her words sound almost accusatory when she says them. Pain rushes through me at the thought of Sven, but I ignore it, because now isn’t the time to have a breakdown, and I know once I really let myself think about him, that’s exactly what’s going to happen.

“You live with a man?” Dad asks, looking at me.

I really, really want to kick Morgan under the table for opening her big, fat mouth, but instead, I just mutter, “Something bad happened and—”

“What happened?” Dad asks, and I feel Morgan tense at my side, but I’m not going to lie for her. If one good thing came from Sven’s story, it’s that you can’t protect the people you care about by covering for them, and I’m done covering for Morgan.

“Morgan stole some money from a guy. He came looking for her and found me. He roughed me up and—”

“What?” Dad hisses, turning to look at Morgan as Mom whispers, “Oh my,” at the same time.

“Is this true?” Dad asks.

“I know it was wrong.”

“You know it was wrong?” Mom repeats in disbelief.

“I…” She drops her voice. “I know I messed up. I—”

“I gave her the money to pay him back.” I cut her off. “Hopefully it’s done and we can move forward with getting her the help she needs,”

“I want help,” Morgan says softly, and I find her hand under the table and give it a squeeze then drop it.

“What are you on?” Dad questions, and I freeze, because Morgan has never been honest about that. She’s never told me straight out what kind of drugs she’s taking and has always denied using, even when she’s been picked up by the cops and taken in.

“Crack mostly, prescription drugs when I can’t get enough money for a fix,” she tells us, and my body sinks back into my chair.

“You’re gonna go through withdraws. You ready for that?” Dad asks, and she wraps her arms around herself and nods, dropping her eyes to the table.

“Star,” Mom calls, using Morgan’s nickname, and my sister’s eyes go to her, and this time they’re wet. “We love you. I know we’ve mostly let you girls find your own way, but we love you and your sister.”

“Why?” I ask, and Mom’s eyes come to me.

“Why what MoonPie?”

“Why have you let us find our own way?” I ask as tears burn my eyes and my throat aches as I swallow the tears back.

“You girls have always been smart,” Dad cuts in, and my eyes go to him and my brows draw downward.

“No, I was a kid. Morgan was a kid when we left home. Yes, we were both eighteen, but we didn’t know much about the world outside of this place, only what friends told us and what we saw when we were at school. Neither of us were at all prepared for the real world, and you both just left us to find our way.”

“You did okay for yourself,” Mom argues, and I close my eyes and let out a frustrated breath.

“I didn’t, not at first anyway. I was free to make choices, and a lot of them were bad ones.”

“You never said anything,” Dad defends, and I shake my head.

“Even if I wanted to ask you guys for advice, it would take days to get word to you.”

“We didn’t know,” Mom murmurs, and I look at her.

“That’s my point. You guys as parents should have wanted to know what was going on, how we were doing. Not, ‘They will find their own way.’ Even when I sent you letters explaining things that were going on, you weren’t there. You two just live here in your little bubble, where nothing ever penetrates. It’s not fair to me, and it it’s not fair to Morgan.”

Turning when I hear Morgan’s whimper, I watch tears fall from her eyes and her body shake.

“We’re sorry you felt like that way,” Dad says gruffly, and I hear a sound of distress come from my mom as she gets up and moves to Morgan, wrapping her in a hug.

“I can’t do this alone, Dad. I’ve been doing it alone for too long, and I can’t do it anymore,” I whisper, and his hand comes across the table and I place my hand in his.

I don’t know if things are going to change, but I really hope they do.

Sven

Second chances

“I
fucked up,”
I mutter as soon as Asher answers the phone.

Asher has been my best friend since I was ten. I would hide out at his house every chance I got. He knew what was going on with my mom, was there when shit went down, and his parents took me in while my dad recovered in the hospital. He’s the best man I know, a man I respect and a man who laughed his ass off when I told him months ago that Maggie was driving me to the brink of insanity.

“Give me a sec,” he mumbles, and I hear him moving around. I’m sure he’s in bed with his wife, November, or has one of his girls close and is trying to get away so he can talk. Hearing a door open on his end, I wander into the den and take a seat in the dark, feeling my nostrils flare when I sit on something hard and know it’s one of Maggie’s books.

When Justin called and told me that Maggie was with her sister, I didn’t even think, or I did, but none of it was good. All I kept seeing was my dad, his constant excuses for my mom’s behavior, what that led to. It’s not an excuse for my behavior, but it’s the truth. By the time I realized what the fuck I did, what I asked Maggie to do, it was too late.

“What happened?” Asher asks, and I press my fingers to the bridge of my nose, trying to get my thoughts in order over the pain in my chest.

“Maggie and I got together a few weeks ago.” I tell him, realizing how long it’s been since we last spoke.

“We both knew that was coming,” he mutters, not sounding at all surprised. “That doesn’t explain a middle of the night phone call, unless you’re calling so I can congratulate you on finally pulling the stick out of your ass.”

“Fuck,” I curse under my breath, feeling pain slice through my chest, the same pain I felt when I saw tears in Maggie’s eyes and heard her soft words.

That’s not love, Sven. You asking that of me is not love.

She was right; me asking that of her had nothing to do with love.

“What did you do?”

“Told her to choose between me and her sister.”

“What the fuck, man?” he rumbles, sounding pissed.

“Yeah.” I agree.

“Jesus, you seriously fucked up.”

“I already know that. Now I need to know what the fuck to do to get out of this mess.”

“Where is she now?” he asks, blowing out a breath, and I know he thinks I’m as fucked as I think I am.

“At her parents’.” When she left, I had Justin follow her to make sure she was, and still is, safe. I wanted to go after her, but after what happened, I didn’t want her to spot my car, get pissed, and get hurt while trying to get away from me.

“Can you go there?” he asks quietly.

“Not sure how that’s gonna go over, and not sure I want the first time I meet her parents to be the same time I’m dragging her kicking and screaming from their house.”

“Kicking and screaming?” He chuckles, but I’m not joking. If I got there and she refused to come home with me, I’d bring her back with me no matter how that came about. “You’re not joking.” His laughter dies and I shake my head, even though he can’t see me do it. “You call her?”

“Yeah, voicemail.”

“Christ, man.”

“What the fuck do I do?” I growl, standing from the couch.

“Go get her,” he states softly. “If it was November, I’d go get her ass and bring her home. No way I’d let her stew on that shit.”

“You think that’s the right move?” I ask, already heading for the door.

“You love her?”

His question has my hand pausing on the handle, and I drop my head forward and close my eyes. “Yeah, man,” I mutter, feeling a pain in my chest at the thought of her not being mine, of losing her.

“Go get her, plead your case, and bring her home.”

“Thanks, man.”

“Anytime, you know that.”

“Yeah, man,” I agree, hanging up the phone. Getting in the car, I have no idea what the fuck I’m gonna say when I see her. I just hope that whatever I come up with is enough to convince her to give me a second chance.

Pulling onto the
side of the road, I watch Justin get off a Harley and do a double take. The kid who once looked like a high wind would blow him over, now looks like he could take Teo on in a fight and would come out on top.

I roll down my window when he gets close, and he grins as I ask, “You start doing steroids?”

“Seven-Eleven,” he replies, ignoring my comment. “Good to see you, man.” He places his hand out toward mine and I shake it once.

“She still at her mom and dad’s?” I ask, and his face changes.

“Yeah, she’s still there. All’s quiet.”

“Thanks for looking out, man.”

“You know I got your back, just glad I was in town and could help.”

“You didn’t tell me you we’re still searching for her sister.” The call from Justin telling me Maggie was with her sister was unexpected. I didn’t even know he was in town, let alone following Morgan.

“I was working a separate case and spotted her, followed her then saw she was with Maggie and called you.”

“What case?” I ask studying him and seeing something’s off.

“Talked to Kenton and Kai. Shit’s going down with Paulie,” he says effectively changing the subject.

“Fuck,” I rumble, squeezing the steering wheel.

“Go get your girl. The guys will be in town in a few days. We’ll figure everything out then.”

“Not looking forward to that,” I tell him something he already knows as I look out at the empty desert beyond my windshield.

“We’ll probably set up shop at Kai’s place. He’s got the best location and the best security. The women can all stay there while we figure out our next step.”

Rubbing my forehead, I wonder how the fuck this is gonna go down. We all knew things would come to an end with Paulie, but none of us thought it would be happening this quickly. “Just go get your woman, and the rest can wait.”

“You going back to the city?”

“Yeah, I have a few things to take care of before everyone gets to town.”

“Don’t go off half cocked, Justin. Wait for us to meet.”