Better When He's Bad

CHAPTER 13 Bax

I SHOULD HAVE KNOWN Gus knew more than he was letting on. That old coot didn’t let anything get by him, and I should’ve been more clued in by the fact that he wasn’t more alarmed by Race’s disappearance than he was. As it turned out, my friend was hiding out in the apartment Gus kept above the garage for personal reasons. Reasons that involved more than one girlfriend and a jealous wife. Race had been right under Novak’s nose all along, so close it was really going to chap his ass when everything played out. Served the bastard right. That’s what happened when any one man tried to play God over so many other people’s lives. I couldn’t wait to laugh in his face and put my boot on the back of his neck.

Of course I was going to have to get the bitter taste of the last look Dovie had given me out of my mouth before I did anything. I could see it in her eyes; she wanted me to ask her to stay with me, to change my mind about going into the lion’s den. I couldn’t do it. Not only because she would be eaten alive if she tried to stay by my side, but because tonight I had come very close to crossing a line I never would have imagined myself crossing. She got under my skin, made me want to make things different, but that wasn’t going to be possible, so I put her in the passenger seat of Race’s cherry ’66 Mustang without a kiss good-bye and closed the door. I watched her eyes turn from the color of the forest to the color of the night sky, and it twisted something up inside my chest so hard, I thought it was going to take me to my knees.

Race watched the entire thing with a frown, and when I told him if anything happened to her I would hold him personally responsible, instead of getting offended or hostile, he just nodded his head solemnly and told me, “I understand, Bax. Be careful.”

There was no such thing as careful when playing Russian roulette with a guy like Novak, so I didn’t bother to respond. I lit up a cigarette and watched as the taillights disappeared around the corner. It was already close to dawn and there was no going back to bed, not after having a gun in my face and the ensuing tussle with Race still thudding in my blood. Plus I felt like I was choking on the disappointment I could feel bleeding off of Dovie as she walked away. I couldn’t pretend like she didn’t matter, but I also couldn’t pretend like I didn’t know she needed something better than what I would end up bringing her way. She didn’t need to spend one second of her time visiting a grave or the penitentiary, and those were about the only two options she was going to get if we kept going the way we were together.

I dug my phone out of my back pocket, and for the third time, which was more than I ever had in my entire life before, called my brother. He didn’t answer right away, so I finished the cigarette and went back up to the now thoroughly trashed apartment. I hadn’t really wanted to hurt Race, but no one was going to pull a gun on me and get off lightly, even if I could understand his displeasure at finding me naked and totally wrapped around his sister. That wasn’t anything a big brother wanted to walk in on.

I was stripped down and getting ready to rinse the entire night away in a scalding shower when my phone decided to ring from the other room. Sighing, I wrapped a towel around my waist and went to answer the callback.

“Now what?”

Titus sounded annoyed and I couldn’t really blame him. He had called off the cavalry when the neighbors had reported the disturbance earlier. He was pissed Race had shown up out of the blue, and even more pissed when I told him about the nine-millimeter wake-up call. I think he was starting to regret forcing this brotherly-bond thing when he knew good and well it only mattered to me as long as I could use it to my advantage.

“I have the flash drive.”

I didn’t think he was going to need any more information than that, and I was right. I heard him suck a breath in.

“Race gave you the video?”

“A copy of it. It’s stored on a hard drive somewhere in Gus’s shop, which is where he’s been this entire time, by the way.”

Titus swore. “Shoulda known that old bastard knew more than he was letting on.”

“That’s what I said when he told me.”

“So you’re going to turn the video over to me so I can arrest Novak.” It wasn’t said as a question.

I scowled at my ragged reflection in the mirror over the bathroom sink. Every single week since I had been let out, I had managed to find myself in some kind of physical altercation. My life was violent, filled with blood and uncertainty, and there was no place in it for a girl like Dovie, even if I already felt like there was a hole where she had been.

“I’m going to take Novak down.”

Silence met the bold declaration, but I expected nothing less. My brother was a law-abiding citizen, a cop, a man who saw things clearly as right or wrong, which is why we could never really operate on the same wavelength. His world was all solid shades of black and white; mine was a muddy gray, tinted with vibrant shades of red and green. Red for blood, green for dirty money.

I was surprised he didn’t immediately launch into a lecture or give me the runaround about how it was the law’s job to handle Novak, to protect the Point. Instead he grumbled something foul and asked, “Wanna grab breakfast in a couple?”

My eyebrows shot up. “Sure, why not.”

We made plans to meet at a diner close to the precinct Titus worked out of, and I finished trying to wash Dovie’s memory and scent off of my skin. The cut on my side was open again and Race had gotten a couple good blows to my ribs, so I was moving a little slower than normal. It wasn’t until I went to get dressed that I realized Dovie had left still wrapped up in my new hoodie. I didn’t want to admit that the idea of her holding on to something of mine made something in my gut settle down. I had never really been possessive of anything in my life, aside from my car and my friendship with Race. Whatever I was feeling for Dovie trumped all of it. It felt like hope and promise and all the things in life I had never imagined would apply to me.

I found a place to leave the Runner where I thought it would be inconspicuous and not draw attention to either me or my brother. Titus was already seated in a booth at the back, a plastic menu covering his face. He flicked the edge of it to the side when I sat down across from him and grunted a greeting at me. He looked tired and older than his twenty-nine years. His bright blue eyes were rimmed in red and his dark hair looked like he had used motor oil and a ceiling fan to style it. He had also ditched his cop wear of a pressed white shirt and tie. The guy sitting across from me looked like he could give me a run for my money in the pit at Nassir’s—or be found riding shotgun next to me in one of my boosted rides. We always kind of looked alike, apart from the eye color, but now there was no denying we were built from the same stock. He looked just as rough and dangerous as I typically did.

The waitress came over and Titus asked her to just leave the pot of coffee she was holding. He ordered a massive breakfast and I just got some bacon and eggs. I wasn’t hungry, I was anxious to get the ball rolling.

“What’s up, Officer King?”

He cut me a look. “Race beat the crap out of you. You got a wicked bruise on the side of your face.”

“I know. He got me in the ribs even worse. Can’t say I blame him. I was all over Dovie, and there were no clothes involved.”

“What’s the story with you and her anyway? She doesn’t really strike me as your type.”

I chomped on a piece of the bacon and gave him a considering look. “How would you know what my type is, Titus? It’s not like you were around when I finally figured out what girls were for.”

He looked at me and frowned, his mug of coffee stilled halfway to his mouth. “Just because I wasn’t around didn’t mean I wasn’t keeping tabs on you. If I hadn’t kept a finger on the pulse of the felonies and misdemeanors of the infamous Shane Baxter, your ass would’ve been in prison a lot sooner than when you turned eighteen.”

I’d had run-ins with the law on and off since I was old enough to remember, but really, luck had always been on my side. Sure, I spent a month or two in juvie and was way more familiar with the back of a squad car than anyone should be, but my record was mostly clean, except for the last big fuckup that had kept me on lockdown for five wasted years.

“Why? Why interfere? Why pretend like I mattered when you were off being supercop? Those two things don’t seem to go hand in hand.”

“Because you’re my little brother and have always been a pain in the ass. I wondered all the time if things would have been different if Mom had managed to get her shit together when you were younger. I wonder if you had never been forced to steal, forced to break the law, if you would’ve just finished school and ended up a regular douchebag like most twenty-three-year-olds.”

I snorted. “Doubt it.”

Titus smiled around the coffee mug. “Yeah, I doubt it too. So about the girl?”

I grunted and leaned back in the booth. “She’s sweet and hot. She grew up the same way I did—rough—but it didn’t seem to touch her at all. She’s as loyal as I have ever seen one person be, and right now she’s right in the center of this mess with Novak. I sent her off with Race because I don’t know where else she’ll be safe. Once I let Benny know I have the video, he’ll tell Novak and all the dominoes are going to start to fall.”

“Shane . . .” I was getting real tired of people calling me that. I felt like every time they did, it was chipping away at the solid steel armor that was Bax. “I need you to take one second and look at this from the other side of things for once in your life. I know for you it’s easier to go in with guns blazing, ready to cause a riot, but I’m telling you that isn’t how things are going to work out.”

I flicked my gaze away from him and looked out the grimy window of the diner.

“As soon as Novak knows you have the tape, he’s going to try and destroy everything you care about, and I’m not talking about the Runner.”

“What are you talking about? I don’t think anyone qualifies for that list.”

“You’re an idiot.”

I scowled at him. “Fuck you.”

“Mom, Race, Gus, me, and now the girl. That’s a long enough list to put the ball solidly in Novak’s court. You might not see it, Bax, but you do not exist in the world unaffected by those of us who love you despite yourself.”

I just stared at him. I couldn’t argue his point. I thought it would be me and Novak in one epic showdown, but the reality was probably much gorier, with a far higher body count than I was seeing.

“So what then, Titus? I just hand the video over, and you and the boys in blue waltz in and arrest him for a murder that happened over five years ago? We both know some slick lawyer will get him off before it even goes to trial, and then he’ll just get rid of anyone and everyone who can speak out against him. You tell me how this ends on the side of all that is good and right. The only way to deal with a man like Novak is to get your hands dirty. You know that, Titus.”

“I do, and I also know those hands do not have to be yours, Bax.”

“If not me, then who?”

“I’m not so sure of the answer to that question just yet. You and Race need to keep your heads down, keep the girl out of Benny’s hands until we can come up with a plan that gets everyone out alive. You think you can sit on it for a few days?”

I didn’t want to, but in the harsh light of day, there was no denying he was right.

“Novak knew Race had the tape, he knows about the setup. The only reason Novak hasn’t done anything is because Race’s dad is laundering his dirty cash, and Race doesn’t want his mom dragged into the gutter with the old man, who, by the way, tried to hire Novak to kill Dovie.”

Titus’s eyes flared with a blue fire, and I saw his hands curl into fists on the top of the table between us.

“Who are these people? How did we end up in a place where people’s lives are nothing more than moves on a chessboard?”

I lifted a broad shoulder and let it fall. It made my battered ribs scream at me in protest. “It’s the Point. That’s how it’s always been. You were lucky to make it out before it poisoned you like it did the rest of us.”

He blinked at me and opened and closed his mouth. Then he just gaped at me. “You really believe that, don’t you?”

I tilted my head to the side. “Believe what?”

“That I got out. That I went and lived up on the Hill and nothing from the Point ever touched me. Like my mom wasn’t still a drunk, my brother a thief, and my old man doing life for drugs and murder? You think moving to a place with a different zip code made everything else just go away and turned me into a different person? You’re wrong, Bax. Being a poor kid with a messed up home life in the Point just makes you one sadder story out of a million. Being the poor kid and the charity case on the Hill makes you a freak show and a target. I knew every day I didn’t belong, knew I was never going to be anything more than some schmuck from the ghetto that everyone looked down on and pitied.”

I didn’t know what to say to that. For the longest time I thought Titus had left me, left us, to fend for ourselves. I never thought about his side of things. Like the rest of us, he had done what he needed to do in order to survive. Just like Dovie had so eloquently tried to point out to me. Thinking about her made my stomach drop and that open place in the center of my chest twist up and release like a car accelerating at full speed. She hadn’t even been out of my life for a full day, and I could already feel the loss, which made sending her off with Race the right thing. If I had to do time again, there was no way I would make it with Dovie Pryce living under my skin. The absence of her while I was on the inside would make me go crazy.

“And yet you managed to come out of it a verified good guy with a shiny badge and everything.” I didn’t bother to keep the sarcasm out of my tone.

“What else was I supposed to do? You were always in trouble with the cops, my dad is a goddamn drug kingpin and killer . . . the only way to separate myself from all of that was to become a cop. There aren’t enough of us out there who can walk on both sides of the street. I can. I know people from the Hill are just as crooked, just as twisted, as people from the Point, and a broken law is a broken law, I don’t care who is breaking it. I put criminals in jail, Bax. You know that better than anyone.”

“Is that how you see me, Titus? I’m just one more criminal in a city overrun with them?”

He sighed and pushed his empty plate to the side. “No. You’re my little brother, but you’re also an asshole who has a penchant for getting into the worst kind of trouble. I wish you weren’t so good with cars, especially the ones that don’t belong to you, but I have never blamed you for doing what you had to do back then.”

“I wanted out, you know?” I fiddled with the edge of my fork. “That’s why Novak was trying to set me up for the murder of the old guy who owned the Aston Martin. It was getting old being yanked around. Sure, the money was nice and the cars were enough to leave me with a hard-on for days, but I knew it was going to go bad. I wanted out before I took Race down with me.”

“Why couldn’t you have wanted out before you went down? Bax, come on, you gotta start thinking about the big picture.”

“What does that mean?” I knew I sounded defensive, but I couldn’t help it. This was probably the longest conversation I had ever had with my brother and I didn’t need a lecture.

He waved a hand in the general direction of my face. “Just look at you. What do you think comes next for a guy with a fucking tattoo on his face? Where does that kind of choice end you up, Bax? What comes next for you? More car theft, more fighting, something else that’s going to put you in a body bag? You need to start looking at what comes after.”

The star was so much a part of me that I couldn’t imagine looking in the mirror each day and not seeing it, but he had a point. It wasn’t like I thought about what putting ink on my face was going to mean for me as an adult or what kind of opportunities it would limit me to, which were just what he said, being a thief and a thug from here on out. I scowled and tossed the fork down on the table.

“What exactly do you think comes after, Titus?” I put my palms flat on the table and leaned closer, so we were staring intently at each other. For the first time, I saw the same core of steel that ran through me reflected back in my brother’s bright blue eyes. “This is my life. This is the Point. Even if we figure out a way to get a handle on Novak, some other piece of shit is going to rise up and take his place. You think I’m going to wake up one day and decide I want to be a banker or a stockbroker? I don’t know what fairy tale you’ve been reading, but that isn’t mine. I’m a criminal, it’s what I know how to do.”

We stared at each other for a long moment until he swore and dug in his pants for his wallet. He tossed some money on the table between us and climbed to his feet. He looked worn out and sad.

“I was hoping the redhead mattered enough that maybe your opinion on that would’ve changed. I saw the way you looked at her. A man doesn’t willingly walk away from a woman who puts that look in his eyes. Give me until the weekend. Let me see what I can come up with regarding the tape. Keep your head low and try not to antagonize Benny or Novak.”

I sucked in a breath between my teeth. “A week is all you’re gonna get. If I have to handle this bloody and messy, I will.”

He lifted a black eyebrow at me. “I know, that’s your whole problem, little brother. I’ll be in touch.”

I watched him walk away and tried not to feel a twinge of envy when he climbed into a perfectly restored ’69 GTO. I had built a pretty strong foundation of hatred based on the belief that Titus had abandoned me when I was younger, and that we had nothing in common after he became one of the Hill elite. When he had arrested me five years ago, I was convinced he was trying to teach me a lesson, to prove that he was better than me, but now I wasn’t so sure. Just like I wasn’t so sure what my life was going to look like if I managed to make it out of this confrontation with Novak alive and a free man. I was so certain that this was the end of the road for me that I never had given a second thought to what might come next.

Irritated that Titus had managed to get so expertly under my skin, I slid out of the booth and headed to my own car. I was going to go find Nassir and have him set up another fight for me. I had too much energy, too much stuff buzzing around under my skin, and I needed a physical way to burn it off. Otherwise, there was a pretty good chance I was going to throw caution and good sense to the wind and say “the hell with it,” and go find Dovie and bury myself inside her until it burned us both alive. Inherently, I knew that was a far more dangerous option than letting Nassir find some ’roided-up meathead to take a few cheap shots at me.

I was racing down the mostly empty streets, since it was still too early for most of the city to be up and active, when my phone rang. Since only a few people had the number for the disposable unit, I answered it without looking.

“Yeah?”

“What did you do to my sister, Bax?”

I choked back a laugh and wheeled the car to a spot in front of the rickety-looking building that held all Nassir’s dirty little secrets.

“I don’t think you really want me to answer that question, Race.” He didn’t, because I could recall with startling clarity every touch, every kiss, every whimper and moan that I had elicited out of her pretty mouth over the last few weeks.

He swore at me. “That’s not what I meant. She used to be reasonable and understanding. The group home wants her to come in this weekend and I told her it was too dangerous right now. She won’t listen. She agreed to get her shift at the restaurant covered and skip school for the week, but she won’t relent on the group home. Before I left, she used to just take my suggestions and roll with it because she knows I always have her best interests in mind. So I repeat, what did you do to her?”

I climbed out of the car and stuck a smoke between my lips. I leaned a hip on the door and squinted at the ramshackle building.

“Your sister was born into the life, Race. You fell into it by accident because of me, but Dovie . . .”—I had to clear my throat—“she has the streets in her blood. I think spending time with me made her remember how tough she has to be to survive out here. She’ll be fine, just keep an eye on her. I’ll make sure nothing happens to her at the house this weekend.”

“I thought you were going to throw the gauntlet down with Novak?”

“Titus convinced me to give him some time with it.”

Race snorted. “And you actually listened? Maybe I should be asking what my sister did to you.”

“She makes me want to think that even the bad guy can be a good guy when he needs to be. She’ll be fine, Race. It can’t happen any other way or else I’m going to take this godforsaken city apart brick by brick in order to make it right.”

He was quiet for a long enough amount of time that I thought that maybe he had hung up on me. I started to make my way to the staircase that led to the inner sanctum.

“Well, shit, Bax. You’re in love with her.”

I finally lit the cigarette that was dangling out of my mouth and wished I had my hoodie so I could pull it up over my head.

“She matters more than I wish she did.”

He grumbled something at me that I wasn’t paying any attention to. “Hey, are you ever going to forgive me for what happened that night?”

The quick change in subject jerked me back to the present as I punched in the code to open the heavy steel door.

“Probably. It sucks, and doing hard time for five years isn’t something that’s easy to forgive, but you’re my only friend in the world, Race.” I blew out a cloud of smoke and squinted through the haze. “Someone needs to miss me when I’m not around anymore. Plus, I banged your sister, so that kind of makes us even.”

“Don’t say that crap, Bax. You seriously think Dovie is just going to move on, just pretend like you weren’t a part of her life? If so, you don’t know her for shit, and I knew it last night, even though it pissed me off, that there was more going on than you just hooking up with her.”

I flinched involuntarily at his harsh tone.

“It’s for the best. Look, I gotta go. I’m trying to hook up something with Nassir.”

“What? Why? I didn’t hand your ass to you thoroughly enough last night? You need another beating?”

I barked out a dry laugh and maneuvered my way through the narrow hallway that led into the club. It was bound to be empty this early, but I knew Nassir would be around. He did all his actual, legitimate business, what little of it there was, during the day.

“Gotta make a living somehow.”

“Dovie told me you cleaned Nassir out on the last fight, so don’t pull that with me, Bax. It’s been a while, but I rode shotgun with you for a long time.”

“Don’t tell Dovie that I’m gonna keep an eye on her this weekend. She’ll be upset.”

“No, she won’t, which is why you’re out there looking to get your ass kicked, isn’t it?”

“I’ll talk to you later, Race. I gave Titus a week. After that, I’m opening the gates of hell and everybody better be ready for what comes crawling out.”

“You would burn the entire city down just to spite yourself, Bax.”

“I would.”

“Then I guess some things never change, even with age and wisdom. Feel free to kick Nassir in the nuts for me.”

I hung up and stuck the phone in my back pocket. The answer to his question of what his sister had done to me was too long and too involved for me to try and break it down. I had always been a guy who was comfortable in my skin, in the knowledge that I was what I was, no more or no less. I made it day to day understanding the path I chose to walk in life only had a couple of tragic endings, but I had so few attachments, so few emotional entanglements, it had never mattered before. Now . . . now the idea of disappointing a certain redhead, of leaving her with the knowledge of just how destructive and terrible I could be, left an oily and thick feeling all over the inside of me.