Page 20 of Cage's Downfall

“I didn’t mean to block Hawk out. You know they say the memories you have when you are younger stay with you for the rest of your life.” She paused. “Jacob thinks I don’t remember him locking me in cupboards while mom and dad fought. But I remember.”

I saw her eyes tear up and my hand went to hers.

“You know I grieved for a dad I didn’t really have. That was my downfall. Then Hawk stepped in, and he was the father I had been grieving, thinking I had. That I had lost. When really…” She hesitated, inhaling on the cigarette. “Hawk was, is, every bit of the father I needed.” She ran a hand down her ponytail. “Took me a few months and a conversation with Jacob to realize that.”

“Does what the club did settle with you better now?” I wanted to know what she was getting at, was she stepping back into the club life. Away from the bloody gangsters.

“No and yes. The older I get, the more I see grey.”

I knew exactly what she was talking about. The grey areas of life. The things that weren’t black and white. It got under my skin that a woman like Autumn, whose future was bright, saw the grey. Men like me should see it, but women like her should still be seeing black and white.

“Yeah well that ain’t right,” I muttered- not liking the fact she was in the position she was in. Picking between ya father and ya step father mustn’t be fucking easy. Especially when one killed the other.

She butted the cigarette out, and picked up my packet, lighting one up and handing it back to me. “Sorry for stealing your smoke.” She had a sly smile on her face. And I couldn’t help but think that was the cutest expression she had in her.

“Come here.”

She moved, placing a leg over me. Straddling me. The cigarette was burning in my left hand while I ran my knuckles down her bare arm with my free hand.

“I’d love to say I won’t do wrong by you Autumn- but we both know that will be a lie. I’ll always let you down,” I murmured, my knuckles pausing on her arm. Looking up at her, I see a perfect smile on her face, which is baffling to me, considering.

“That’s perhaps the most honest thing you’ve ever told me,” she said cupping my face. “But that let down is a two-way street.”

I dropped the cigarette in the ashtray, having my preferred drug of choice on my lap. I leaned up and kissed her lips, the best bit? She kissed me back.

Chapter 11

Autumn

Looking at the two storey brick house in front of me I recall most of my childhood here. Hawk house had been released after being seized. Only took a good two years for it to be released.

The police once again doing a number on it because of the club.

I brought my fist to the wooden door, waiting for him to answer. He was on a bender which usually meant vodka and a hell of a lot of it.

The door opened. And my eyes took in the man that was my step father.

“Hi,” I forced out, suddenly feeling nervous. The club said Hawk had disappeared from clubs eyes altogether. No one knew what was going on with him.

“Something wrong?” he looked at me for a reason for me being here.

“Yeah there is,” I said putting my hands in my jacket. “My father disappeared. I was concerned.”

He scoffed.

“Come on Hawk, let me in?”

His expression of sourness didn’t drop but he opened the door for me to walk in. I immediately took the house in that was a mess. I never remembered it like this. But then my eyes landed on the coffee table.

Everyone else would just see a coffee table.

I saw a statement of love.

Jacob and I were running in Hawk’s house. Dad was still alive at this point, I tripped hitting my head on the coffee table.

Hawk felt guilty for it.

Wasn’t his fault. Perhaps it was Jacob’s for stealing my latest toy that Hawk had given me.

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