Page 60 of Rebel

I sank into a chair, the leather creaking under my weight.“We grew up in the same neighborhood, but I was much older,” I said, surprising myself with the words.I didn’t talk about the past.Ever.But Rio deserved to know.“Same block.His dad was gone.Mom worked nights.I’d help him with his homework, made sure he was safe.”

Rio turned from the window, leaned against the wall.Listening.

“My dad was a mechanic.Good one, when he was sober.After my mom died, he crawled into a bottle and never really came out.Java’s mom tried to help.Invited me for dinner.Made sure I knew how to cook, wash clothes.The basics.But she had three jobs and her own issues to worry about.”

“Was Java already born?”Rio asked.

“He was a baby.His mom gave him little sisters over the next few years.They died.Car accident.Drunk driver.Java was fifteen.”I stared at my hands.My father’s hands.“That’s when everything really went to shit.His mom checked out -- mentally, I mean.Started taking pills.Java nearly dropped out of school, but I convinced him to stick it out.”

Rio pushed off from the wall, came to stand in front of me.Close enough to touch, but she didn’t.Just stood there, her presence like an anchor.

“My dad’s drinking got worse before I turned eighteen,” I continued.“Started getting mean with it.I’d stay out as late as I could.I started running with a local crew.Nothing serious at first.Selling weed to rich kids from the suburbs.Boosting car stereos.Stupid shit.”

“When did you join the Devils?”she asked.

“I was in my twenties.”I reached for my beer again, swallowed the last of it.“Java joined much later.He was in the Army, like you.Except he’d been in a lot longer, until an IED took his legs.”

“And your dad?He still alive?”

“Wrapped his truck around a tree two days after my eighteenth birthday.”I said it flatly.No emotion.Ancient history.“Closed casket.I didn’t cry.Java’s mom was the only one who stood with me at the funeral.I’d seen her around the neighborhood, helped carrying groceries in for her a few times.Mowed her lawn a time or two.Dad didn’t exactly have a lot of friends by then.”

Rio moved then, closing the distance between us.She reached out, her fingers hovering over the bruise on my jaw.Not quite touching.“You look like him,” she said.“Java.Around the eyes.”

“We’re not related.”

“Doesn’t matter.You’re brothers.”

Something in my chest cracked open.A fault line I’d been ignoring for years.“Yeah,” I managed.“We are.He’s the kid brother I never had.”

Her hand finally made contact, cool fingers against my hot skin.I had to fight not to lean into it like a starving man.

“We’re going after him,” she said.Not a question.

“Club may have to take a vote.Or Charming may decide we’ve risked enough already.”

Her eyes hardened.“Fuck the vote.”

“Rio --”

“No.”She stepped back, and I felt the loss of her touch like a physical thing.“You know what they’ll decide.They’ll say it’s too risky.That one man isn’t worth endangering the whole club.They’ll say we should hit the Morettis again another way, another time.You know as well as I do, there’s no way that hit was all about getting Java back.Charming is focused on more than our brother.And I get it.To some extent.”

She wasn’t wrong.I’d sat through enough church meetings to know exactly how it would go.Devil’s Boneyard protected their own -- but sometimes the cost got too high.Like when Ashes went missing.

“He’d come for you,” she said.Her voice had dropped, that Georgia drawl thickening with emotion she’d never admit to.“If it was you they had, Java would go in guns blazing.”

Also true.Java was loyal to a fault.

“I don’t know where they’d take him,” I said quietly.

Rio’s eyes locked on mine.“What about the old mill?I saw it on my way into town.Even then, I thought it looked like a bad guy hideout you’d see in old cartoons.They may not have taken him out of the area.Just away from their known locations.”

I nodded.It was isolated.Easily secured.I could see that being an option.

“I can’t ask you to go against the club,” she said.“But at the same time, I don’t think you can live with yourself if you don’t do everything you can to get him back.”

Something passed between us.Understanding.A decision made without words.

Rio’s posture changed subtly.Military precision returning to her spine, her shoulders.Planning mode.“Two of us isn’t enough.We need at least four for a solid team.Two to create a diversion, two to extract.”

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