Page 23 of No Saint
“Well, it’s just a month. Don’t get all bent out of shape over some girl you haven’t dated for years.”
I wasn’t bent out of shape. I just didn’t want her there. At least that was what I’d convinced myself. And like he had any room to talk. “You have a mental breakdown every time you and Cassie break up.”
“I do not.”
I deadpanned him.
“Whatever, man. That girl could make a celibate monk crazy.” He stood up. “Just calm your dick. Four weeks will fly by.”
“Where are you going?”
“To take a shit.”
The back door banged shut, and Dog scampered across the yard. I took another drag from the joint, then snuffed it out on the electrical tape wound around the arm of the lawn chair, right above my dad’s faded initials written in semi-permanent marker. He and my mom used to take those same chairs to the recreation field. They’d set them up by the edge of the turf, drinking beers while they watched me play Pee Wee football.
After mom died, he’d moved to sitting on the bleachers. Dad would never have admitted it, but I’m pretty sure the thought of having only one of those chairs on the field killed him as much as it did me. Eventually, he bungee-corded them to the roof of our trailer. I’d sometimes hear him up there, talking to that empty chair like she could hear him. It took me a good two years before I started going up there, too. I both loved and hated it.
I stayed outside for a good twenty minutes, trying to push the thoughts of Dad and Jade out of my head. Just when I was about to go back inside, someone pulled up to the back gate. Dog got up from where he’d been sunbathing, belly up, and let out a low grumble.
Cassie came through the gate and cut across the yard, Wal-E-Mart bags in hand. The only acknowledgement she gave me was a middle finger on her way up the steps.
“And that’s what we call insufferable,” I mumbled to Dog.
As soon as the back door slammed shut, unintelligible shouting started. This was day one. Surely to God, Rogue would get fed up before they had served their time.
I settled back in the chair, staying right the hell there. Then, blissful silence.
Dog hopped onto the chair beside me, looking back at the house when the door opened again. What now? With any luck, that would be Cassie, bags packed and Jade in tow.
Dog’s curled tail slowly wagged before my algebra notebook dropped to my lap. Then the stupid bickering inside started again.
“I don’t know what’s more unbelievable,” Jade said, staring back at the house. “The fact that he thinks he’ll last a month or the fact that she thought taking those pills would be the pièce de résistance to her so-called relationship with that dickhead.”
I could believe Cassie had taken those pills to piss off Rogue, but Jade… She was the same girl who, three years ago, nearly had a breakdown in the middle of Wal-E-Mart because Hendrix had stolen a ten-dollar yard flamingo. The only “criminal” thing she’d done in her life was set fire to the prick-ass rich kid’s high school football field. Which they’d deserved every bit of, considering one of them had drugged her. Was she that mad over shit-for-brain’s car that she’d taken the drugs to get me back? The thought pissed me off, but I had to know…
“Cassie did it to annoy Rogue.” I took a puff. “Why’d you do it?”
She glared at me. “Certainly not to piss you off, if that’s what you’re thinking.”
Well, she sure as hell seemed defensive about it. I felt my gaze narrow through the wisps of smoke. Hers narrowed right back.
“Okay, so, again. Why did you do it, Jade?”
“Why do people like us ever steal anything, Wolf? Or maybe you’ve forgotten…” She waved a hand toward the house. “Living in your nice house, with your rich friend. A scholarship… Your drug business.”
Nice house? Sure, the place was better than any place I’d lived in, but it was still a shithole. Peeling wallpaper, leaningfloors. She just assumed I no longer had financial problems because of what? Rogue? He didn’t pay my way. I earned it.
“Give me a fucking break.”
“Well, I could do with a break, but here I am playing maid to a bunch of slobs.” She threw her hands out to the sides, studying me. “Why did you even agree to this, Wolf? I know damn well that you don’t want me in your life any more than I want to be here.”
I hated how those words stung.
“You could have just let us pay you back.”
What did she think we were? The Bank of Hard Knocks? “That’s not how this crap works, Jade.” I dropped the notebook to the ground. “You steal from most drug dealers and they’ll put a bullet in your head. Woman or not.”
“Rogue isn’t Al Capone. That—” she pointed toward the house—“is Rogue’s petty way to get one up on Cassie.”
