Page 28 of Jax

“You ready?” Leenie asks. “We have a big day ahead of us.”

That’s news to me. “We do?”

She nods. “I have to do some inventory at the gym and then we’re going to the Ring to help set up for tonight.”

I follow her out of the house while Max gets himself comfortable on the couch. She reaches into a cute purse and pulls out a pair of car keys. Shock ripples through me. I remember what a novelty it was when Jax and Finn’s parents owned a vehicle. “Wait. You guys have a car?”

“Ihave a car.” Leenie grins at me over her shoulder. “The guys don’t like to use it because my brother gave it to me.”

Her brother gave her a car? My brow furrows. Gang guys aren’t known for being wealthy. How in the hell can her brother buy her a damn car?

When we come around the side of the house, the black sedan is sitting close to the house. I don’t understand how I missed it before. It’s the newest thing in the damn neighborhood though I suppose it is obscured by overgrown tree limbs hanging over the rough driveway. In years past, their dad’s rusty old hatchback that sputtered sat in this same place.

“If they don’t like your brother...” I hesitate, not sure if I should get into their business. She may be acting like we’re friends but we’re really not. I’m still enemy number one in the house.

“Well, I don’t know. They don’t dislike him anymore. It’s more like a mutual ignoring of what the other is.”

She laughs to herself, and I shake my head. “I did think it was a little weird that Jax would let a gang member in his house.”

“Begrudgingly,” she acknowledges. “Trust me.”

I trail my fingers over the black paint on the car until I reach the handle. Leenie’s already inside and starting it up, so I pull the door open and get inside. The new car smell hits me in the face, and I have to hold myself back from asking how her brother afforded this thing. The question is on the tip of my tongue waiting to jump off but she’s the only one who’s been nice to me, so I keep my mouth shut so I don’t offend her. Maybe she’s different than I originally had her pegged. I only met Cole briefly—when he threatened me—so maybe they come from money, and I’m not getting how being a Dragon ties into it.

She backs out of the driveway and puts the car in Drive. We’ve only just started rolling forward when she begins talking. “I’m going to give you some unsolicited advice about Jax. One, don’t let him push you around. Two, he’s probably more broken up than you think he is. Three, he’s a really good guy, and if you do fuck him over again, I’ll kill you myself. No gang ties needed,” she mumbles as she takes the next right.

I turn toward her, her rapid-fire advice still hanging in the air. “Okay. Um...”

She laughs at my awkwardness but then gets serious again. “I mean it.”

I run my hands through my hair, feeling the same silky strands from years ago. It’s like I’ve shed my armored skin and can sit in my own again without feeling bad about it. Still, I’m waiting for the moment Psycho decides to check in with me. If I don’t tell him what he wants to hear, I’m in trouble. If I do hurt Jax again— I swallow. It’s not just about Jax anymore. It’s Finn and Leenie and all the other people they have depending on them. It’s the whole business they’ve built.

I wipe my palms off on my borrowed jeans and stare up at the ceiling of the car. I don’t see a way out of this where I get to save the people I care about.. and myself. In the past, I’ve always chosen self-preservation. It’s ingrained in me. “Noted,” I whisper.

“Damn. Did that work?” She smiles to herself. “Jaz tells me I can be scary when I want to be but I really thought you were going to laugh in my face.”

I chuckle softly, something I haven’t been able to do in a while. I know she’s serious though, so I give her a serious answer. “I don’t want to hurt Jax,” I tell her honestly. “I never did.”

She bites her bottom lip as we make our way into the heart of the Heights. We’re in the section of town that the Crew decided to clean up but pretty soon, we’ll be out of it and into reality again. Slowly, I watch the degradation of not only the bones of the city but the people too. In the nice section, people were walking around relatively clean. Now, there are people on the street using dilapidated buildings as back rests. Discarded trash tumbles past them, and I have to look away because it reminds me too much of the most horrible parts of my life.

The first was when I got to the Heights and knew no one and had nothing. A couple of blocks from here was where I hung out almost all day only to find myself back there as soon as K kicked me out of Crew headquarters. Being one of K’s girls wasn’t ideal. I was only a couple of years older than his son for crying out loud but it was better than living on the streets and wondering when my next meal would come.

When will I be able to have a comfortable life like that again but with someone who won’t use me? It’s the only thing I’ve ever wanted but it feels impossible to obtain when it really should be a basic necessity.

Leenie and I are silent for the rest of the car ride even though I can feel her inspecting me all the way up until we pull into a small strip mall. I recognize it from a newspaper someone showed me. It was only a short blip with a grainy picture but I’d bursted with pride that day. Elite Boxing. Jax and Finn’s gym.

I stare up at the sign, my face heating, concentrating in the area behind my eyes as tears gather in the corners. It’s what he’d always wanted. The only thing he’d talked about aside from being a fighter himself.

Sitting here, it hits me then that I’m the weak link and always was. Jax and I were together. We were with it. And yet, who’s the one who actually did something with their life? Certainly not me. If I tell him everything I’ve done, he’ll never be able to look at me the same way. Like Leenie said, he’s a good guy with a heart of gold. He wouldn’t understand what I’ve done to survive.

“Come on,” Leenie urges. “Inventory time.”

Everything in me tells me not to go in there. The parking lot is safer, shielding all of my past wrongs and realizations. I’m the weak one. I’m selfish. There’s something wrong with me. Not them. Obviously.

Then again, Jax may not even have this if it weren’t for me. Big Daddy K didn’t like people playing with his toys. If I’d told him I’d wanted to have sex with Jax, the greatest man I’ve ever known might have ended up in that cemetery outside of town. He wouldn’t have all this if I’d come clean.

I click off my seatbelt and follow Leenie forward, across the parking lot and up onto the sidewalk. As we get closer, the familiar noises send me back to the storage facility. If I close my eyes and focus on the melodic thump of the pads, I could fool myself into thinking that I’m back there, listening to Psycho’s cold, cutting barbs he attacks his guys with.

Elite Boxing isn’t like that. It’s obvious from the moment I first step inside. It has a life to it that the storage facility doesn’t. It has ignition and fire and a pulse.

---