Page 105 of Hard to Love
Now, only tomorrow would tell if he was willing to give it back.
Chapter Thirty
The sun was just peeking over a neighboring house when Nic plopped down on Raylene’s back porch steps beside Alex. After he and Greer had made love early this morning, he hadn’t been able to get back to sleep. Something about emotions and thoughts roller-derbying through his head had that effect. They’d all been throwing elbows, trying to trip one another, and generally going full contact in there. Where was the fucking penalty box when he needed one?
“Guess you want me to say thank you for getting Maria José out of there.” His brother’s resentful teenage attitude was already thick this morning.
“I don’t want you to do anything.”
“What does that mean?”
Alex flopped back onto the porch and covered his eyes with a forearm. “Just what I said.”
“You’re not gonna keep her, are you?”
“She’s not a fucking puppy,” Alex said, letting all his weariness and uncertainty ride his words.
“You didn’t know she was a girl. That makes things different.”
“How long have you been in love with her?”
“It’s not like that—”
Alex jackknifed up and grabbed his brother by the shirt. “You can lie to yourself all you want. But I’m done withthat bullshit in my life.”
“Shit.” Nicolás swiped a hand across his face. “I’ve been looking out for her since the first time I saw her hanging off the side of a forty-foot-tall warehouse.”
“That why you joined the Tejanos Pintados?”
“She woulda killed herself.” Nicolás jumped up and stalked over to the basketball goal near Raylene’s two-story detached garage.
Jesus, it was hard to be pissed at the kid for looking after what he considered to be his. Alex pushed himself off the porch and headed for the basketball goal to grab the ball that he knew, from his short stay here, was in a trunk holding a variety of sports equipment. He palmed it, feeling the weight and the air pressure of the ball. Then he did a chest pass to Nic.
The kid was a monster on offense, shucking and jiving trying to shake Alex’s rusty defense. He’d scored a half-dozen points before Alex was even able to rebound the ball. With his bigger body, he was able to bulldoze Nic and make a few.
A little more back and forth like that and the score was tied 30 to 30. Sweat was dripping down Alex’s face and scorching his eyeballs. Nic was breathing heavy, but he’d barely sweated through his T-shirt. “What’s the matter,” he jeered, “the old man can’t take it?”
Alex jabbed him with an elbow and stole the ball.
“Hey,” Nic protested, “that’s bullshit.”
“Lotta things in this world are bullshit.”
They jockeyed back and forth before Nic caught Alex in the stomach with his shoulder and hammered the breath out of him. With Alex sucking wind, Nic made an easy layup. “You did what you had to do for her. You gave Ruben the finger to protect Greer. Figured you’dunderstand about Maria José.”
Oh, Jesus, did he understand. But Nic was only seeing part of the story. “I didn’t go to Ruben because of Greer. She came after me.”
“Then why were you there?”
“To get you the fuck out.”
“I can take care of myself.”
Alex popped the ball out of Nic’s slack hands. “That kind of cocky attitude will get you killed.”
“I’m not you, and I’m not Javi.”
Rather than take the easy shot, Alex bounced the ball off the back of his brother’s head. “You were heading down the same dumb-ass path.”
