Page 9 of Road to Ruin
“Yeah, just my brother.”
I’m relieved to hear his cousins are staying away. They’re the ones who landed him in prison in the first place, by the sounds of things. He refuses to talk about them very often, so it’s hard to get a proper gauge on the situation, but it seems parts of his extended family are involved with some very dangerous people.
“You could do some part-time study. Go to a community college. You’re a smart guy, Peter.”
“College?” He laughs, looking up at me. “College isn’t for guys like me. Guys like me are made for steel works and construction sites.”
“That’s not true. You make your own decisions in life, don’t you? Why follow a career path prescribed to you by someone else? What someone else thinks you’re capable of?”
He doesn’t say anything for a long time. He clenches and unclenches his jaw, simmering under his own skin. Finally, he says, “It’s not as easy as that. The moment I walk out of those doors into the parking lot, I have responsibilities again. I have commitments. Not the kind that you can just walk away from. Not ever.” His eyes shine brightly, a fevered madness growing in intensity as he continues to stare at me. “When you work for Bastien, you always work for Bastien. There’s no out. There’s no handing in my notice. There’s no polite resignation and a farewell party afterwards. if I decide I want to stop fighting, there’ll be a shotgun or a knife out there with my name on it, and nowhere for me to hide.”
“Fighting?” He’s never mentioned this to me before. It makes sense, though. I know about the underground fighting circuits in New Orleans. I’m also familiar with the name that just tripped carelessly off his tongue: Bastien. Alexander Bastien. The cruel bastard who technically owns the deed to my grandmother’s house, the house I’ve lived in my entire life. If he’s caught up in the Bastien Empire then sadly he’s right. He will be expected to go back to work as soon as he walks out of the prison. Escaping his ties to the most evil family in Louisiana is an almost impossible feat.
“Why have you never told me this before?” I ask softly.
Junior sighs, picking at his fingernails. “What’s the point? Talking about it doesn’t help. It doesn’t get me out.”
My mind is spinning, a thousand thoughts running through my brain, cogs turning frantically. Junior is so dejected. This is the reason why he’s been quiet the past couple of weeks. Because he’s getting out. Most people would be thrilled that they’d served their time and they were getting to go back to their normal lives, but in this particular instance I can understand Junior’s apprehension. For some, prison is a vacation when compared to life working for Alexander Bastien. For some, a life sentence in the Parish is a get-out-of-jail-free card in the most ironic way possible.
A sick, sinking feeling pulls at my insides. Junior thinks in three days’ time, his life is officially over. In some ways, it could be. Bastien’s staff members don’t tend to make it past thirty a lot of the time. But…shit. I try to block the thought from my mind. It won’t stay gone, though. There is a way Junior could be free of the Bastiens. A frightening, terrible way albeit, but still…a way.
I clench my hands into fists under my desk. Junior doesn’t see the action. He’s too caught up in his own thoughts, which is a relief. If he could see the look on my face right now…
He clears his throat. “I’ve made my peace with going back out into the world,” he says softly. “You don’t need to worry about me, okay?”
But I am worried about him.
I am.
