Page 91 of Love Thy Brother
“That’ll do it. Buzz me when you’re ready to leave.” Decoy dipped his chin and disappeared.
I let my frustration out in a noisy breath and sagged against River, just for a moment. “Sorry, mate.”
“I’m not your mate.”
“No? What if I need one?”
“Then we need to be swans. Or foxes. Now calm the fuck down. Don’t make me the sane one.”
He let me go, kissed my cheek, and slipped into the house. I followed, dragging my wet feet, the cold seeping into my bones as I shut the door behind me and leaned against it.
Oscar came out of the kitchen and regarded us. “Is there something I should know?”
He was talking to River more than me.
I answered him anyway. “Probably.”
“No,” River snapped at the same time.
Oscar ventured closer and knocked his fist to River’s shoulder. “Is there trouble with the club?”
River sighed. “Kind of.”
“It’s my fault,” I piped up. “I thumped someone I shouldn’t have and it’s trying to bite me on the arse.”
“Here? In Porth Luck?”
“He chucked Jonsey over the sea wall,” River supplied.
“Oh.” Oscar’s lips twitched in the closest to malice I’d ever seen in him. “That is not fair on the fish. But why is this a problem for your club? He is—how do you say it?”
“A scrote?”
Oscar considered that the same way Alexei sometimes did when we threw him slang he’d never heard before. “I don’t know that word. But if it means weak and stupid, then it works for me. Why are you afraid of him?”
“It’s not about him.” I leaned harder against the door. “We don’t know who he works for, and they might come after me to make a point.”
“You cannot just go home by yourself?”
Valid. If I was the problem, it was the easiest solution for me to fuck the fuck off and not come back. But there were a few snags with that solution.
One: we didn’t know for sure Jonsey McScumbag was the problem.
Two: Douchy McVanface outside was still fucking there.
Andthree: there was nothing on earth that could pull me from River right now. Every time I thought about taking two steps back from him, something inside me short-circuited, and if the last six minutes had proved anything, it was that I didn’t have much rope left. “River stays with me.”
Issuing commands wasn’t any more my style than daylight-raging head stomps, but I said what I said, and Oscar made no further comment.
He ducked back into the kitchen. I braced myself for River’s fury, but Oscar was back before I could take a breath, keys in one hand, my ma’s macaroni in the other. “I will take Aras to see my brother in Peterborough. When we come back, I am away for a few weeks. If you need more time, just tell me.”
“We don’t need any time,” River protested. “Nothing’s going to happen.”
“Can you promise me that? On my son’s life?” Oscar swung his gaze back to me. “Canyou?”
I couldn’t. Neither could River and it hit him hard. He hung his head, misery slumping his shoulders, and I felt fuckingterrible.If Cam was right, this was all my fault. And even if he wasn’t, we should’ve done more to protect River. Enough that no cunt had ever had the stones to come at him. “I’m sorry, man. We’re fixing it, I promise.”
Oscar nodded and turned to River, embracing him with one big arm. “You warned me that being your friend was dangerous. And I accepted that as much as you accepted sharing your house with a tiny human who wipes jam on the walls. You just need to tell me the truth when something happens. If you do this, everything will always be okay.”
