“Jacob?”Brennan’s tone wakes me up.Brennan’s always seemed fairly unthreatening to me in spite of his reputation, but the way Brennan says that name sounds like a bullet seeking a target.
“Uhm.Yeah.That’s him.Liam’s talking to him now.”
“You tell that hostile asshole you live with he does not touch that kid.I’ll take his hand.”
So many questions.So many.
“Okay, that’s…” The sort of thing Liam would say.How did I end up here, in the middle of the street like a damsel in a weird gang soap opera?“You know what?I’m going to let you tell him yourself.”
So I hand over the phone while Liam keeps the gun in his right hand.He responds in a series of grunts to whatever Brennan’s saying before growling a clipped “You’d fucking better” and returning the gun to its holster.
He hands the phone back to me and then nods to Zed.“We need to move the car.”To Jacob, he adds, “Your guardian felon has asked that I keep an eye on you until he gets here.Which is fine, because I have some questions.”
“He’s not my?—”
“I give zero fucks, Jacob.”
Why does the kid who’s younger than me get called by his name when to Liam I’m always “kid”?
My stomach chooses that moment to rumble again.Loudly.
Liam glances over at me and then points down the street to Gil’s.“Go get your damn burrito.As soon as Brennan gets here, we’ll go home.”
Then he grabs my chin and leans in, whispering for only me to hear.“You didn’t stay where you were supposed to.I owe you another punishment, kid.”
Chapter Twenty-Four
Liam
By the timewe get back to my house, Ravi’s face is unusually red.I think he’s even on the verge of tears.
I’m used to my word being final.I’ve faced down gangs and suicide bombers and armed war generals, but here I am about to be brought low by a nineteen-year-old twink.
“He’s all I have, Liam.Please.”
He’s pissed because I won’t let him go get his damn cat.Furious, in fact.On the inside, I’m already desperate to give him what he wants.Anything to wipe that look from his face.But if I cave now, I know I’ll regret it.
“There’s no way that guy was serious about eating the cat.He can wait.”
“I know, but, Liam, if he’s impatient, he could let it go or give it away or, I don’t know, get mad and throw it across the room.I went to school with a kid whose father did that to their dog when he was drunk, and he had permanent neurological damage.You’ve seen things like that happen.I know you have.”
Whatever issues I had with Corvus’s oversized employee, he was not hot-headed.That much I’m sure of, or we’d be on the way to the damn club.Right now, I have half a day left with Ravi, and I intend to use it.
“He’ll be fine for a few more hours.I gave you my answer.”
Waiting isn’t going to kill him.It really isn’t.The way he falls silent, I know he knows I’m right.He may not like it, but he knows.Self-loathing swells in my chest all the same.
I pull up in front of the house.“Get inside,” I order.
He trudges up the front steps with his shoulders hunched.The defeat on his face is enough to make my insides squirm, and that’s before he opens his mouth again.“Liam, please.I’ll do anything.He’s the only thing in my life that loves me.Doesn’t that matter at all?”
I don’t expect the way that makes my heart sink.
There are a lot of ways I could answer.Reminding him he’s got friends.Reminding him a kitten probably doesn’t love him so much as see him as a safe and reliable source of food.
Telling him I’m right fucking here and I love him?That would open a can of worms I can never close.
Even though I do.