Tara
The cottage at the edge of the Hayle property is a tiny one-bedroom shack with a red door, a brick facade, and creeping vines growing up into the gutters. A rain barrel sits out front collecting whatever water falls in the desert, which isn’t much, and dozens of gardening implements are scattered around in the shade of the nearby shed’s overhang, with more tools inside.
At least it’s cool in my little house. It’s been mine for years, ever since I begged Cait’s Dad for a job and he allowed me to stay here while I got clean. I drifted into the gardening position, and that’s been my life ever since—though the old man’s tolerance and leniency didn’t last for long.
Still, this place is my home, or at least the closest thing I have to a home right now. My plants are in little pots along the deep kitchen windowsill. My cups and plates and utensils are nestled in their little drawers and cupboards and my tiny living room is cluttered but cozy with lots of pillows, throw blankets, and a constantly humming ductless AC system. My bedroom isn’t much bigger, but it’s got a decent closet, enough room for a queen bed, and the bathroom was updated in the last century.
Overall, it’s my little escape from the world.
And it feels like Kellen’s invading it.
Even though he hasn’t been back here yet. I dig through an old bin I keep tucked away under my bed while the coffee brews and the sun rises on a comfortable morning until I find the old pictures of me and Cait. I smile to myself, amazed all over again at how young we were. The photos range from when we first met at fourteen, all the way up to our last year together at eighteen. Those final pictures aren’t easy to look at—we’re skinny, strung out, eyes half-glazed, probably high. Before that, we were happy teenage girls.
I still don’t understand how the slide happened.
My hands shake when I put the pictures back and shove them under my bed again. Kellen’s question keeps ringing in my ears and I rub my wrist where he gripped me. His fingers left dark black and blue marks in my skin, and the asshole looked like he wanted to crack my skull open and tongue my brain, and I almost can’t blame him.
From his perspective, I’m the source of his family’s suffering, or at least intimately linked with it.
But from where I’m at, Kellen and his entire psycho family deserves to be dragged through the dirt, beaten, bruised, and left for dead.
There’s a reason Cait picked me up from my parents’ house one night when we were sixteen, took a baggie of little white pills from her purse, and said, you want to forget for a little while?
My only regret is laughing and saying, hell, yes.
I sit down at my kitchen table and try to distract myself. My father moved to Florida after I got clean and now I send them half my paycheck every month to help him make ends meet after a shitty investment nearly wiped out all his savings. I get the pleasure of supporting his new girlfriend, Janet, a girl I dislike with all my power, but I do it anyway because I’m a good daughter. When that’s done, I put the check in a card, put the card in an envelope, and force myself to take it down to the front driveway where I can drop it in the mailbox.
On the way, I slow and stop when I reach the driveway. A big, white van’s parked out front, and three guys are lounging around. I don’t recognize any of them, but a bunch of stuff is piled up on the ground: furniture, luggage, big paintings. The guys are all in jeans and shirts, talking to each other quietly, laughing about something, and as I stand there staring at them through the bushes, Kellen comes out from the front, picks up a chair, and carries it inside.
The guys get up and start helping. I watch, transfixed. Kellen’s moving into the manor house and bringing what looks like an entire apartment’s worth of stuff into one of the suites upstairs. The guys helping him must be his friends, because they’re all laughing and joking.
I shake my head and hurry away. Why the hell is Kellen moving back into the manor now? I know his father’s dead, but he’s been away a long time. Hugh’s taken over in the intervening years and I can’t imagine that snake letting Kellen muscle into his territory, regardless of whether Kellen is the first-born son of Orin or not.
I drop my letter off and hurry back to my cottage. I should get working soon—some of the bushes need pruning and I have some flowers I want to plant in the side bed—but before I get a chance, I spot two figures coming down the path toward me.
It’s Kellen and one of the guys from the van. The stranger is tall, muscular, and covered in tattoos just like Kellen. But his hair is a rusty, dark, coppery red, and his eyes are a deep blue. His nose is small and straight and his smile is tense, almost like he’s forcing it. Where Kellen is relaxed and flows, this man seems wound up.
I look around wildly. My place is cozy by my standards—but it’s also a cluttered wreck according to basically everyone that’s ever seen it, which isn’t very many people to be fair, but still. I learned a while back that my standard of neatness doesn’t exactly jive with the average human, and so I don’t let many people into my house.
Instead of letting him knock, I grab my hat, shove it over my head, snatch my work gloves from the peg by the door, and step outside into the heat.
Kellen and his friend stop. I look up, feigning surprise, and based on the smirk Kellen gives me, I don’t think they buy my performance.
“Good morning,” Kellen says. “Heading to work?” His smile gets slightly larger and a jolt of anger runs down my spine. I remember the day before, his fingers digging into my wrist, his rage burning so brightly it almost hurt, and I glance down at the ground. That smile is hiding his real feelings toward me, but I saw the monster lurking inside.
Typical Hayle. Pretty on the exterior but poisoned beneath the skin.
“What do you want, Kellen?”
“Polite as always.” He gestures at his friend. “This is Finn, my business associate.” I look up at that. Finn’s giving me his tense grin.
“Nice to meet you,” Finn says quietly.
Business associateprobably means fellow gangster but I don’t say that out loud.
I nod at Finn and cross my arms. “I’m busy,” I say, heading back to the shed. “Don’t have time to chat.”
Kellen follows and Finn lingers out front, looking in my front windows. I grimace slightly and want to tell him to cut it out, but I doubt he’d listen anyway.