“I don’t think I can.” She was too tense and wound up to sleep.
“Okay, how about you lie back and I’ll tell you the rest.”
“If you don’t want to tell me, it’s fine,” she said, noticing how stiff he was.
Dylan shook his head and sat beside her, resting his back against the headboard. “It’s not that I don’t want to tell you, it’s more that I try hard not to think about that night.”
Tilly snuggled up against his side and just waited.
“My parents were immigrants and poor, but so were most of the people we knew. I met Lucas at school. We both thought of ourselves as basketball stars. Lucas didn’t have a great home life. He had eight brothers and sisters, and his dad drank. His mom was worn down from having too many kids and an asshole of a husband. She was alive, but it was like no one was home. He spent a lot of time at my place.”
He paused for a long moment and Tilly just waited.
“When we reached high school, the basketball coach took a real interest in Lucas. He could see how talented he was. He even helped him get a scholarship to attend basketball camp. That’s where Lucas met Aedan.”
“Aedan is good at basketball?” she asked. Aedan appeared fit, but he didn’t seem athletic.
“Aedan is crap at basketball,” Dylan said with amusement in his voice. “But his parents had the money to send him and they wanted him to become immersed in American culture. They thought basketball camp was a good way for him to meet people since they’d only been in the states a short time. Aedan had the most miserable time of his life. I think Lucas took pity on him. When they got home the three of us started to hang out and Aedan introduced us to Rogan.”
“Was he as scary then as he is now?” she asked.
Dylan laughed. “Not quite. But he still had a presence, if you know what I mean. Rogan’s grandfather immigrated here with nothing and when he died he was one of the richest and most powerful men in the city. Rogan’s grandfather had his finger in numerous businesses. On both sides of the law. He hired a lot of immigrants. He paid his workers well. He took care of them and earned their loyalty.”
“You liked him?”
“I don’t think like is the right word. I knew he was a criminal and he had a hard side to him, but he was also charismatic. And he cared about his family. When he died, things changed for Rogan. His dad took over. He was a hard man and he was out to make as much money as he could. However he could.”
Dylan took a deep breath. “Anyway, my parents had both died within six months of each other and I was staying with an aunt and uncle. They had five kids in a two-bedroom apartment, so I tried to stay out of their way as much as possible. We were all hanging out at Rogan’s house when we overheard some of his father’s men talking about how they needed a stronger street presence to intimidate this rival gang pushing into their territory.
“We thought we were pretty tough. I guess we’d watched one too many gangster movies or something and romanticized it all. Or maybe Lucas and I were just so dirt poor that we wanted something more and we saw this as our way to break out of poverty. Anyway, the three of us took to the streets that night.”
“Three of you? You, Rogan and Lucas?”
“No, me, Aedan and Lucas. Rogan refused to go. We argued with him, but he wouldn’t listen. He didn’t want anything to do with his father’s business. They never got along. God, we were so stupid. I still can’t believe that we actually managed to find a kid from the other gang selling drugs. I think the only reason we scared him off is because there were three of us to his one. We went back and bragged to Rogan about how bad ass we were. So we went out again the next night. Only this time there wasn’t just one skinny kid. There were two of them and his friend had a gun.”
“Oh my God.”
“I still dream about it. I still see that gun pointing at me. We all stood there, frozen. I think they were even younger than we were. I don’t even know if they would have shot at us if Lucas hadn’t run. They looked just as shocked as us as he fell to the ground.”
“Then what happened? Why didn’t they shoot the rest of you?”
“Rogan turned up.”
“Rogan? How? Why?”
“I’m not sure. I never actually asked him. But he yelled at them that he’d called the cops and we could hear sirens. They ran off. Lucas was lying there on the pavement bleeding and we didn’t know what to do. The sirens got closer. Aedan and I were panicking. It was Rogan who held us together. He quickly took off his sweatshirt and folded it up, placing it on Lucas’s stomach. Then he told us to go.”
“What? He told you to leave? Why?”
“Because the cops were getting close. We’d been part of a gang shooting. Things were going to get messy, and the police would be the least of our problems.”
“The other gang?” she asked.
“Yeah, the Seven Sinners. Rogan promised us he had this. I still didn’t want to leave. Lucas was my best friend. Rogan yelled at us, said he couldn’t protect us unless we left. We ran. I have never forgiven myself for that. Lucas died on the way to the hospital. He’d lost too much blood.”
“If you’d stayed it wouldn’t have made any difference.”
“Maybe not. But I would have been there.” He sighed. “The next evening, Rogan’s father turned up on my doorstep. He hands me an envelope full of cash and tells me to get out of town. I tried to protest, but he just glared at me with these cold eyes. He told me that Rogan wanted me to have a chance at a life. He said he didn’t understand why his son cared, but I’d only have this one chance. I took the money. I didn’t know what else to do; I was living in fear of either the cops or the gang finding me. But I couldn’t go without seeing Rogan and Aedan again.”