Campbell (31 page)

After tossing and turning for a couple of hours, he decided to get some fresh air, and after carefully avoiding waking Chloe on the couch, went upstairs and let himself into the screen veranda. The night was clear, the sky awash with stars, and he sat down on the old porch swing, careful not to make a sound
 

The screen door creaked open a few minutes later, and Andrew, who scared the shit out of Tal, sat down beside him. Tal froze, unsure if he’d come to kill him or share a bit of the crisp night air.
 

“My sister trusts you,” Andrew said quietly, stretching his long legs out in front of him. “That’s why you’re allowed to sleep in this house, eat meals with us. I don’t give a shit who you are in West. Here, that’s the only thing that matters.”

Tal nodded. “I know.”

“And if you betray her, or any of us, I’ll hunt you down and I’ll kill you, but not the easy way. I’ll make every second before your body gives up more painful than the one before it.”

His tone was terrifyingly even.
 

“I want to work with her,” Tal stammered. “I…won’t.”

Andrew stood. “Then you and I, we won’t have a problem.”

Tal had never felt so much acceptance in such a terrifying situation. “Thanks, man.”

“By the way, I called your boy, Connor, to tell him you were gone. He doesn’t give a shit about you,” he reached for the door to go inside. “Watch your back.”

When he went back to bed and thought about it, Tal decided Andrew telling him that was possibly the nicest thing he’d ever done for anyone outside his family, and Tal should probably take his words seriously. It was Zoey that woke him up the next morning, freshly showered and perky in a way that drew Tal to a conclusion that bothered him more than he’d imagined it would.

“I’m making breakfast. You like eggs? I’m going to make them with cheese,” she said, her expression bliss-soaked. “I make good eggs.”

Their eyes met, and Tal had the briefest flash of Zoey on her knees in front of him the week before. That made him more depressed somehow.
 

“Yeah, sure,” he muttered, pulling the blanket back around himself.

“Thanks. For keeping her safe. She…told me,” Zoey said, her arms wrapped tightly around her. “She told me that she probably wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for you.”

Her sincere gratitude made it very hard to hate Zoey as he wanted to, and in that moment, logic won out, and he decided he had to let whatever he was feeling for Lucy Campbell stay where they’d agreed to leave it.

In the Midwest.
 

“I’ll be up in a few,” he said, putting on a smile. “Thanks. For waking me up.”

“No problem,” she said brightly. “See you in a bit.”

Lucy wasn’t at breakfast. It was Tal, Bull, Zoey, and Chloe—possibly the most awkward group of people to ever eat together.
 

“Lucy went to check on her cows,” Zoey explained. “They’re a few miles up the road. She said she’d see you before you go.”

Tal nodded as he dug into the best eggs he’d ever eaten, and the anxiety of returning home hit him for the first time.

It was about noon when the pilots Connor sent arrived, touching down not far from the Campbell house. Andrew brought Rosa to the plane and she boarded immediately. Tal thought about what it would seem like if he asked them to wait for Lucy, so he could say goodbye, but he opted not to in the hopes that his interest in her wouldn’t be too obvious and something that could be spun and used against him.
 

It turned out, Tal didn’t need to over-think it.
 

She stomped up, boots covered in mud, and gave him the most genuine smile he’d ever seen just as they started the engine. “I’ll be in touch, and you be in touch too,” she shouted over the airplane motor. “Call me!”

“I will,” Tal shouted in return. “Thanks. For everything.”

Lucy nodded and they both let out a heavy sigh. “You too.”

They stood there, and Tal thought of all the things he could possibly say that might have changed their situation. All the seemingly simple words from every romantic comedy he’d seen, all the lines from classic literature. Nothing fit in that moment. No words that summed up the beginnings of a real affection deeper than anything he’d experienced before. Nothing that said that, in the long run, it didn’t matter if she felt the same, it was just enough for her to know that he did.
 

Instead of risking it by opening his mouth and blurting out the wrong thing, he simply pulled her into his arms and squeezed her tight, hopeful that his unspoken thoughts might pass through their clothes, and skin, and all that other stuff that got in the way, and eventually hit her heart.
 

“If you need anything...” she shouted as she squeezed him back just as hard. “Ask.”

Tal nodded against her shoulder, unable to fight the smile on his face at her firm embrace. “You too.”

Chapter 18

September 2002

Los Angeles, West

Rika Minami grew up in Silicon Valley, far away from the glitz and glamour of Hollywood. Her parents had worked hard to ensure that she was successful and always sat squarely at the top of her class. She’d taken violin lessons, and riding lessons, and gone to math camp every summer since she was five.

None of that mattered, she decided, as she straddled a geeky kid’s lap, in an old tattoo parlor in Long Beach. All that mattered in that moment was that she really, really wanted a tongue ring and he swore he knew how to do it.
 

“You know those get infected,” a voice that was most certainly attached to a smirk said. Rika turned around to see a big Mexican kid, probably her age, in a wife-beater and a pair of too-big jeans, leaning in the doorframe. “My cousin got him to do one and she almost lost her tongue.”

“Fuck off, Juan,” her would-be piercer said. “Lupe was fine.”

Rika’s mouth snapped shut and she climbed off the kid’s lap, much to his disappointment since there was no way he’d get his twenty bucks.
 

Rika had been high for days on weed and pills, wandering with a few of her friends, waiting for something interesting to happen, and the boy in the door, he seemed almost heaven-sent.
 

That is, if she’d believed in any of that shit.

“Who are you?” she asked the stranger curiously, looking him square in the eye.
 

“You don’t belong here,” he said firmly, walking up to her. He was tall, with the beginning of adult muscles and a dirt moustache so absurd that it made Rika smile. “You look like you belong at science camp.”

“Math camp,” she corrected, pushing up her glasses. “I used to go to math camp.”

“Come with me,” he said, a grin forming on his serious face as the skinny girl sized him up. “You look like you could use a sandwich.”

Rika decided that it wasn’t likely Juan Vargas played the hero often, but that day he felt like one to her. They sat down on the beach and he vanished for a minute, returning with two
tortas
a distant cousin of his had sold him out of a stand on the beach. She beamed when he offered her one.
 

“This is amazing,” she said through a mouthful of food. “LA isn’t so bad. Better than San Francisco.”

“It’s a mess,” Juan muttered, looking her up and down. “Everyone’s still poor, even though there’s like a tenth the people there were a year ago. Everyone’s getting shot, and fighting.”

“But you’ve got the movies.”

Juan raised his eyebrows. “I work for Connor Wilde.”

“Really? I used to have a thing for him,” she admitted, shaking her head. “When he was in that kid spy movie.”

“And now?”

She shook her head. “He’s so short. I guess he’s doing all right with all the movies he’s making?”

“He’s practically king of the world,” Juan chuckled. “Or you’d think so anyway.”

“What do you do?”

“I drive him around. Act as muscle. That type of shit. I’m learning to fly a plane.” He spread his arms out. “It’s a fucking rush.”

“Cool,” she said, genuinely interested, especially because she couldn’t imagine this kid being friends with Connor Wilde. In her normal straightforward fashion, she asked him, “How do you know Connor Wilde?”

“My mom was his nanny. I’ve known him all my life.”

They ate their sandwiches and stared out over the ocean.

“I’ve been dropping acid every night for a week,” the small girl mumbled, pulling her knees into her chest. “Nothing’s been as nice as this.”

Juan tisked at her, dropping back in the sand. “That stuff will cook your brain.”

She shook her head. “The side effects aren’t long-term.”

“It looks like you’ve been forgetting to eat,” he shrugged. “Where do you stay?”

“We found an abandoned beach house not far from here. We’re from San Fran.”

“You going back?”

She lay back in the sand and closed her eyes. “Not sure. There’s not much there for me anymore. I don’t have any family. I was an only child. My parent’s house is nice, but—”
 

“It doesn’t feel like home without them.”

She nodded. “And when I think back, I’m not sure it ever did. Not like that movie idea of home. It was hard sometimes, being their kid.”

“My mom just wanted me to steer clear of gangs. We were illegals. No math camp for me.” He flopped back in the sand beside her. “I’ve got this house in the Hills. It’s where Stallone used to live before he made it huge. You want to come see? I moved in like a month ago.”

She rolled onto her side and cocked her head at him. “Just to hang?”

“Yeah,” he said, giving her a half grin. “I’ve got lots of movies, and like, seven bedrooms.”

She thought about it for a few minutes, before her mouth turned up into a broad smile.

“Do you know how to make those sandwiches? Can you make me another one?”

October 2012

Los Angeles, West

Connor and Leah were parked in his father’s Bentley at the LAX airstrip when Tal landed. He could see them from the sky, at first a tiny dot, and then bigger and more real. Tal had never imagined feeling so out of sorts about being at home. He’d known he needed a break before he left, but he hadn’t realized that he needed more than that. He needed a change.

“Oh, Tal,” Leah squeaked, wrapping her arms around him as he climbed down the stairs. “It’s so fucking good to see you.”

“We thought you were dead,” Connor said, a grin on his face. “We heard that. From Campbell.”

Tal shook his head. “I don’t think they really knew—“

“Well, we heard Juan was dead, and you were gone, so we assumed, because what else would you assume?” He leaned in for an awkward man hug when Leah was finished. “Good to have you back.”

“Thanks,” Tal nodded, forcing a smile. “It’s good to be back. I’m just...” he exhaled loudly, catching an uncomfortable glance between Leah and Connor. “It’s been a long week.”

“We’ll get you home, man,” Connor said, with what was likely supposed to be a comforting pat on the back. “We don’t have to talk about anything today.”

“Anything what?” Tal searched Connor and Leah’s face and found them guarded. Two brick walls. He’d never seen them with an even similar expression before, and he felt his gut sink.

Connor shook his head. “Just some problems in Old Nevada. You know. The usual. I’m working through it.”

“What does that mean?” Tal asked, as they piled into the Bentley. Vegas was a huge source of revenue for them. “How are you working through it?”

“We’ve been negotiating this week. It’ll be fine. I’ll fill you in when you’ve rested.”
 

Leah shook her head, glancing at Connor. “You can talk about it more later, if you want. Let’s just…I want to get home. You look like shit, Tal.”

Connor didn’t really negotiate, and his tone confirmed that. That, combined with the look he and Leah had exchanged, caused Tal’s stomach to knot further. He didn’t say much on the drive home, and when they dropped Rosa off at her house and then drove the rest of the way to theirs, Tal knew they were in for a long night.
 

Connor lingered in the useless way that normally bothered Leah, not Tal, but that evening, they were both on edge with his presence. Tal knew his reasons, but Leah’s were a mystery, and he dreaded hearing them because his mind had already made up a series of possibilities, none of which would make the situation any better. If Connor had hurt his cousin, Tal would kill him. He knew he was capable now. His best friend asked a series of very concerned questions about Tal’s ordeal, and expressed remorse over Juan, but there was something chillingly superficial about his behavior and tone that drew Tal back to his brief conversation with Andrew Campbell the night before.
 

He finally left around ten, citing Rosa’s desperation for some Wilde as the reason for his departure. Surprisingly, when he left, Leah, her eyes heavy, didn’t have much to say.

“I’m…I’m beat, Tal. I think I’m going to call it a night.” She smiled wearily. “It’s great that you’re back. I…I didn’t know what—”

“What happened, Leah?”

She looked at him like a deer in the headlights. “I’m not sure what—”

“What happened?” he asked firmly. “Because something—“

“He’s just…Connor,” she sighed, her brow tight. “You knew things weren’t good when you left. I guess…I just…I didn’t know how bad they were.”

Tal sat down on the couch and nodded for his cousin to join him “Go on?”

“Just the stuff with Vegas. I…I haven’t wanted to know for a while, and now I do, and it sucks.” She tucked her feet up under her and stared at him for a long minute. “You’re really okay?”

Tal thought about that for a minute. “I’ll be okay. There’s a lot happening out there, Leah.”

Her eyes went wide. “Bad stuff, in the Midwest? You were in the Midwest?”

While different, Tal wasn’t sure anything past his initial kidnapping would qualify as bad. “Not bad. Just not the same as here. Yeah. The Midwest.”

Leah nodded, her eyes troubled. “So, I’m going to go to bed. Tomorrow. We’ll talk tomorrow.”

“Okay,” Tal said, with a nod. “See you in the morning?”