I was too little to know for sure. I’d wait all frigging night to see what my surprise was, but I knew better than to ask. Eventually he’d buy me a burger or pizza.”
The anger and disgust in Justin’s voice made it even harder to hear.
“During another robbery, he told me if anyone saw me, they’d take me away from him and put him in jail. I knew my life wasn’t great, but he was all I had. By the time I was nine or ten, I knew what he was doing. But he’d brainwashed me to believe the world was a shitty place, cops were bad, and we were due the money and other things he stole. I was a badass little prick by then, getting in fights, skipping school. I had no idea what friends were, and I was so broken, I didn’t want to know. I had just turned eleven when he finally got arrested. I wasn’t with him that night. He said he’d hooked up with some other guys and they were pulling a big job. That we’d be rich. I remember sitting at home in a crappy little apartment making plans, thinking of all the things we’d do when we were living like kings.” He lowered his gaze and said, “He killed an innocent man that night. Shot him over a few hundred bucks. That was when I went into foster care.”
“Did you know he’d killed a man?”
He nodded, his jaw tight, eyes still on the sand. “Eventually. The police and social services showed up at the apartment and said he’d been arrested and I had to go with them. Sometime after that I was told what he’d done.”
“Oh God, Justin. Did they let you see him? That’s so young to be taken away. Even though things were horrible with him, it must have been so hard for you.”
“I was too busy trying to figure out how to live in a new place with people I didn’t know or understand to think about him much. My world had been fucked up for so long, I didn’t know what normal was. I didn’t trust people who tried to be nice. I was awful to my foster families and went through two homes before I ended up with Rob and Reba.” He lifted grateful eyes to her and said, “They took me in, and from day one they treated me like I was their kid, while I did everything I could to get the hell away from them. I ran away a hundred times, trying to outrun the hate I had for my life, my father, myself. I felt like it was me against the world, like it always had been. But there was no escape. The Wickeds came after me every damn time I ran—so did the Dark Knights. Blaine was always there with Rob, which shocked the hell out of me because Blaine and I had knock-down, drag-out fights on a near-daily basis. I didn’t trust him, and he sure as hell didn’t trust me.”
He told her a story about Blaine standing up for him at school and how things had changed between them after that. He went on to talk about the things Blaine had said and taught him about friendship and family. He told her stories about his other siblings, too, but they were much younger than him. They’d never had competitive feelings toward him like Blaine had. They’d followed him around as if he were just another brother.
Chloe would never look at any of them the same way again.
Justin went on to explain how the other foster families had punished him for running away and acting out. “I wanted that punishment as a form of penance, but also as a means to keep myself in some kind of warped box so I would remain angry at the world. I thought I was such a badass kid, I could take on the world and win. I never knew how messed up that was until Preacher and Reba came into my life.”
“Preacher? The guy who founded your club? Is that Rob, or a real preacher?”
“That’s Rob’s road name, and it’s what I call him. He is the best role model a guy could ask for. He gave me reasons to find my way out of that self-destructive box, and he did it with patience and sometimes with anger, but never aimed at me. His anger was aimed at the life I’d been born into.