Mess Us Up – Jaxson Kidman Page 0,57

me now.

I touch my pocket and take out my phone.

There’s a second where I look at the counter and see the gun.

I can never hurt Mama.

But she can hurt me.

And she doesn’t need a gun to hurt me.

Just the truth.

There’s silence for a minute or so.

Mama then looks back at me. “Why are you so quiet, Mac?”

I shake my head. “No reason. I have to go. I’m meeting up with Jolie.”

“Bring her over sometime soon,” Mama says.

“I will,” I say.

“Hey, Mac. Don’t worry about Ado. It’ll be taken care of.”

“Trust me, Ado is the last thing on my mind right now,” I say.

I force myself forward and make sure to kiss Mama on the cheek.

Her mind is slipping.

But the truth is coming out.

And I know everything is going to explode.

When I see Jolie standing by her car outside the warehouse, I hurry up to her.

There’s a lot of thoughts rushing through my head as I close in on her.

My hands touch her face and my lips touch her lips.

I shut my eyes and pretend the world doesn’t exist for a few seconds.

She gives me a sense of life.

But I know I give her a sense of death.

Near me, it’s only going to be that. Pain. Risk. Danger. Death.

My thumbs stroke her cheeks.

I can see it in her eyes that whatever happened with her mother wasn’t a good thing.

At the moment, I’m going to hijack all the emotion.

“Get into my car, sweetie,” I whisper. “We have to take a ride. We will talk about everything. But I need you to see something.”

“Okay,” Jolie says. “Are you okay?”

I shake my head.

I kiss her again.

I put my lips to her ear. “Just listen to me, Jolie. Go get into the car.”

She walks away and I face Taz.

“I kept her alive,” he says. “We went to see Violet. That crazy one was going to jump into the ocean and try to swim away. I have someone’s face I have to break too.”

“Hold off on that for a minute,” I say. “If shit ever went bad, you and Les would take the crew, right?”

“What?”

“I would have Les handle the brains. You be the muscle. Are you okay with that?”

“What the fuck are you talking about, Mac?”

“Call Les right now. Get everyone together, minus Ado. Stay some what visible. Okay? Visible, Taz. Be seen. Be heard. Be annoying. Whatever it takes.”

Taz looks at my car, then back to me. “What’s going on?”

“The Ado situation is being handled,” I say. “Everything with Jolie’s parents is handled too. Shit is clearing up finally.”

“Then why do you look ready to kill someone?”

“Don’t worry about that right now, Taz,” I say. “Just keep an eye on the crew. Be loud and visible.”

I start to turn and Taz grabs my shirt. “Mac…”

“Don’t fucking do this,” I say.

“I’m not,” he says. “I get it. I just want you to know, whatever happens, I think I love you, bro.”

“Yeah,” I say. “Same to you and the others. Just keep the crew close. No Ado. No matter what.”

Taz nods.

He lets my shirt go and I run to my car.

I get inside and start the car and take off.

Jolie lets out a little yell and grabs for the seat as I turn the car as hard as I can.

“Mac…?”

“It was a fucking set up, sweetie,” I say to her.

“What was?”

“It wasn’t your father or anyone he’s been involved with,” I say.

“What are you talking about?” Jolie asks.

I pick up more speed on the main road.

“It was Mama and Declan,” I say. “They’re the ones who planned it out. It was Declan inside your apartment.”

“What?”

“Yeah,” I say. “I just found out. This whole thing is messier than ever. And I’m fucking done with it all.”

“Wait a second, Mac,” Jolie says. “You’re telling me that Declan was the guy in my apartment?”

“That’s right.”

“How?”

“How? Mama told him to. She wanted to scare you away from me. Away from the life. But it didn’t work.”

“No… I mean how did…”

“She’s losing her fucking mind, remember?” I snap.

The inside of my car goes silent.

I stare forward and drive even faster.

You can’t yell at Jolie for it. For anything. It’s not her fault.

“I didn’t mean to snap,” I say.

“My father isn’t a good person though, Mac,” Jolie says.

I look at her for a second. “That’s what you have to say? You’re still in on all of this?”

Jolie nods. “My father is a bad person. He’s going to get what he deserves. The same with my mother. And if this is true about