Burn Down the Night (Everything I Left Unsaid #3)- Molly O'Keefe Page 0,88

a few more.

“Max?” I was silent. I couldn’t even find the words to speak. “It can’t be that hard.”

It wasn’t. And at the same time, it was impossible.

“What do you know about it?” I finally managed to say.

“Nothing,” Dylan said. “I know nothing about it and I’m grateful every damn day for the sacrifice you made, but you can stop now, Max. You. Can. Stop.”

There was a gull outside making a huge fucking racket.

Give up the club. But…what if I could make it mean something? Something real. What if I could build the beginning of the next part of my life on the bones of the old?

Like my tattoo—but real.

Fuck. Was it possible?

“You used to wear a Spider-Man shirt, every day, remember that?” I said into the silence between us.

“No.”

“You did. It was the top part of a pajama set. You wore it for like six weeks straight. Finally, it stank so bad I had to bribe you to take it off. Ten bucks and an ice cream sandwich.”

“I don’t remember.”

“You cried when I put it in the wash, while sitting half-naked on top of the dryers at the laundromat. You cried so hard, clutching that money and eating that sandwich. Ice cream running down your hand.”

“You want me to give you ten bucks and an ice cream sandwich? Done. Come here and get them. Please, Max. Come here. Let me help you.”

I smiled at the thought. Staring up at the ceiling, I smiled at a lot of things I never thought I’d smile about. Things that seemed impossible. “I don’t want an ice cream sandwich, but I need something else.”

“Anything. Name it.”

My breath shuddered in my chest. Brotherhood. I’d forgotten what that was like.

Joan told me to take what’s mine.

And she was mine.

I was going to try and save both of us. Me and Joan. Maybe Dylan was right and it didn’t have to be either-or. Maybe it could be both of us. Together.

“I’m going to need a lawyer.”

Chapter 23

Joan

I walked to Eric’s apartment with my stomach in knots and my hands a sweaty mess. And I would have given just about anything to have Max beside me. Not that I would take back the words I said—no, I wouldn’t do that.

But the need to say them. This situation we were in. I’d give anything to change that.

Stop. Stop wanting that. Stop wanting him. If he’s smart—which you know he is—he’s halfway to Tampa by now.

I knocked on the door and Eric answered right away. Looking sharp as hell in a suit jacket and a pair of dark jeans.

“Hi Joan,” he said.

“Eric.”

“Come on in.”

Fern was already there, sitting on the couch in a long black skirt and a tight black T-shirt with a red belt around her waist. She wore a pair of red espadrilles that tied half way up her calf. It was a killer look for her.

“Hey Fern,” I said.

“I hope it’s all right I’m here,” she said.

“It’s fine.” I wasn’t completely surprised. They had something going and it had nothing to do with me. And, I won’t lie, I was glad she was there.

After kicking Max off my team after that kiss, I felt surprisingly alone. Like I’d lost a weight I was used to and now I was all off balance and raw on one side. Which did absolutely nothing to change the fact that it was the right thing to do.

The only thing to do.

But that kiss…that fucking kiss…was screwing with my head.

Tell me it hurts. Tell me this mattered.

“Your aunt hasn’t told me anything,” Eric said, glancing between us with his wide, solemn eyes, while Max’s words echoed in my head. I couldn’t shake them. “So why don’t you have a seat and start at the beginning.” He gestured to the edge of his couch and then took a seat in the chair in front of his computer setup.

The beginning. Where exactly did the sad story of Jennifer and Olivia Matthews begin? I looked at Fern, and the way she looked back at me with her careful face told me Eric already knew about her family. The junkyard. The poverty and crime. The younger brother she left behind. The two girls she knew nothing about. The life she got away from as fast as she could.

She’d told him all that and for a minute, real and awkward, I was real glad. That she’d moved that rock off her chest. It gave me a foolish slice of hope that she and Eric might have