Evan Arden 04 Isolated (3 page)

Despite our similarities, I can’t help but notice how different our motives are. Stark didn’t want to be involved in this game but agreed to fight to save Raine and his son. My reason for being here is…

Is what?

Because I have been in this life for too long. I don’t know any other way.

The next thing I know, I’m telling Stark all about Lia. I can’t say why I’m talking about her at all—I have no idea. Maybe it’s because I know I’m going to die, and I want to go thinking about her and not how I got here in the first place. I play dumb when Stark brings up Raine, but I slip up a little, and he calls me out on it when I act as if I don’t know Raine isn’t his son’s mother. I am a little surprised when he accuses me of killing the mother of his child.

“
Franks put the hit on her,” I tell him. I don’t have any loyalty to Franks or his organization, so I don’t care if Stark knows who is responsible. “Rinaldo told me about it.”

I lay my head back, trying to stretch out the muscles in my neck. They’re stiff from the cold and the angle of the ice. I see movement up above me, and the vision of a teenage boy dressed in plain, tan clothing appears on the ledge above me.

I close my eyes for a moment, but he’s still there when I open them.

I don’t know his name. No one ever knew who he was or where he came from. When I was in Iraq, he had walked up to the camp where my unit was stationed with a bomb strapped around his chest. I killed him with a single bullet from my sniper rifle before he could get too close.

Apparently, being dead isn’t enough to keep him away from me. His specter follows me everywhere.

Stark is still talking about Raine, calling her a saint for putting up with him. It doesn’t sound like he’s much of a boyfriend, which just comes with being wrapped up in organized crime. Our relationships, if we have any at all, are never good ones.

When he says something about Raine’s friends not liking him, I realize Lia doesn’t have any friends at all. In my desire to always keep her safe at my side, she’s sacrificed anything that ever might have looked like a normal life. At least Stark had attempted to try to be a boyfriend. I am probably better described as a keeper.

A fucked up keeper.

I tell Stark about how I plan my hits around Lia’s school schedule; he says I’m crazy.

“
Yeah,” I say with a laugh. “I’ve got the diagnosis to prove it.”

He stares pointedly into my eyes.

“
PTSD,” I tell him, not seeing any reason to lie about it. “I’m a certified nut.”

“
From being in the Marines?”

“
From being a POW, yeah.” I take a breath and hold it for a minute, trying to keep my mind from immediately going back to that hole in the sand where I spent a year and a half. Maybe it is an excuse for how I act with Lia, but there are things in my head I just can’t control. Considering the other characteristics Stark and I seem to share, I wonder how he justifies his actions, so I ask. “Why are you such a dick to your girl?”

“
I just…have a nasty temper. I used to drink to make up for it.”

“
Not anymore?”

“
That’s the one thing she’d leave me for,” he admits. “If I drink, she’s gone.”

“
And that’s enough to keep you off it?”

“
Yeah,” Stark says. “Well, mostly. I’ve fucked up but just once.”

“
She forgave you?”

“
She did.”

I wonder how many times Lia has forgiven my misdeeds. There are the number of deaths she knows I’d had a hand in and countless others she knows nothing about. If she had any idea I was still working for Rinaldo, would she forgive me? No, probably not.

“
I don’t think Lia would be so forgiving if she knew I was still in the business.”

“
If she’s anything like Raine, she’d have your balls.”

I have to laugh because it does sound like Lia. Apparently, Stark and I have something else in common—the women who put up with us would probably be great friends. Of course, they might compare notes and decide to just get the fuck away from both of us.

The mounting similarities between my half-brother and me are interesting, especially since we hadn’t grown up anywhere near each other. There are a few times I’m tempted to tell him, but I don’t. There is no point. Instead, I watch him become agitated as he finds new energy to try to dig his way out of the hole he’s in. There’s no way—not with his leg stuck the way it is. I give a half-hearted effort myself, but I know it’s pointless.

“
I want a fucking cigarette,” I say out loud.

I can’t hide my shock as he hands me one.

As the smoke fills my lungs, I think about how pissed off Lia would be if she caught me smoking. The irony that I worry about that instead of the fact that she’s never going to know why I never came home isn’t lost on me.

As Bastian and I continue to discuss how pissed off our women would be at us and the various ways we are likely to die, he says something that does catch my attention, a quote from his father figure, Landon.

“
Victory is in your head first. If you decide that’s how it’s going to be, then that’s how it
will
be.”

Even as I spout off the possible outcomes—all bad—other thoughts creep into my head. I look at Bastian’s leg caught in the rocks and realize I could reach it with my foot easily enough. If I could kick the rock away, he just might be able to pull his leg out. It would hurt like a bitch, but if anyone could handle the pain, he could. If he were freed, he could free me. There’s no camera for anyone to see what happened to us.

And then what?

I think back to how things have been over the past year: living a double life with Lia on one side of it and Rinaldo on the other. I’d be just as trapped between the two of them as I am trapped between rocks and ice now.

Death seemed like the only way out. As long as I am alive, Rinaldo will still have a hold over me. I will still feel obligated to him, and I will still do whatever he asks me to do. Lia will eventually catch on to what I’m doing, and I have no idea how she’ll react.

Well, I have some idea. It won’t be good; that’s for sure.

I’ve been a selfish bastard. I want her and I want my ties to Rinaldo. When we first left Chicago, I really did intend to live life on the straight and narrow, but I’m not capable of denying Rinaldo what he wants from me. It’s just not possible. Now I keep her in the dark about my activities, and she is stuck with me when she’d probably be better off if I never came back. She could move on then, live a normal life without my interference, except I can’t go on without her.

Selfish asshole.

If Rinaldo would really let me go, maybe it could be different. He won’t do that though—not as long as I’m alive.

What if he thinks I’m dead?

If he really, truly believed me to be dead, our relationship would be severed. I wouldn’t be called on to do his bidding, and he would no longer have a hold over me. Without the obligation, I could be a real partner to Lia. No more lies. No more hiding.

I can feel my energy shift. I want what Bastian has managed to achieve despite his temper and other transgressions. He is here to fight for his life with her, and I realize that I don’t want to die. I don’t want to leave Lia like that. I need her, and if Bastian Stark and I work together, I can finally be there for her. Always.

A plan begins to form in my head. There’s only one thing to do, only one hope left. It will be tricky, but it’s possible. The loss of my Barrett might prove to be a positive thing—it will help convince Rinaldo that I’m really gone. All I need to do is convince Stark that this could work.

I decide to strike a deal with him.

“
A deal?” Bastian Stark is hesitant. More than hesitant, really—he doesn’t believe a word I’m saying.

“
Yeah,” I say, “a deal where we both end up retired for real with the women we fight for.”

“
The only way that happens is when one of us dies,” he says. “There isn’t a prize for second place.”

“
Yeah, I get that.” I take a breath and look at him. He’s not thinking beyond the norm, and I have to convince him to consider options that wouldn’t usually be possible. The loss of our cameras in the avalanche has left us in a unique situation. Without any communication to the group, we have freedom of movement. We can plan without their knowledge. Bastian’s only thoughts are of winning, but that isn’t my priority. “You can have the trophy—I don’t give a shit about that. I just want to walk away with people thinking I’m dead.”

He’s not convinced and argues with me, calling me insane. I can’t refute the facts there and decide to let him know just how far gone I really am. Maybe it will be enough to convince him that I’m crazy enough to make this work.

“
Look over there,” I say as I point near the top of the ridge. The kid stands there, staring down at me with his hand pressed against the bomb at his stomach. “You see anyone?”

He looks quickly before telling me he doesn’t.

“
I still see him,” I say. The kid crosses his arms over his chest and glares as if he can’t believe I’m admitting to his existence.

“
Who?”

“
A kid I killed in Iraq. He follows me everywhere. He’ll go away for a while—sometimes for months—but he always comes back when shit gets real.”

Bastian stares at me with an open mouth for a moment and then glares.

“
Dude—there’s no one there.”

“
I know,” I say with a shrug. “I still see him. I have nightmares all the time about killing him. Not just him, but being in the desert, tied up in a hole for months. Sometimes I can’t stop thinking about it, and when I do, I can’t sleep at all—sometimes for days. When I’m with Lia, I sleep better.”

Bastian’s shock is apparent, but even I am surprised when he says he also has nightmares, and that Raine makes sleeping easier. It becomes clear to me that we both rely on our women to survive mentally, and I have to get him to see a way for both of us to come out of this alive without our pasts continuing to follow us. My devotion to Rinaldo holds me to the life, and I realize who has a hold over Bastian.

“
I’ll kill Franks,” I tell him.

I can practically see the little wheels in his head spinning. I’d do it far away from wherever Stark ends up and wait several weeks before completing the task. It would never be traced back to the tournament, and Stark still comes out the winner. Franks would be my last kill.

I come out presumed dead, which is exactly what I want.

“
So what’s your plan?” Bastian asks although it’s clear his guard is up.

“
Neither of us can move without help.” I point out the obvious and continue. “I’m guessing you can’t see what I see.”

“
A kid I’ve killed in the past?” he says with bite. “No, I don’t see that.”

“
Not him.” I shake my head, not wanting to think about the vision on the ledge above, let alone talk about it. “The position of the rock next to your leg.”

“
Where?” Bastian twists his neck around.

“
I don’t think you’ll be able to see it, but it’s jammed up against your leg, holding it to the ice. With that angle, there’s no way you can pull it out. The rock has to go.”

“
So what are you going to do? Yell at it?”

“
I’m pretty sure I can move the rock up against your leg out of the way with my foot. Once it’s gone, you should be able to pull yourself out and keep your leg intact. Well, as intact as it is now. It’s broken.”

“
Yeah, I can tell that.”

As much as it has to hurt now, it’s
gonna hurt a lot more when I kick it out of the way, but he knows it’s better than dying where he is.

“
Do it,” he commands.

I don’t hesitate.

“
Fuck!” Bastian yells. His body tenses as he grips the edge of the hole with his fingers.

“
Almost got it,” I tell him.

“
Fucking hurry.”

I raise an eyebrow at him.

“
That’ll hurt more.”