OUTLAW KING (19 page)

*
NOW*

I
HATED CEMETERIES
. I hated death. I hated everything about it. But if King wanted to meet me at his brother’s grave, I had to see him. The last week together had been different. It was almost like I had some kind of sickness and he was afraid to be near me. Yet not a day went by that he wasn’t present in some form. There to make sure I was okay. That I was alive. Other than that, it was nothing.

I knew something happened with the Reap.

So I walked through the cemetery, hugging myself, looking for Tito’s grave.

It wasn’t all that hard to find.

Not with King standing there with his arms crossed, looking a second away from killing someone.

I walked between the gravestones, keeping on a narrow path, telling myself that if I stayed there I wouldn’t be stepping on any dead bodies. It was childish, but when you grew up like I did, all this shit freaked you out bad.

“I’m here,” I said to King.

“If I was gone for forever, could you make it without me?”

“What?”

“You heard the question,” King said. “It’s simple.”

“Simple? Nothing about you or me is simple.”

King pointed to the headstone. “This is what is left of my brother. A guy that I worshipped. Because he was the only one around. I know the truth of everything, Linds. The Reap went after Tito. The guys in charge of Tito fucked over the Reap and took Tito out. The guy I shot? It wasn’t my bullet that killed him. I have all the information.”

“That’s a good thing, right?” I asked.

“I don’t know. I just set up a meeting with Anderson and the Reap. I don’t know what the hell is going to happen. Anderson is going to try and arrest me again. Just to play it off because he thinks he’s taking down the Reap. Uncle Jakey has something planned but won’t tell anyone. We just have to be there.”

“Why are you telling me this? And why here?”

King stepped forward. He reached for me, touching my hand. My chin started to shiver. I was freaked out in the cemetery and even more freaked out by King’s sudden desire to be open about his club’s business.

“I’m telling you all of this because I love you. Because I know what it all means to you. You want to be in on my life, sweetie, this is it. I’m not a murderer. I don’t belong in prison or on death row. But that’s where I’m going to end up if anything goes wrong here. Why are we here? So you could see me walking away from my brother for the last time. He was the most important person in my life. But the more I look back and think back, he never really did much. He was afraid of everything. The coolest guy I knew but yet he was terrified of his own fucking shadow. He ended up hitting the streets, becoming a lowlife dealer, an even lower junkie, and then he wound up killed. That’s not my life. Not the life I want. So I want you to know something, Linds. If this goes south in any way at all, I need you to move on. I need you to find someone. You deserve happiness. You deserve a good life. You deserve to be loved and feel loved.”

Tears filled my eyes. I couldn’t remember ever seeing King this raw before.

I reached for his face, blinking fast.

“King… you’re the only one,” I whispered. “That’s how it’s always been for us.”

“I don’t want that for you.”

“It’s my destiny,” I said. “To forever love you. To forever want you. To forever need you in my life.”

King slipped a hand around to my back and pulled me close. “I don’t know if you’re stupid or crazy, Linds. This could destroy the Reap. This could destroy me.”

“I’ll be waiting for you,” I said.

King pointed to Tito’s grave. “And if I end up there?”

“Then we’ll come visit you every chance we get. And I’ll make sure your story is known.
My King
. A man who loved me with every ounce of his heart and soul. A man that took care of me in a way that will carry for the rest of our lives.”

“What are you talking about…
we’ll come
? Who is the
we
?”

I couldn’t help but smile.

A cemetery wasn’t the right place for what I had to say.

But I had no choice.

Our lives were forever changed… again.

34

⁽
L
indsey)

*
AN
HOUR
AGO*

“
Y
OU’RE HIDING
something from me.” Aunt Jane pulled out a chair from the kitchen table and sat down. “I know that look.”

“What look?” I asked with a smile.

“
That look
,” she said. “I remember you many times sitting across the table from me with news. When you were failing classes. When you wanted to go on birth control.”

I laughed. “Well… funny you bring that up.”

“What?”

I reached into my bag and grabbed the four pregnancy tests. They were all positive. Easily positive. Four different brands. Four positive tests.

I slid them all across the table at Aunt Jane.

She looked at the tests and then looked at me. “Wait… are you… no.”

She grabbed one of the tests and jumped up. Her chair fell over and crashed to the floor.

“Are you mad at me?” I asked.

Aunt Jane looked at me. “Mad at you? Why… wait a second. You know who the father is, right?”

“I’m not you,” I said and slowly started to stand up. “It’s King’s baby. It’s always about King.”

Aunt Jane then did some kind of weird dance on her toes. She waved the pregnancy test and shook her head. When she stopped, her eyes were glistening.

That’s when she finally hugged me.

I broke down into tears myself, the shock giving away since I saw the first pregnancy test pop up positive.

“I want to ask how but I know the answer,” Aunt Jane said.

“Everything has been so crazy lately,” I said. “I should have been thinking of it sooner. But I was sitting there last night and going through my work schedule. That’s when it hit me. I was actually late. Whoops.”

“Whoops,” Aunt Jane said. “Just what every woman should say when she finds out she’s pregnant. Does King know?”

“I haven’t told him yet,” I said. “I wanted to tell you first. I wanted… what the hell do I do?”

I started to cry again and Aunt Jane sat me down. She crouched in front of me.

“Hey, Lindsey. Look at me right now. A baby is nothing to cry about. You go to the doctor and you make sure that little peanut is healthy. That’s what matters.”

“You know the way King lives,” I said. “Am I going to be taking his baby to a prison for visits?”

“Don’t think like that,” Aunt Jane said. But I could see sorrow in her eyes. We both knew King was unpredictable. “I got a call one night that changed my life. I lost my sister and I gained basically a daughter. Think about that. You were suddenly mine. I was terrified. I wanted to quit so many times, Lindsey. Not on you, but on the idea of it all. Of being a mother. Of being in control of someone’s life. Making big decisions. Making hard decisions. Doing all I could do to protect your innocence. And I really sucked at it all.”

“No you didn’t,” I said. “You didn’t suck at any of it.”

“Look at the position I put us in so many times.”

“And we survived.”

“Right,” Aunt Jane. “My point is that you take whatever you have in front of you and go with it. No matter what happens with King. Right now you need to think about yourself. Your body. You’re pregnant! I’m going to be…”

“Grandma,” I said.

“Wouldn’t it be Great Aunt Jane?” she asked.

“No. I may have lost my mother and I may have called you Aunt Jane… but you raised me. And this baby will know all of that. But this baby will call you grandma.”

Aunt Jane wiped a tear from her eye as she backed away from me. “Well, as special as that it, it makes me feel so old. I need to have a little fun before this all settles in and I get wrinkles, gray hair, and actually look like a grandma.”

I laughed. “You’re so dramatic, I love it.”

“Gather up your pregnancy tests and go talk to King. Maybe something like this will help him in whatever he’s going through. A baby changes everything.”

I nodded.

Yes, a baby would change everything.

But so would a single phone call.

King called me a little bit later, wanting me to meet him at his brother’s grave.

35

⁽
K
ing)

*
NOW*

L
INDS HAD
to pee in a cup. Then we waited in the small exam room. She sat on the table with her feet dangling over it while I paced the room back and forth.

Pregnant? A baby? A father? Me?

Talk about a reality check. Getting a one-two punch to the gut.

Being put away was one thing. Being killed was another. Losing Linds was the worst case scenario for me. But now all of that changed. Losing my unborn baby was the worst case scenario. Sending Linds out to the world as a single mother - a pregnant, single mother - was not right. She didn’t sign up for this shit. In a way, neither did I. We couldn’t change it now though. We fucked like rabbits, all unprotected.
Whoops.

The doctor came into the room with a big smile on her face.

“You’re pregnant,” she said.

I stopped dead in my tracks. I pointed to the folder the doctor was holding.

“You’re sure?” I asked.

“It’s there,” the doctor said. “Now we need to get blood work done next to check your levels. We’ll repeat and make sure everything increases. You can schedule your first ultrasound appointment when you checkout, too.”

I looked at Linds. I swore her eyes were spinning in circles.

I got the doctor to focus on me for a second. “Can we get the blood work done right now?”

“Sure. The lab is open.”

“That’s our next stop. Thank you, Doc.”

“Congrats,” she said. “Take deep breaths. Enjoy the ride. And get yourself some prenatal vitamins.”

The doctor left the room and I put a hand out for Linds to take. I stood her up and pulled her close for a hug.

“Holy shit,” Linds whispered.

“Holy shit,” I said. I cupped her face and kissed her. “Holy fucking shit, sweetie. You’re pregnant.”

“I’m pregnant.”

“With my baby.”

“With your baby.”

“I’m…”

“What do we do now?” Linds asked.

I knew what the question meant. She wanted to talk about the Reap, Anderson, Uncle Jakey. All of that bullshit mess. But I wasn’t interested in that. At all.

I kissed the tip of her nose. “We go get you some blood work.”

“I’m afraid of needles, King.”

“I’ll be right there to hold your hand.”

And I was.

I made Linds look at me while blood was drawn from her left arm. She squeezed my hand tight and was shaking. I couldn’t help myself as I smiled. Somehow, it all felt so right. She and I together. She being pregnant with my child. Like our destiny was finally coming to life.

When we were finished with all doctors and lab stuff, I took her for a ride through the old part of town. The south side where we had grown up. Where two blocks separated those who were dirt poor to those who were living in the upper middle class. I cruised down my old street and saw my old house. It was the same pale blue color with ugly reddish shutters. The same flat slab of concrete as a porch where I stood and watched Linds walk away after the first time it really hit me that I was in love with her.

The road came to an end with a stop sign. I turned left and went down to the library two blocks away. It was now shut down, once for sale, now being used as some kind of makeshift religious center and place for alcoholics to get together and talk. I hooked another left and was on a winding road that took me to the upper middle class development. Where the houses mostly looked the same.

I took Linds to her old house.

I thought about the two times I was in that house. The first was for a minute until her Aunt Jane and Jim came home really early. I had to bolt out the back door and run like hell. The second time I was in the house was the night Jim attacked them both. That night I got to take Linds out of that house.

I slowed but didn’t stop as we went by the house.

I felt Linds’s grip on me change. She held tighter. The house would forever haunt her. Just more proof that no matter what I couldn’t end up back inside prison.

So I took her back to her apartment and tried to come up with a plan. If I bailed on the Reap and my brothers, they’d hunt me and Linds down. I couldn’t do that to Knox and Slam though. They were my brothers. True brothers.

Linds went to take a shower and I twisted the cap off a beer.

A minute later, I was halfway walking to the bathroom to join Linds in the shower to celebrate our good news.

That’s when the phone rang.

Uncle Jakey was calling me.

It was time for action.

36

⁽
L
indsey)

*
THEN*

T
HE RAIN CAME
from out of nowhere. There was a bunch of us standing on King’s front porch. A few of his friends, a few of mine. The sole purpose was so that me and King could face each other. There had been too many rumors and lingering feelings swirling around. I wanted to hear it from his mouth before anything else happened.

It was all dumb high school shit though.

Do you like me? Do you like me, like me? Do I like you? Do I like you, like you?

A crack of thunder rang out in the distance.

The wind started to pick up.

King was with Knox, Slam, and Matteo. They all parted away and King stepped forward. I was right near the steps of the porch. My two friends - Amy and Becca - were calling for me, saying they had to get home before they got grounded. We weren’t allowed to be in the rain. I wasn’t even allowed out of the house. Aunt Jane fought with Jim to let me spend the afternoon at Amy’s house.

“Hey,” King said.

“Hey,” I said.

“I wish you could stay.”

“I can’t. I’m going to get into trouble.”