Surviving Raine 02 Bastian's Storm (37 page)

I laughed. I paused for a moment and then dug through my pockets. I had three smokes wrapped up in a plastic baggie—my usual emergency supply—and I pulled two of them out. Moving my torn facemask to the side, I stuck both Marlboros in my mouth. I grabbed one of the matches from the bag and leaned down into the hole and away from the wind to strike it against the rock. I ran the flame across the ends of each cigarette until they blazed.

Reaching out over my shoulder, I handed one to Evan.

“
Damn,” he said, genuinely surprised. “Thanks.”

I inhaled deeply and watched the smoke flow out around my face.

“
If I get out of this, I’m going to end up running that whole organization when Rinaldo retires,” Evan said. “I don’t want it, but the war has made it clear that his daughter can’t handle the pressure. Lia wants nothing to do with it. I’m going to lose her over the whole thing, and there’s no other path before me. I think I’d rather die on the edge of a mountain than lose her over that. I’d rather she just wonder why I never came home.”

“
That’s fucked up,” I replied. “Raine would go bat-shit if I just didn’t come home one night. She’d drive herself to an early grave wondering what happened to me. I may be a dick, but I wouldn’t do that to her.”

“
I don’t know what Lia will do,” Evan said softly. “She’ll be upset, but she’ll get over it eventually, right?”

I looked over my shoulder at him and raised my eyebrows. I didn’t know this chick, but she did sound a lot like Raine. Raine wouldn’t just get over it. I knew that much. I figured Evan’s girl wouldn’t either.

“
Fuck,” Evan muttered. He took a long drag off the cigarette and stared out over the ledge. “I can’t leave her like that.”

“
Well, why don’t you help me get out, and then I’ll make sure to let her know you’re dead when I’m done with you.”

“
Thanks a lot,” he said as he glared over the burning tip of the smoke. “I’m sure having the dude who killed me tell her all about it would be a great comfort to her.”

“
Just tryin’ to help,” I snickered.

“
Yeah, I can do without that type of assistance.”

“
Wouldn’t Moretti tell her what happened?” I asked.

“
He doesn’t know where she is.”

“
He knew how to find you, though,” I said after a moment’s consideration. “Are you saying he can’t find her?”

“
Rinaldo has people who could locate her,” Evan said with a deep breath. “She’d be able to move on then, I guess.”

He didn’t seem convinced as I watched him drop his eyes to the ground. He blinked his frozen eyelashes a couple of times, and with a shiver, took another long drag off the smoke. I might not have been as perceptive as Evan was, but I could see it in his face—he didn’t have any hope left. He was done. I wasn’t even sure he wanted to survive.

The knowledge should have spurred me on. It should have encouraged me to listen to Landon’s voice in my head and get my ass moving, but it didn’t. For some reason, I didn’t want Evan to give up though I wasn’t sure at what point he became
Evan
in my head instead of just
Arden
.

“
Landon’s always told me that victory is in your head first,” I said. “If you decide that’s how it’s going to be, then that’s how it
will
be.”

Evan took another hit on the smoke and tried to shift himself into a more comfortable position. He looked straight at me.

“
Let’ go over the possibilities, shall we?” he suggested.

“
Okay.”

“
Most likely—we freeze to death right here,” he said. “No winner. I don’t know how this shit works when there’s a tie, but it won’t matter to us because we’ll both be dead.”

I didn’t agree with him—what happened to Raine and Alex mattered a fucking hell of a lot regardless of how things turned out for me, but I didn’t feel like arguing the point.

“
Next option—one of us manages to get free, and the other one is still trapped,” he continued. “Easy enough kill for either of us.”

I had to concur with that one.

“
They don’t know where we are at this point,” Evan said. “Neither of us has our cameras anymore, and they’d have to come looking for us. My guess is they’ve already decided to do that but are probably waiting until the wind dies down. I don’t know what the protocol is. Rinaldo only filled me in on standard procedure, not exceptions.”

“
There aren’t usually any exceptions,” I said. “The tournament goes until there’s only one player left. I’ve never been in the situation where the investors don’t know what’s happening, but I can guess. There was a tournament once—not one I was in—where the last two people were fighting with knives. They both cut each other fatally. The investors waited to see which one died first and declared the other guy the winner even though he died a few minutes later.”

“
What if they find us both dead at the same time,” Evan asked, “or if they find us both alive?”

“
As far as I know, that’s never happened.” I thought about it for a minute. “They might decide to start the whole thing over again.”

My stomach churned a bit. The idea of having to do it all again actually sounded worse than losing. It would mean breaking one more promise to Raine. She’d never trust me again.

“
How about we make a deal?” Evan said quietly.

I turned a little farther to get a better look at him. He was watching the cigarette burn as opposed to looking back at me, but his expression was quite serious.

“
A deal?”

“
Yeah,” he said. “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,” I reminded him. “There isn’t a prize for second place.”

“
Yeah, I get that.” Arden rolled his head to the side and stared into my eyes. “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.”

I knew exactly what he was suggesting. Normally, it wouldn’t be an option because the audience would be aware of any allegiances formed between tournament players and would put a stop to it. This time, they had no idea what we were doing. I still didn’t see how it would work—they’d have to have a body to prove I’d won.

“
Don’t you think that kind of alliance has been tried before?” I asked. “They watch for that shit.”

“
Not if they think I’m buried on the side of the mountain. They’ll only look for me for so long before they have to take your word for it”

“
You’re crazy.”

“
Already established.”

“
I mean
really
crazy,” I countered. “You’re living in some kind of fantasy world.”

He glared at me a moment.

“
Look over there,” Evan said. He pointed with his finger out near the top of the ridge. “You see anyone?”

I glanced over for a second then looked back at him with narrowed eyes.

“
There’s no one for miles,” I reminded him.

“
Yeah, I know,” he said softly, “but I still see him.”

“
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.”

I stared at him for a moment until I realized my mouth was hanging open. I closed it quickly.

“
Dude—there’s no one there.”

He shrugged.

“
I know. I still see him. I have nightmares about killing him all the time. 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.”

I could certainly relate to the nightmares. Before I had met Raine, I could only avoid them with alcohol. With her around, I slept better than I had since I was a kid. She drove the nightmares from my head.

The next phrase out of Evan’s mouth would have knocked me to the ground had I been standing.

“
When I’m with Lia, I sleep better.”

I looked over to him quickly, trying to figure out if he had somehow used his skills of perception to know what I was thinking, but he seemed completely inside of his own head.

“
Fuck,” I muttered. “Seriously?”

“
Yeah,” he said. His eyes darkened as he looked at me.

“
It’s just…well, Raine helps with my nightmares, too.”

Our gazes locked as we both considered this. I thought it was just me, and from the look on his face, Evan had thought the same thing about himself. Knowing we had such an odd similarity struck me right in the gut. I didn’t know what to make of it.

“
I couldn’t deal with it if it wasn’t for her,” Evan said quietly.

“
Me either,” I said. “With Raine, I mean.”

“
All the more reason I should stay away from Lia,” he said. “She deserves better, but I can’t let her go. I also can’t get out of my debt to Rinaldo. At some point, it will become either her or him, and I can’t choose between them.”

“
You are fucked up.” I took in a long breath and thought about it for a minute. Evan was fucked up because of a war and whatever happened to him over there. None of that shit was his fault. What was my excuse? Crappy childhood and a woman running out on me? It all sounded kind of lame to me now.

I was trying, though. I tried to keep myself off the booze even if I
had
failed. I wanted to be better for Raine, and I wanted to be a good father for Alex. I didn’t have the slightest fucking idea what that entailed, but I fully intended to figure it out.

Evan was different.

He’d been cheating on his girl. All right, maybe not with another woman, but he was doing what she didn’t want him to do with full knowledge that he was going against her wishes. I had the feeling that he would ultimately side with Moretti, if it ever came to that. It wasn’t the same situation as mine. I’d had a momentary lapse of judgment under a stressful situation and taken a drink. He was actively planning his deceptions.

“
That doesn’t end my relationship with Franks,” I pointed out. “Maybe that would secure your retirement, but I’d still be in the same situation.”

“
I’ll kill Franks,” he said simply.

I stared at him, unblinking, and considered what he was saying.

If I acted on my own, there was always the risk of being caught. If everyone thought Evan was dead, and Franks got knocked off a while later, it would never be traced back to me. As long as he was gone, Franks would lose his hold over me, and the organization would be in a total uproar as they tried to figure out who would be in charge. All my past transgressions would be forgotten.

“
So, what do you think? Evan asked.

“
Dude, I think you make me sound like a fucking angel,” I said. “When this is over, I’m going to tell Raine how much worse it could be.”

“
You can’t tell her that if you don’t get out of this,” he pointed out.

“
True.” My mind was spinning. What he was suggesting could actually work. It was fucked up and insane, but it could still work. It meant trusting him, which was probably a mistake, but I was out of options.

“
So we should find a way to end it?” he pressed. “We both come out alive, but as far as anyone else is concerned, I’m dead.”

I looked at him carefully. There was no deceit in his eyes. He was being perfectly straightforward with me. He wanted to figure out how to get both of us out of this mess and didn’t give a shit about winning.

That’s how we were different. I had to win.

There was no choice. At least for now, we were going to work together.