Only… that didn’t happen.

Instead, the streets descended into chaos. Ryker’s gang had emerged and revealed themselves. The Syndicate, they called themselves, and they turned against the small gangs they supplied, knocking them out one after the other until shootings around Hedley were so commonplace, people stayed in their homes just to wait it out. The sound of police sirens became background noise for a long while after Ricardo’s death, and nobody understood what was going on. They didn’t know what the falling out between them was in regards to.

Except me.

I knew everything.

This was the chain reaction I’d hoped for. While the Syndicate tried to avenge Ricardo’s death by going against others, I lurked in the shadows, completely untraceable.

Nobody came for me. I’d probably been shelved. An unimportant debt that didn’t need tending to until they got to the bottom of what happened. They probably cared about the money more than Ricardo beaten to death. After all, it was over a hundred thousand dollars. A hundred thousand dollars I’d buried away next to a marked tree in the middle of the bush forty minutes outside of Hedley.

It was money that couldn’t be touched. I needed to lay low, not flaunt my sudden wealth to people. I had to make do without it and continue living and providing by my own means. It was harder than I thought it would be. That temptation to not fight grew every day that passed with Kayden. I didn’t want to come home with bruises and have to lie to a little boy about where they came from. I wanted to be better than that. I wanted to be someone he could look up to. Being a street fighter just wasn’t enough anymore, and the money buried away became all the more alluring.

I couldn’t explore options or get it off my chest by bringing it to Allie. I couldn’t tell her about the money because I couldn’t endanger her life if they sniffed around here and demanded answers. At times, truth was a burden, and telling it meant someone else had to carry it with you. Allie didn’t deserve to know. She needed to focus on her education and her little boy. She needed to trust that I would take care of it all.

But I had a plan. It was dangerous, it was crazy, and it warranted help from someone equally as fucked up as me. It was the only way to get to my goal of ensuring a good life for the ones I loved – something I’d obsessed about for a very long time.

And as always, when I thought of everything that happened, I reflected on seeing Ryker after Kayden had been born. I wanted peace. I wanted him to tell me everything, but fuck, that guy was stubborn.

When I saw his face, I knew he wanted nothing more than to kill me. He dragged his feet, apprehensive about getting any closer to me, all the while frowning like he had a reason to be angry.

My entire body was tense and wound up tight by the time he sat on the bolted down chair. We said nothing for a while. The silence was loud somehow, drowning out my riotous heart beats. We were hardly even breathing.

Ryker looked older by some means. His cheeks were covered in stubble, his hair a little longer than he’d ever let it grow before. I wondered what he saw when he looked at me. His eyes wandered about my face, and for a moment it was like he was staring at someone unfamiliar to him. I knew I was different. I felt different. Ever since I killed a man, I’d lost a part of my identity, and I wasn’t sure it could be reclaimed.

“Are we just going to sit here and stare at each other all day?” I said, breaking the silence.

He didn’t respond. He continued staring at me, barely blinking.

“Stop acting like I’m the one that fucked up,” I growled, leaning forward to look at him closely. “I never asked for any of this, Ryker. All of it happened, and it wouldn’t have if it wasn’t for you and your stupidity. You’re sitting on that side of the table because you fucked up, and I’m still the one cleaning up after your mistakes. So how about you open your goddamn mouth and talk like a man?”

He smirked at me. If I’d spoken to him like this before, he’d have fought me tooth and nail to show me that he was a man. I’d played this game many times before, saying things that I knew would push his buttons. I was seeking a reaction, trying to stir him out of his silence in order to talk to me. Even if he spoke in anger.

“I’m thinkin’ about how I’m going to kill you,” he said softly, tilting his head to the side. “Thinkin’ about how I’m going to cut your fucking throat after I’ve torn you limb from limb.”

I scoffed, completely unbothered by his words. “If anyone deserves to get killed, it’s your ass. You want to play this sob story? Bet you’re telling yourself I’m some thief: took your woman, took your kid, took a life you could have had and all that bullshit losers like to tell themselves when they’ve fucked up. That’s what you’re doing, right? Well, listen here, you little shit, I’m not a thief. I got given all your responsibilities, and unlike you, I’m not fucking it up. It’s the best thing that ever happened to me, and it could have been the best thing to ever happen to you too. But it isn’t. And that’s because you threw it all away.”

“You don’t know shit about me,” he retorted, swallowing hard. “You don’t know what I’ve been through to get where I am right now. So how about you get the fuck out of my face? I’m not going to sit here and take your insults like you know one cent about me –”

“I’m here because we’re going to talk, Ryker,” I interrupted sharply. “We’re going to talk about it all, or as much as we can in the half hour I’ve got.”

“I’ve got nothing to say –”

“Bullshit you don’t! You sit here telling me I don’t know one thing about you. How about you start opening your mouth and filling me in? The only way to mend this shit is by being honest –”

“I’m not mendin’ shit with you! And last I heard, honesty wasn’t your fuckin’ priority when you sat across from me like you are right now, promising me you’ll take care of my woman.”

My woman, he said. Like Allie still belonged to him. It had me boiling in anger because she wasn’t his. She was mine now.

He saw my reaction and leaned forward, that smirk intensifying. “She’s with you out of convenience, Heath. Because you’re looking after her. The second I’m out of here, she’ll come back to me, like she always has. Every fight we ever had, every time she ever walked away from me, I always got her back. Always made her realize she was only half of herself without me. And it’s going to happen again, Heath.”