End Game Read online

  I think of the moment the alarms went off in the hospital, and the sense of dread and death that had come over me. “I knew he was dead before they told me. I felt it.”

  “My brother’s not dead,” she says. “I still feel him out there.”

  So do I, I think. And that’s the problem. He’s out there, and eventually we both know where this is headed. He’s going to be a problem I’m going to have to solve. And when it comes down to it, my brother almost buried Emily. I’m not going to let hers finish the job.

  CHAPTER NINE

  Afternoon is no different from morning. There are calls. There are challenges. There is the dread of night I soon understand. Turns out that the night before a funeral is as close to hell as the day you find out someone dies. It’s you being trapped in that sludge, as Emily called it earlier this morning. It’s emotions you don’t name because you don’t want to feel them. Except one you can’t escape: guilt. And that guilt is darkness. You feel it approaching. It’s suffocating and you can’t breathe. Emily and I survive it with a bottle of wine and pizza. When finally we head to bed, I get Emily talking about the fashion label, and her excitement about everything she feels it can be becomes light in that darkness trying to consume us both. At some point, hours later, she falls silent, resting on my chest. Sleeping.

  I don’t sleep.

  I lie awake and listen to Emily breathing, thinking about the eulogy I’ll deliver in only a few short hours. I also think of the promises I made Derek, haunted by the one I haven’t even tried to fulfill: Teresa. She disappeared almost immediately after his death, and I let it happen. I haven’t tried to find her, because the truth is, I despise her connection to the world that killed my brother. But nevertheless, he loved her. And judging her on the way she stayed by his side, she loved him.

  I text Seth: I need to talk to Teresa. Find her and get her to the funeral.

  His reply is simple and without question: Message received. Will handle.

  By dawn I’ve dozed off, only to wake up with the brutal memory of being on the floor of the restaurant, Derek and Emily next to me, blood everywhere. I slip out of bed and manage not to wake Emily, finding my way to the closet to pick out a black suit, one I can later burn as far as I’m concerned. I stand there staring at the rack, and I can’t seem to force myself to pick one.

  Suddenly Emily is in front of me, looking up at me with those gorgeous pale blue eyes of hers, and something snaps between us. We move at the same moment, and I pull her to me, molding her soft curves to every hard part of me, my hand at the back of her head, my mouth slanting over hers. And then I am kissing her, and she is against the wall, the beast that is my anger, guilt, and pain consuming me. I cup her breast and nip her bottom lip.

  She moans, and her teeth scrape my lip, that defiant act driving me wilder still. I rip open the front of the pink silk robe and swallow her gasp. Her panties follow, and my fingers are instantly sliding into the slick heat of her sex, stroking her, teasing her, pressing inside her.

  “Shane,” she pants, pulling on the band of my pajama bottoms. “You … I want—” Her hand closes over my shaft, and I kiss her again, a deep, possessive, hungry kiss, and when I’m done, I’m not done. I’m just getting started.

  I maneuver us, lifting her leg, and I press inside her, lifting her completely off the ground, off the wall. Balancing all her weight myself, a frenzied sway and grind of our bodies follows. And it’s good. So damn good that I don’t want it to end, and yet it does. She shivers and shakes in my arms and pulls me over the edge with her. I don’t put her down when it’s over. I hold on to her and carry her to the shower with me, and we repeat the act all over again.

  An hour later I’m dressed in my inevitable black suit, sitting at the island in the kitchen, coffee and my computer in front of me.

  “We have a situation with your parents,” Emily says, joining me, her long-sleeved black dress simple and somehow perfect. Her long brown hair is tied back at the nape of her neck.

  “Why does this not surprise me?” I ask.

  She stops beside me at the end of the island. “Your father’s been gone since midnight last night and hasn’t returned, and he won’t answer your mother’s calls. She’s devastated and wants us to come over and ride with her to the funeral home.”

  “Fucking his woman on the side the day his son is buried,” I say. “That’s priceless. Maybe I’ve been too hard on my mother after all.”

  “You have been,” Emily says, “and she really needs us right now.”

  “We’ll go,” I say, reaching for my phone. “I need to alert Seth and Cody that we’re headed downstairs.” I punch in a text before pushing to my feet and following Emily to the coat rack, where she reaches for a coat.

  “Do I really need this?”

  “It’s May in Denver. It’s windy, not cold unless it’s raining or it decides to snow.”

  “Snow in May,” she says. “I’m not in Texas anymore.”

  It’s one of those random conversations people have when they either want to talk about something else and cant figure out a way, or they don’t want to talk about something else so they talk abut nothing.

  We head to the door, where I intend to open it for Emily, but she grabs my arm. “Don’t decide the worst of your father just yet,” she says. “Maybe he’s not with a woman. Maybe he is just dealing with this his own way and that means he needed some time alone.”

  “I’m not judging him by a few hours,” I say. “I’m judging him by a lifetime of actions.”

  “I know. I do, but death has not only marked our near future, it’s taken his son. No matter how hard a person you are, that has to shake you to the core. These are extraordinary circumstances. Just, please, for me, I’m asking you to wait to pass judgment.”

  “For you, sweetheart, I will do anything,” I say, but as we head to the elevator, I think of how my parents gravitate toward Emily, like her goodness is a magnet to their evil. And evil always tries to destroy good. We step into the parking garage, and Cody is already in his car, next to mine. And, as if emphasizing the point I’ve just made to Emily, her phone rings as we’re settling into the Bentley. “Let me guess,” I say. “My mother.”

  “Actually, no. It’s Jessica.” She answers and I reach for the gear shift, only to have her close her hand down on mine. “Wait, I’ll talk to him,” she tells Jessica, ending the call to look at me. “Jessica stopped by the office to take care of a few things before the funeral, and she noticed a light on in my office area. She wasn’t sure how you’d react and—”

  Adrenaline surges through me, a sense of dread I don’t understand. “Just tell me.”

  “Your father is in his office, working.”

  I let out a relieved breath, irritated at the lack of control my extreme reaction showed. “I don’t even know what to say to that.”

  “Security says he’s been there since about one in the morning. This must be his way of grieving. I’m going to call your mother so she has some peace of mind.”

  Grieving in his office, I think. My father. That doesn’t ring true to me. “More like he’s telling me he won’t retire,” I say. “And trying to pick that funeral-day fight you warned me about.” I place the car in gear. “Let’s go to the office.”

  * * *

  Jessica’s waiting on us as we step off the elevator outside Brandon Enterprises. “Still in his office,” she says. “But his door is open and he has people calling for him.”

  “Of course he does,” I say, walking past her and heading into the lobby. I don’t stop until I’m at my father’s door, where I pause in the open archway.

  He’s behind his desk, wearing a red T-shirt of all things, probably one of the only T-shirts I’ve seen him wear in a decade, stacks of files to his left, his attention on his computer screen. I know the instant he knows I’m here, his spine straightening a moment before his gaze lifts to mine. “Hello, son,” he says, dropping the pen in his hand and leaning back in his seat, his face so d
amn gaunt, I barely know him as the asshole that is my father.

  I walk toward him, closing the space between us, and I don’t stop until I’m on the opposite side of his desk, with my hands pressed to the surface. “Why are you here?”

  “I’m running my company.”

  I don’t take the bait. Not today. “You do know you have a son to bury today, right?”

  “I’m fully aware of what today is, but this company—”

  “Not today, Father. Not today.”

  “I’m not retiring.”

  “I said, not today. Today doesn’t get to be about you.”

  He erupts and stands. “I know it’s not about me. This place is about me and my sons. This place was his too.”

  “And yet you made him feel that it would never be his, just to entertain yourself.”

  “To make him stronger.”

  “He’s pretty damn strong now, isn’t he? Go home to your wife, who thinks you’re fucking another woman right now, because that’s what you do. Fuck people you shouldn’t be fucking.” I turn and walk toward the door. “Like you fucked Derek right into his grave.”

  “I didn’t drive him to his death.”

  “He didn’t die in a car accident, Pops. He died with bullets in his chest from a Mexican cartel. He died trying to win a power struggle you created.”

  His cheeks redden in anger, and something else I cannot name, spiking in his eyes. “You could have just given him the reins.”

  “And let him end up in jail,” I say. “You’re right. I could have, but I wanted better for him.”

  “You mean you wanted to run the company your way.”

  “He wanted me to run it my way. He made me promise to save it from you. And I’m going to.”

  “He was weak. I didn’t want him to stay that way.”

  “Weak?” I say, astounded by how much of an ass he really is, when I shouldn’t be surprised. I think of the bullets Derek took for Emily and add, “He wasn’t weak. And by the way, his last words were a message for you. He said to tell you, ‘Fuck you’ and he’ll see you in hell, where you won’t be king. But he won’t see you in hell. He’s not there, but you will be.” I push off the desk and give him my back, walking toward the door.

  “Stop, Shane,” he orders, but I don’t take commands from him and I don’t stop, at least not until I have exited the office and my mother steps in front of me.

  “I’m sorry,” she whispers before stepping around me and entering the office.

  “Why are you here?” she demands of my father. I shut my eyes, the quaking of her voice, the pain in her eyes when she’d said “I’m sorry,” jabbing unexpectedly at my heart. “Why are you not at home with me?” my mother continues.

  “I have work to do,” he says.

  “I need you. I need you with me.”

  “Don’t get all prickly with me, woman.”

  “Don’t get prickly with you? Our son is dead. He’s dead. He’s not coming back. I need you, and you’re never there for me. Never.” Tears vibrate in her voice. “Why do you think I ended up with Mike? Why? Because you are always with some young girl and you are always gone. You left me alone. And now he’s gone. Now Derek is gone and I’m really alone.”

  Her emotions slam into me, and I step to Emily’s desk just to the left of the door, my hands coming down on the wooden surface. And suddenly Emily is rushing toward the office. I push off the desk and turn to watch her pull the door shut. “They need privacy,” she says, stepping in front of me.

  “I hurt for her,” I tell her. “I do. I know he’s hurt her. I know she wants Derek back, but it doesn’t change the actions she took to destroy him and this company.”

  “I know,” she says. “And she can’t take those things back. We can only hope that she will be a different person moving forward, with or without your father. And you have to forgive her and give her a chance to be that person.”

  “And if I can’t?”

  “You can. I know you can.”

  I’m saved from giving her an answer she won’t like when the door to my father’s office opens again and my mother joins us. “Please take me to the funeral home.”

  It’s the first time in years I’ve heard my mother use that word: “please.” Maybe that should give me hope that she’s going to change and be that different person Emily mentioned. But it doesn’t. Hope doesn’t live here. Death does. And so do my promises to my brother. One of those promises is unfulfilled, and I text Seth to meet me in the parking garage.

  A few minutes later, after Emily insists some private conversation with her might help my mother, I seal them into a black sedan with Cody as their driver. Once they’re gone, Seth is waiting for me by my Bentley. “Teresa,” I say to him. “Tell me you’ve found her.”

  “She left town a week ago, and no one has seen her since, her brother included. I stopped by the restaurant.”

  “Damn it,” I murmur, frustrated at myself for allowing this to happen. “Keep trying,” I say. “Even if it’s after the funeral.” I walk to the driver’s side of the car. “Be the fixer that you are. I need you to find her.”

  I climb into the Bentley and grip the steering wheel. “I’ll keep my promise, Derek. Somehow, some way, I’ll keep my promise.”

  * * *

  There is thunder and gusting winds when we arrive at the funeral home, almost as if Derek is making his presence known. Or maybe it’s the devil fighting for his soul, but the devil won’t win, at least not when it comes to my brother. My father is another story.

  Once inside, there are yellow flowers. So many damn yellow flowers, and they make my mother smile before she bursts into tears. From there, it doesn’t get better. With Emily and my mother by my side, we deal with the arrangements. At two o’clock it’s time for the visitation, and my father, now dressed in a black suit and tie, walks through the door, more of that wind gusting behind him as he enters from outside. Almost as if that devil he knows is stalking him.

  He doesn’t look at me. He walks straight to my mother, takes her hand, and leads her to another room. Emily and I exchange a curious look, but then we’re greeted by the funeral attendant and a long line of visitors. And so we walk into a room with a closed casket, and before I can even recover the reality of my brother lying inside that box of shiny wood, we have visitors entering the room. It’s a full fifteen minutes before my parents, hand in hand, join us. I don’t read into their unity.

  Eric is there too. He speaks to Emily, concern in his eyes, but she doesn’t know he was there that night, I realize. Now isn’t the time to enlighten her. And even if it was, Seth joins us, gives Eric a warning look, and Eric quickly departs. He needs to depart. He needs to stay away, and we all need to hope Martina stays away from him.

  Come three forty-five, we’re fifteen minutes from saying good-bye to my brother.

  I stand in a private room for family and close friends, just outside the service room, which is filled to the brim with hundreds of people. A preacher asks us to bow our heads. Emily, my mother, and my father are with me, as are Seth and Jessica and a few random people my mother wanted close to her. We form a circle, and the preacher begins his words of comfort.

  I hear them, trying to take solace in them, but I am lost in the regret that this service is at a funeral home for Derek. It feels cold. It feels like he’s a number. And he will never be just a number. “It’s time,” the preacher says, and Emily slides her hand into mine.

  We’re about to step forward when my mother appears in front of me. Emily releases me, stepping away. “I know you’re angry at me,” my mother says, tears streaming down her cheeks. “I know you feel I failed him, and you’re right. And I will suffer for the rest of my life for that mistake. You have no idea how much I’m going to suffer. You have no idea how much I want to turn back time.” She runs her hand down my tie. “I just wanted you to know that.” She turns away, and my father offers her his arm as they enter the service room.

  Emily is immediately in
front of me, her hands at my sides, but she says nothing. She just lets me know that she’s with me. I lean down and press my lips to her forehead, letting them linger there a few moments. I take Emily’s hand in mine, my gaze finding Seth’s, hoping for news on Teresa. He gives me a slight shake of his head, and I accept that some promises will have to wait until after today. What matters is I keep them, and as Emily and I walk into the room, a piano playing somewhere nearby, I start to experience that tunnel vision I had in the restaurant. The room shrinks. The sounds are muffled. The casket is closed.

  I only have a vague memory of sitting in the front row between my mother and Emily. I know, though, the minute my mother takes my hand, and the minute Emily does the same. Time fades until the moment they call my name: Shane Brandon. I kiss Emily’s hand, and then I do not know what comes over me, but I kiss my mother’s as well. It seems to spark something in her, and the minute I stand up, she is in front of me. “I know this isn’t the time,” she whispers, stepping to me, her hands gripping my sleeves. “But please forgive me. Forgive me.” And there is so much guilt and hurt in her eyes, I believe she is suffering. I believe she will suffer for the rest of her life, and as bitter as I am about Derek’s death, she is my mother. And what son wants his mother to suffer?

  My hands come down on her arms. “There’s nothing to forgive,” I say. “It’s not your fault.”

  “It is,” she says, tears welling in her eyes. “I should have stepped in. I should have. I—”

  “Don’t do this to yourself. You’re human. And he loved you. He doesn’t want this for you. I don’t want this for you.”

  She flings her arms around me, and I can hear Emily’s sob behind me. I can hear many sobs. I hold my mother for several beats before I kiss her head and help her back to her seat, surprised when my father aids my efforts. More surprised when I find more tears in his eyes. I turn away from him, my attention landing on Emily, tears streaming down her cheeks. I take her hand, kissing it again, thinking about how right having her in my life is. How impossible it would be for her to be here today if not for Derek.