“That was yesterday.”
“Okay,” I say, deciding not to focus on figuring him out right now. “So you don’t…you know on Sunday.”
“Never,” he says.
Curious, I push it a little further. “What if I did?”
He lifts two fingers and puts them to his temple, miming pulling a trigger.
“You’d shoot me?” I say, jaw dropping.
“No,” he says. “Of course not.”
“Okay,” I say, relieved.
“I’ll shoot her,” he says.
“What?”
“Before Miss Holly, there was a woman very much like her. After Miss Holly, there will be another one. The same goes for you. Make yourself irreplaceable, Jen. Just don’t drink or fuck on Sundays in my home.”
He gets up, giving me a soft look. There’s something about his face, the way he holds himself, that makes me want to trust him. It’s weirdly paternalistic for his age.
“Stick with me, Jen, and I’ll make sure you’re always taken care of,” he says. “Oh, and there’s only one other thing. We don’t abide Caudills, so don’t consort with any of them.”
I know who the Caudills are; they’re one of the richest families in the state. They have businesses, but their real money is made at the track and on drug running through the eastern end of the state.
“Why?” I ask.
“Because we are compet-tit-tors.” He breaks up the syllables in that word, for emphasis.
Before I can answer, he walks out. I cut the steak, put it in my mouth, and damn—I think he’s got me.
That begins the most exciting year of my life. I do odd jobs, set up meetings, and don’t ask questions. In return, I get paid a thousand dollars a week, I stay in the Boyd Mansion, and I still get to fuck Miss Holly whenever she decides to appear in my bed. Whether the last part is a good thing is up for debate. It’s getting to be a more traumatic experience every time, but I can’t seem to stop.
I have bigger things to think about now—a real future. Brothers takes a liking to me. I’m smart, despite not having a great education. When it comes to hands-on stuff, I learn quick. He likes that all he has to do is give me instructions once, and I can carry them out to the letter.
The only contention between us is that I like Brothers and Brothers likes me, but Brothersdoes notlike Holly and pretends she doesn’t exist when she talks in front of him. Me liking Holly feels like a vulnerable point in our growing relationship.
I ask him about it one day while we’re duck hunting. He’s tracking a bird, shotgun up, one eye shut.
“Money is money, Jen,” he murmurs. “Business is business. Fucking is fucking.”
I don’t know exactly what that means, but it sounds like he’s telling me who I fuck won’t negatively affect my standing with him.
So, I don’t break it off with Holly. By day, I’m Brothers Boyd’s best worker and closest friend. By night, I’m Jen, the guy who can’t make up his mind about what he wants.
Pretty soon, I become something of a right hand to Brothers, taking the place of his absent brother, Jem. He was supposed to help run the business, but he rarely shows up for work anymore, not unless he’s forced. At first, I like Jem, and we work together a lot, but then he starts to feel a lot like Kyle, just checked out all the time.
But me, I show up in all ways. Brothers starts trusting me with the more delicate parts of his business, the parts that could get him in trouble if we mess up. In turn, I trust he knows what he’s doing and follow his orders.
I like that trust. It makes me irreplaceable.
We’re all over the town, in the speakeasies, the pubs, the racetrack, rubbing elbows with what Brothers refers to as the seersucker bourgeoisie. Not a day goes by where we rest—he’s building an empire and he’s building it fast. Brothers is always at Keeneland, shaking hands and leaving with his pockets heavier. I go from being a boy from Harlan County with nothing to sitting at the tables of Lexington’s richest men.
Most importantly, for the first time in my life, I have something that feels like a real family. I never had a father or a brother, but Brothers Boyd comes so close. My life is good, beyond my wildest dreams.
Until it isn’t, and everything crumbles in a single night. One mistake, and the whole thing is gone, leaving me standing in the rubble. I have nothing but my very first dream and my unbreakable will to live. On horseback, with only a revolver on my belt, I head west to cowboy country and never look back.
