Page 61 of Pistol Whipped

I wasn’t lying when I told Dallas I was dog shit on my own. It’s been years since I’ve managed to string more than two notes together. But this afternoon…this afternoon, something finally clicked. Or came back, I suppose. Then Rain Gamble had to come along and spoil that too.

I don’t bother to make for the pool house. Instead, I flop my ass down on the gigantic beige sectional my mom bought to “fill the space”.

Neither she nor Dad are super comfortable with how big this house is. I’m not even sure why they bought it after Brady Construction took off. They’re hardly ever here. Like right now. As far as I know, they are in London for some new build. Before that, it was Berlin for the construction of a new flagship hotel property. Pretty sure restlessness, that inability to sit still, runs in my damn veins.

Their frequent absences are part of why I still live in their pool house as a grown-ass man instead of getting my own place like Dallas and Dutch. Mom asked that I stay to keep an eye on the house and the business here while they traipse around the world. Then again, that was nearly eight years ago now, and I’m pretty sure she and Dad were just afraid that I’d have another episode if I lived on my own. At least in the pool house, they could have their cleaners keep an eye on my comings and goings.

“Fuck,” I swear out loud again. It echoes around the living room. Too big, too empty, too beige. The knock on the front door comes just as the echoes of my voice subside.

“What now?” I snarl, but I shove myself off the couch anyway and head to the door. My assumption was that one of our nosy fucking neighbours had seen me scale the fence and was coming to tattle to my parents. Yet, on the front step is a kid who looks like he can’t be more than twenty, wearing a bike helmet and holding a large stock envelope out in my direction.

“You Cohen Brady?” he asks.

One nod, and he shoves the thing at me, and in the dull voice of someone who hates his job, he says, “Congratulations. You’ve been served.”

He doesn’t linger after that. By the time I process the words, he’s long gone, and I’m left standing in my open door, mouth gaping and the envelope pinched between my palms and stomach.

What. The. Fuck, I mouth. My hands move fast. My index finger slides under the sealed edge and, with a bit of pressure, tears the paper. Inside is just more paper. White this time. Standard legal paper. The kind I know exactly how to read from four years in management with Brady Construction. Pulling the stack of stapled pages halfway out, my eyes rove over it looking for the name. There will be a name somewhere on this first page that tells me who exactly is suing me and what the fuck they are suing me for.

Sure enough, it’s there in bold.

Trey McCoy.

Suing me for assault.

God-fucking-dammit. Serves me right for getting mixed up in Rain Gamble’s shit again, even though I know better. The rush of anger and frustration surges the longer I look at that mother fucker’s name in print. With it comes the familiar buzz that blocks out all other sounds. The only thing that penetrates it is a faint ringing. It’s there behind the whirling storm of anger.

Somewhere in another room, I realize after the third set of rings, someone is phoning the house. I attempt to ignore it, but whoever is calling won’t give it a fucking rest. Still clutching the legal paperwork, I storm through the house to the only remaining landline.

“What?!” I shout.

“Excuse me? You don’t talk to me like that.”

Fuck. I run my fingers through my curls. My mother is about to give me shit like I’m a five-year-old.

“Where are your manners, Cohen?” she scolds. Kira Brady is a fierce woman. One that gives most men an inferiority complex, which, when she isn’t yelling at me, makes me damn proud to call her Mom.

“Sorry,” I apologize, “I’m just dealing with a lot of shit right now.”

As I said, the cursing doesn’t bother her, just bad phone manners.

“Yeah, well, then you’re not going to like what I’m about to tell you.”

I suck in a breath, expecting some news about the business or their travels that I don’t actually care that much about. They are staying at The Savoy in London, so I figure the worst that can happen is their scones are served with jam-first instead of cream or some shit like that.

“Where have you been, son? The lawyers have been trying to get a hold of you for weeks!”

“I’ve been…busy.”

Sue me. Oh wait, I guess I’m already being sued for something else. Still, I didn’t exactly tell my folks that The Pistols were back together. After the way things ended last time, I was nervous they’d freak out and come home. Doesn’t matter how old you get, how grown you think you are, your parents are still your parents. And that goes double for those of us who mess up their first go-round with adulthood.

“Busy with Rain Gamble, Lou Braun and The Preaching-fucking-Pistols.”

My throat bobs. Gulp. Looks like the lawyers at our contracted firm, Wren and McQuaid, ratted me out after I sent them the contract to review.

Mom as good as confirms it before launching into a lecture about keeping secrets, not returning phone calls, ignoring important emails and oh yeah, the cherry on top of my shit-sundae, she says, “And! I saw the news, Cohen. Apparently, you beat the shit out of Rain’s fiancé, and now you’re facing legal action?”

She—admittedly correctly—takes my silence as an affirmative.