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Had I really changed for the better?
Was I really making a difference?
Would Mikey have been proud of me?
My phone rang mid pull-up, and I dropped down to the floor. Sweat coated my body, and all my limbs trembled from the hour-long workout. I swiped my damp forearm across my forehead and crossed the room to my iPhone. Glancing down at it, I frowned at the unfamiliar number. I didn’t get many calls, and never from people I didn’t know, and when I did, it was never good news.
Swiping my finger across the screen, I lifted it to my ear. “Hello?”
“Is this Thorn McKinney?”
I cleared my throat, my heart pounding full speed. “May I ask who this is?”
“This is the Eleventh Precinct, South Side Chicago, and I’m Officer Forkes.” The officer paused. “Are you Thorn McKinney?”
I closed my eyes. If the police were calling, it had to mean one thing. Mom had gotten herself arrested again. “Yes, I’m Layla McKinney’s son. What did she do this time? Drugs? Prostitution? Both?”
“Uh…” The officer laughed uneasily. “I’m not calling about your mother, though I am familiar with her…uh…work.”
I opened my eyes quickly, relief hitting me in the gut. Every time I bailed out Mom, it was a trip to the past—a trip I never wanted to take. Ever. “Then why are you calling me?”
“Do you know a Rose Gallagher? You’re listed as her emergency contact on her job application at—”
Just like that, my stomach dropped. She was the only person in my life who mattered. The last remaining reminder of who I’d been, once upon a time.
More than that, she was my only friend.
Sure, the only reason I’d hung out with her initially was because I had been her brother’s best friend. When Mikey died almost eight years ago in a tragic accident, I slipped into the role of older brother the best I could. And I’d never once strayed from that role. But over time, my “obligation” became something more.
Something I looked forward to.
Earlier today, I’d gone out to lunch with her—like I did every week—and even through my distraction and my need to tell her something that would probably make her hate me, I could tell that something had been off. Her beautiful blue eyes had seemed less shiny, and her smooth pale skin had been a little less bright. She’d still been breathtakingly beautiful, perfect in every way, enough to tempt a saint into breaking his vows of celibacy, but she seemed…tired.
Rose was never tired.
I knew her better than I knew myself, so I knew something had been wrong, and I kept pressing her for information, but she shrugged it off and changed the subject each time. And now…“Is she okay?”
“She was attacked—”
I grabbed the first shirt I found off my dorm bed, my heart twisting. If she wasn’t all right…I didn’t know what I’d do. “Is she okay?”
“She’s alive. But she got attacked outside her workplace.” The officer paused. “She’s in the ER now. They might keep her overnight, considering the nature of her attack, but then she’ll be released.”
I shrugged into the black shirt the best I could while holding the phone to my ear. I tried to keep calm, but this was Rose, and there was no calm. “Where is she?”
“Chester Memorial.”
I switched the phone to the other ear to shrug my other arm into my shirt. “I’ll be there in fifteen minutes.”
I hung up, grabbed my keys, and was halfway out the door before I remembered I was barefoot…by stepping on a thumbtack. “Son of a—” Breaking off before I let a curse slip, I picked up the tack and hurried back inside, ignoring the throbbing pain in my heel, stomped into a pair of black-and-white Chucks, and took the stairs two at a time down to the main exit of my dorms—the dorms reserved for guys like me, who were almost finished here but hadn’t quite taken the final step that was required for us to leave.
Swiping my card into the slot beside the door that led to the garage on campus, I tapped the card on my thigh. “C’mon,” I said as I waited impatiently for the light by the door to flash green. The second it did, I yanked the doors open and took off for my old black ’01 BMW. I bought it last year for eight hundred bucks, off of a guy who hadn’t graduated, but had instead chosen to spend his life with the boy he met at a bar a few blocks from school. The check-engine light lit up when I started it, like always, but for the first time I actually gave a damn. If this crapper of a car didn’t get me to my Rose…
I wouldn’t be responsible for my actions.
Gripping the wheel tightly, I stepped on the gas, speeding down I-55. As I drove, all I could picture was Rose’s pale face, surrounded by dark brown hair. The soft freckles across her cheeks always gave her a soft, angelic appearance, but she was tougher than steel. She would be fine. She had to be okay.
I’d make sure of it, if it was the last thing I did.
