Total pages in book: 88
Estimated words: 84002 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 420(@200wpm)___ 336(@250wpm)___ 280(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 84002 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 420(@200wpm)___ 336(@250wpm)___ 280(@300wpm)
He steeled his emotions, pushed to his feet, got changed, and headed down the stairs. He wouldn’t cry. Wouldn’t give in to the tightness in his chest. Wouldn’t let himself be what his dad hated. He’d be strong. He’d be good. He’d show his father he wasn’t weak.
He jumped into his Mustang and drove straight to Lucky Rose where the whole team would be. His hands hurt, he gripped the steering wheel so tight. His foot pressed more and more on the accelerator and he watched the number rise…sixty, sixty-five, seventy, seventy-five….
His head still hurt. His father’s words still circled his brain. Weak. Fucked up. Leader.
He went around each sharp corner, his speed still rising, his heart beating faster as he went. Eighty, eighty-five.
Jesus, he couldn’t breathe. Why in the hell couldn’t he breathe?
Max jerked the car to the side of the road. Slamming the brakes, nearly running off the edge and into a ditch.
The second the car stopped, he jumped out, gasping for breath that he couldn’t find. He held his chest, bent over, and vomited in the dirt.
When his pulse slowed and his breathing evened out, he got back into his car. He’d be okay. He’d freaked out. No one had seen. Everything was okay.
When he pulled into the parking lot at Lucky Rose, he saw the whole team was in fact there. He rinsed his mouth out with an old Gatorade in his car, opened the door and spit it out, before popping a mint past his lips and going inside.
“Sullivan! What took you so long, fucker?” Jonathan called and everyone laughed.
“I was busy with your mama. She gives the best head,” Max replied and earned harder laughter than Jonathan had.
Your peers need to be able to look at you to lead.
He glanced to the left and saw Shane bussing a table. He knew his father hadn’t meant people like Shane when he spoke about Max’s peers. He meant Jonathan and Jimmy and the rest of the team.
Shane turned with a gray bin in his hands full of dishes.
“Oops,” Max replied as he walked by and hit it with his hand, so it toppled to the floor, dishes going everywhere. “Sorry. I didn’t see you there.”
The laughter got louder. His friends cheered for him. Shane bent down to clean the mess…looked up at him with hate in his eyes…hate and loneliness. Max fought the urge to stop, to apologize. To kneel beside him and help because that look that Shane gave him? He felt it too. The hate for himself every time he looked in the mirror and the loneliness every second of his life.
CHAPTER FIVE
Back at the auto shop, Shane hadn’t expected it to bother him as much as it had to see Maxwell. He’d never left Last Chance. He saw people like Jonathan every day of his life and let it roll off his back. He had his life and they had theirs and damned if he would let anyone think theirs was more important or that he’d put any thought into who they were or what they did.
Jonathan was still a dick but they were adults and were cordial to each other, even though there was obviously no love lost between them.
Seeing Maxwell had somehow been different. Maybe it was because he’d left, disappeared for twelve years without so much as a visit, so he hadn’t had time to put his past with Maxwell to rest.
Maybe it was because every time he thought about Maxwell, he saw the fear in his eyes that night at his house, when he’d said, “he’ll kill me,” and Shane had never forgotten it. He’d spent too much time thinking about it and wondering who Maxwell meant. If maybe there had been more to him than Shane saw, only for Max to fuck with him again and show there wasn’t.
And there he was, thinking about the motherfucker again.
“Shane?”
He shook his head and turned to Ryan at the sound of his voice.
“You okay, buddy? I said your name three times.”
Shane groaned, annoyed at himself for losing his mind to thoughts of Maxwell and wondering where in the fuck he’d been for twelve years. “Yeah, I’m good. What’s up?” He wiped the sweat off his brow and no doubt left a smudge of dirt or oil behind.
“I wanted to ask you something about this paperwork.” He showed an invoice to Shane and asked a few questions about the discount it showed, which Shane explained to him. They were done in less than three minutes.
He walked back into the stall just as a shadow cast around the corner. “Can I help you?” His eyes darted up and were met with ones he was just trying to forget. His body immediately went tight all over.
“Place looks great. It’s yours?” Max asked. His voice sounded careful, wary.