Chapter 30

THIRTY

ELLIS

The moment I get into the older man’s apartment, I call Leland, who picks up on the first ring.

“Well, hello, my new favorite friend,” Leland says.

Everything just comes running out of me in a quick rush. “They have Tavish and he said you guys would know what do and what if he gets hurt and what if it’s all my fault and I have to save him?”

“I think I got most of that… Alright, Ellis, you need to go back to my house and sit your tush down and watch some TV. We’ll handle it,” Leland assures me.

“I’m not fucking sitting down! No! I’m… I’m… uh… going to… save him.”

“Try to sound a bit more confident the next time you declare that.”

“I don’t know how to sound confident!” I exclaim. “Where do I meet you? Do you have a plane?”

“Do I look like I just have a plane?” Leland asks.

“You have a murder van and a weird extra house and a sex dungeon and a gun shrine and a fucking… slab of fence! I feel like having a plane isn’t out of the realm of possibilities!”

“I have more than one extra house but no plane. But I’ll get us one, don’t worry.”

“Where do I meet you?”

“We’ll swing by and pick you up.”

“You promise?”

“I promise.”

“You’re not going to leave me behind because you think I’ll just get in the way?”

Leland hesitates. “That’s totally what I was going to do, but now that you sound really sad, I feel like I have to pick you up.”

“Thank you. Thank you so much!”

“Now I feel guilty that I’m taking you off to Murder Island knowing that you have no idea what you’re doing. I bet if I teach you the Murder Song, the fighting spirit of your ancient ancestors from the medieval times will tear through you, and by harnessing their spirit, you will know how to fight.”

I feel quite confident that Leland is confused and just talking to hear himself talk, but that’s fine. “Okay! I’m going to let you go, though. But please don’t forget me.”

“Clench the ass cheeks and call forth your ancient fighting spirit.”

“They’re clenched,” I assure him.

“Perfect.” And with that, he hangs up. I turn to the man whose home I’m currently hiding in. He’s yelling at someone on the phone about not being paid enough for his life to be at risk, and it takes me longer than it should have to realize that it’s likely my father.

I snatch the phone from him as the older man hollers at me. “Dad?”

“Shawn?” he asks, and I find it weird hearing his voice. It’s a voice I longed to hear for so many years and now… now what?

“Were you taking drugs out of evidence?”

Dad ignores my question. “Ellis, you need to get out of all of this. You don’t know how cruel these men can be.”

“And yet my father seems to be just as cruel,” I say. “Don’t talk to me about protecting me or whatever the fuck nonsense you want to go on about… that you want to lie to me about. I want to know what’s going on here. You were taking drugs out of the department? And then what? You were scared you were going to get caught afterward, so you ran off? So you only thought about yourself and never once thought about or cared about anyone else?”

“You don’t understand?—”

“No, Dad, I don’t. I don’t even want to call you my dad anymore. I built you up so fucking much throughout these years. In my mind I painted you as a hero who got caught up in something awful. Got caught up in some… fictitious scheme where you were protecting someone or saving someone that you couldn’t come back from. I knew you’d been killed because there was no other reason you wouldn’t come home. But it was just because you were fucking protecting yourself from bullshit you selfishly got involved in!”

“No! I did it for you guys.”

I can’t believe him. “You did what ? You fucking started some drug-smuggling bullshit because of us? You’re going to blame that on us?”

“We didn’t have much money?—”

“You and Mom both had full-time jobs. People survive on so much less. We had plenty of money. You just wanted more. You ruined our lives. We had to change our names. We had to change schools. We weren’t allowed to speak to friends we grew up with. We literally had to become new people because they thought someone was after you. Because you made it look like you were the victim, when you were actually the man behind it all. They thought you stepped too deep into something that led to your death and because they were afraid they would come after us, we had to start a whole new life. But no. This whole goddamn time you were hiding from your own mistakes, using money you got from your fucking lies.”

“That’s not true. That’s not true,” Dad says.

“Which part isn’t? How the hell can I believe anything if I know nothing ? All I can do is make up my own assumptions. My own guesses. If you want to start telling the truth, do it right now. Did you take drugs illegally from the department? I don’t know if you took them out of evidence or if you took them off a job… or however the fuck you took them. Did you take them and sell them to Arthur’s daughter, Jasmine?”

Dad’s quiet for a moment before he goes, “Yes.”

“Okay… So you’re admitting all of this… every fucking ounce of this is your fucking fault!”

“It’s not my fault! She tried killing me! She fucking stabbed me in the back when she thought she could cut me out of it and start going elsewhere in the department. And when I threatened to expose her, she tried to kill me. She swore she’d kill my entire family. She would send me pictures of you and Sienna. Pictures of you reading in your room. She’d send me messages she was sending your sister where she was pretending to be some boy who asked her to meet him somewhere, and Sienna was more than eager to. Jasmine was vindictive and a bitch and better off dead.”

I hesitate as I let that sink in. “You killed her?”

“Did you not just hear me? She was going to hurt the two of you.”

“You couldn’t have done something about it?” I ask before realizing that he couldn’t… if he wanted to protect himself. “Oh wait… you couldn’t because if you went to someone in your department and had her arrested, she would have told them where she was getting drugs from. So instead of taking the fall… you killed her? You killed her and pissed Arthur off to the point where you went into hiding and you fucking left us to fend for ourselves?”

Slowly, the rage leaves me and in its place is just disappointment and a hollow feeling. And I find myself thinking… at least Tavish is here. Tavish will help me through this bullshit. As long as Tavish is safe, that is.

“Dad, even now… you know that they’re after me because of you. And yet you still choose yourself. If you actually loved any one of us, you’d go to the police. You’d tell them what you did. And you’d tell them why Arthur is after you.”

“Just… Ellis, I can fix this.”

“You don’t want to fix this. You want to pretend it never existed. I’m not a stupid kid anymore. Now tell me why Arthur is after you now instead of years ago. Why now?”

“I don’t know,” he insists.

“I swear everything that comes out of your mouth is nothing more than lies. I’m so fucking sick of them. Don’t ever contact me again. Try harder to disappear from my life this time,” I say as I hang up and hand the man his phone back.

Without a word to him, I step out into the hallway and yell “FUCK” into my bunched-up shirt that I press against my mouth. I just… I just fucking don’t understand. I thought our life was good. But he wanted something so much different. So much more.

The door opens and I jump, expecting it to be some gunman who has come to see what I’m screaming about, but instead, it’s Leland.

“You look like you want to punch something or cry. Depending on your choice, I’ll either help you or send Jackson in,” he says as he watches me warily. Apparently, he’s as bad with tears as Tavish is… maybe even worse.

“I’m fine,” I state as I stomp down all of those stupid emotions. He doesn’t deserve a damn one of them. With my mom and sister safe, all I need to do is devote them all to worrying about Tavish. “Thank you so much for helping me.”

“You know you don’t have to be fine, right? You can be pissed, angry, sad… whatever you want to be. You can curse the sky and the sun and the moon. Or you could just punch something.”

“The last option sounds painful and a good way to break my hand,” I say.

“I’ll teach you the proper way to punch someone. And then you will graduate to shivving. And then it will just snowball from there. I can teach you how to kill a man with a snowball. Best part is that the evidence will melt.” Leland slings his arm over my shoulders. “But once you know the Murder Song, everything will feel better.”

“Yeah?” I ask, not sure that’s true, but willing to do whatever he mentions just to focus on something else. Anything else. “How’s the Murder Song go?”

We step outside where there’s some man lying unconscious on the ground. I eye him, but Leland just steps on him before continuing his walk. Clearly, there were still some people hanging around.

“It goes a little something like this: Murrrrrder… we’re gonna commit some muuuurder. We can’t murder Tavish because Ellis isn’t as savage. But we could go get a smoothie and watch a movie and hope Tavish figures it out himself! Yay! ”

“I feel like that entire song was about you trying to get out of saving Tavish and had nothing to actually do with murder…”

“You’re right. Let me try again. Muuuuurder here, murder there… I wanna murder a bear… Fuck, you’re right. It’s about Tavish again. I just keep thinking of all the ways he’s irritated me. Alright. Let me try again.”

“Please stop trying to make his ears bleed,” Cassel shouts from where he’s waiting near the vehicle. “No one wants to hear your awful singing, Leland!”

“ Muuuurrrder… murdering your friends is wrong but what if they’re a dingdong? Blood. And gore. And violence! Oh my! ”

“I swear it gets worse every time,” Jackson mutters.

“GASP. Jackson. My love. What was that?”

“I said your voice is like a songbird,” he says, sounding like a monotone robot.

“Yeah, maybe one infesting your ears,” Cassel mutters. “Jeremy is out on a call so he couldn’t slip out but told me to be careful, and if I have to, use Leland as a shield.”

“That’s okay. We have Micah and Everly,” Leland says. “As we were leaving the prison, I called Everly up and was like ‘I know you just left from helping me, but I have someone fun to shoot.’ And he was all like ‘Do I get to shoot you?’ and I was all ‘Ha ha!’ And then he got into the car with a really big gun.”

“Leland, why do half of your friends feel violence toward you?” I ask as I’m escorted into the vehicle.

“It’s because they’re jealous,” Leland explains, which makes the new guy nearly choke to death. Leland grimaces a little and I realize that maybe the joke between them isn’t as much of a joke as it is with the others.

“Tucker found me someone with a boat. I know it’s not as fast as a plane, but sneaking a plane onto an island isn’t the easiest of endeavors, where with a boat, we could have a better chance of getting close before we get noticed. We also are phenomenal at boating.”

“Didn’t you two sink the last boat you were on?” Micah questions.

“And they didn’t drown?” Everly asks.

“No, I had to save them. They were… singing instead of trying to save themselves… and… I still have nightmares,” Micah informs him.

“That’s understandable,” Everly says.

“So Tavish got himself abducted? What a weakling,” Micah comments. “I would never do that.”

“I swear one of the times I dealt with you, we had you tied up,” Cassel says, and Micah has nothing to say about that.

“He like… willingly went along with it or something,” I tell them. “I just don’t understand why he’d go alone.”

“Because he wants to keep you out of it,” Leland responds.

“I… think we’ve all been guilty of doing that,” Jackson says. “Sometimes it’s easier to put yourself at risk instead of dragging along the ones you care about.”

“Wish my dad learned that,” I mutter as I settle into the back seat of the abductor wagon with Everly and Micah in front of me. “Hi, I’m Ellis.”

Everly looks back at me with kind of a cold expression that I’m not quite sure how to take. “Everly.”

“I’m pretty sure he’s just along for the ride on the chance he might get to off Leland,” Micah explains. “Sometimes I think I am too. We were strategizing about the quickest and easiest ways when we saw Leland singing.”

“Uhhhh…”

“Would you like to join?” Everly asks.

I hesitate. “No? I… uh… tend to like… Leland?”

“Ellis is sickeningly sweet. Like disgustingly sweet,” Leland informs them.

What? “I was complimenting you!”

Everly stares at Leland then looks back at me. “Leland says that about you and you still like him?” He looks quite confused.

“I don’t know. I’m really kind of terrified and uncertain, and Leland’s confidence makes me feel like I could accomplish anything,” I explain.

“I just have a wonderful effect on people. Ellis, I got you a new taser. Or three.” Leland passes back a handful of tasers which I hold in confusion.

“This one is a hand one,” Cassel says, which… I could at least tell, but maybe that’s why he thought I looked confused. “Since you can use it multiple times, you can try it out on Leland. And then the other two just aim and point. You can also try them out on Leland.”

“I don’t have room for all of these,” I protest.

“I tried packing you a gun but then I was scared you’d shoot your foot off like you shot Tavish’s foot. So then I just decided that I would have to teach you how to shoot,” Leland says.

“I’d prefer not to,” I say. “I’m confident that you should only aim a gun at something you’re willing to kill.”

“Right,” Leland agrees. “But we can teach you less lethal shots.”

“‘Less’?”

“Yeah. I mean… semi-less lethal. It’s fine.”

“I’ll stick with these.”

“And are you clenching your ass cheeks and pulling forth the ancient fighting spirit? Because if you are, I got you this neat little whomping stick. It looks like an itty-bitty thing and then pow .” Leland flicks it and it extends. “I tried it on Jackson’s ass, so it should be good to go.”

I gingerly take it. “What? In case I want to spank some people? That’s why you tried it on his ass? And where the hell am I putting all of this stuff?”

“I also got you some pepper spray. Make sure you’re not in a position for that to be blown into your face.”

“None of these look like things I will have success with, but I’ll try them.”

“And a mini flamethrower,” he says as he tries to pass that back as well.

“What the fuck would I do with a mini flamethrower ?” I hiss.

“And then we’ll get some good padding on you,” Leland says, fully ignoring that question as he grabs a bag and comes into the back.

“So… Everly…” Micah starts. Everly slowly looks over at him and Micah doesn’t seem to know what to say now. “I, uhhhh, heard you’re in charge of Lucas?”

“I deal with him, correct,” Everly says.

“Any, uhhhhh… interest in murdering him? I pay well.”

“I already tried it,” Leland says.

“I tried it too,” Cassel mutters.

“Why’d you put him in prison if you just want to murder him?” Everly asks.

“Because I was a very confused man trying to be all ‘Look, Lucas, I’ve changed.’ It was a stupid mistake,” Leland says as he starts stuffing a vest on me. He’s cinching it so tightly that I’m positive he’s planning on suffocating me and leaving me behind.

“I can’t… breathe.”

“You don’t need to be able to breathe,” he assures me, which sounds counterintuitive to my survival… if that’s what this is.

Once I’m more than a little confident that Leland is just going to leave me in the back of the car where I can no longer move from all the protective gear on me, we reach the water.

“Leland, I can’t move like this.”

“Good. Just stay here until we get back,” he says. “Jackson, roll the window down and leave a little bowl of water for him.”

I grumble and flail my way out of these weird protective pants before slithering out of the car. “I am going! I’m… capable of something!”

“Are you sure you want to go?” Jackson asks.

“Yes, more than sure. I’m… I’m not like my dad and won’t just run away when things get rough.”

Jackson gives me a soft smile. “You’re nothing like your father. Don’t ever think that. You can stay back here where it’s safe and leave it to the rest of us who know what we’re doing.”

“I don’t know what we’re doing,” Everly mutters. “Is this the boat? Will anyone notice if I push Leland off?”

“I would notice,” Leland responds.

“I would pay handsomely,” Micah says.

Everly’s expression doesn’t change but when Leland gets close to the water, Everly seems quite interested in him. Even though they are all quite strange, I hurry after them as we get onto the boat. The person manning the boat guns it the moment we’re on and I fly back, slamming into a box before falling into Cassel, who takes me down with him. Cassel clearly isn’t going down alone because he grabs on to Jackson’s pants, whipping them down as Leland trips over me while trying to catch his footing and skids across the boat on his chest.

When it’s all said and done, the only one still standing is Jackson with no pants or underwear up since Cassel has both in a firm grip that he doesn’t seem prepared to release.

“Y’all should get some life jackets on,” the captain of the boat says, like he didn’t think to possibly tell us that before our lives were endangered.

Leland whistles from where he’s wallowing on the ground, also a victim of the horrible driving. “Damn, darling. Look at dat asssssss. Cassel, look at dat ass.”

“Cassel, can I please have my pants back?” Jackson asks as he tries to cover himself with them, but with Cassel holding on to them like a lifeline, it doesn’t seem that he’s going to be getting them.

“I’m so sorry,” I tell Cassel.

Leland waves off my apology. “Don’t apologize, Ellis. Never apologize for getting to see Jackson’s tush.”

Cassel finally lets go, and I help him up enough that we can kind of waddle our way to a seat when my phone beeps.

Anxious that it might be Tavish, I yank it out only to see that it’s a picture of me and Cassel disrobing Jackson.

Leland: Dat ass. Dat ass.

Henry: Why the fuck do you think I want to look at that?

Leland: Your wife sure liked it.

Henry: You are never allowed to message Tracy again, you hear me?

Leland: You’re so spicy today, Daddy. It’s not my fault your wife called your ass “tragically flat.”

Jackson: Why?

Leland: Why’s his ass so flat? I don’t know.

Me: Why am I so fixated on his ass in the photo?

Jeremy: Cassel… why?

Cassel: It was this or death! DEATH!

Tavish: This is Danielle. May I inquire your present location? My ride is much more boring. The Scottish one won’t stop talking about some donuts he had like three weeks ago. I’m confused and hungry. And very curious about this ass.

“Huh,” Leland says.

“Did you literally text the bad guys?” Cassel asks in disbelief.

“I was so excited to show off my favorite new photo that I just threw it in a group chat! I didn’t think to make sure Tavish wasn’t in it. You know I love terrorizing him. It’s one of my favorite things to do.”

This is clearly not going to go well.

“If we’d pushed him off the boat, none of this would have happened,” Everly says as he finds his way to a seat where he tries to pretend that he hadn’t also gone flying across the boat.

Once we’re all seated and wearing life jackets while clinging on in terror, I find my mind wandering.

I hope it doesn’t take too long to reach the island. Fear over what might be happening to Tavish is eating through me. I need to reach him, and I will do absolutely anything it takes to get him home safely. I just want to take him home… I want to prove to him that I’m worth sticking around for.

But first, I must live through this boat ride.