“Sure. Yeah. But I’m still going with you.”
CHAPTER25
walker
We parked on the street and jogged over to the restaurant. The scene looked like a war zone and a neighborhood watch had gotten together. Aside from the circle of onlookers, there was glass all over the sidewalk and stripes of red spray paint everywhere. The worst was Ginger’s mural, which Ozzie had said she’d just finished a few days ago. Unlike the random stripes of paint throughout the restaurant, someone had started to spell out a word over her lovely painting—the first two letters were G and R, and the final letter looked like the beginning of a C.
No. That wasn’t a C.
“You see what they were trying to spell, right, Oz?” I asked, my stomach in knots.
I’d never seen him so furious, and I flinched when he reached for me.
“Shh, shh, shh, baby,” he whispered. “I see it. They’re trying to call both of us groomers. I’m mad at them, not you.”
Caution tape was stretched across the door. Tommy was sitting on a bench outside the Seguin Bean, arguing with the EMTs, and Allie was comforting Joel as officers tramped through the restaurant.
Ozzie went to Joel and pulled him into a tight hug. “It’s okay, man. It’s all replaceable.”
“I know. I just…” Joel gestured inside, where the officers were taking pictures.
“I’m so sorry about this, guys,” Allie said, running her hand through her multicolored hair. “This fucking blows.”
We quietly nodded in agreement.
Aside from the fact that the place had been spray-painted to hell and back, chairs and tables were knocked over, and everything was covered in broken glass. And I realized there was something eerily familiar about the scene.
“This is my parents’ doing,” I said, guilt thrashing in my chest.
“You don’t know that, Walk,” Joel said, so willing to be kind, but I knew he knew about the accusations.
“You remember how my sister died, Joel?”
He blinked at me. Well, it probably did seem like an odd question. “She lost control of the car trying to avoid hitting a dog.”
A tear streaked down my cheek. “First responders found the dog and returned it to its owners. Dad found out where they lived, just north of San Antonio. He went there and ripped apart their house. Smashed in a big picture window, broke their furniture, tossed their beds. Found half a gallon of exterior paint in the garage and poured it all over the place.”
“Holy shit. How did you find out he did that?”
“Mom told me at the funeral. She’d helped him find the address. She was mad that the dog wasn’t home.”
“Jesus fucking Christ, Walk,” Allie said, shaking her head.
I tried to keep going, but I couldn’t get the words out through the catch in my throat.
“Hey, hey, hey,” Ozzie said, pulling me into a hug. “Baby, don’t worry. You had nothing to do with this.”
His whispered words soothed something inside me that had always felt a bit tumbled, but the truth was, I had a lot to worry about.
“This is who I come from, Oz,” I finally managed to say. “I told you they wouldn’t be satisfied with hurting me. They had to come after you and your new restaurant. I’m so?—”
Ozzie pressed his hand to my mouth. “Don’t you dare. You will not be apologizing for their actions. And what they did tonight wasn’t only about you. It was about the entire queer community.”
Allie shook her head. “They’d best be prepared, because they don’t know what they started.”
“You don’t even know—” I started, but her fierce look silenced me.
“I don’t need to know everything, Walker.”
