“Fletcher fucking Bundy just got his nose broken by a guy wearing red satin panties.”
I snort. “Don’t forget the lace.”
When AJ comes over a minute later, the two of us are still howling with laughter. “What’s so funny, dudes?” he asks.
“It’s kind of a long story,” I gasp, wiping tears from my eyes.
“Here, why don’t you sit down.” Errol gets up.
“I don’t want to make you stand,” he says, but he’s already sitting down on the chair Errol just vacated with awhooshof a sigh.
“He won’t,” I say, patting my lap. Since most of the beer went down my back, the front of my jeans are more or less dry. “Have a seat, baby.”
AJ kind of laughs. “You guys are funny.” He studies Errol. “I didn’t expect you to have a fighting side in you. Who were those douchebags, anyway?”
“I didn’t really expect it, either,” Errol mumbles. He looks uncomfortable at being complimented on his ass-kicking ability. “Bunch of high school assholes that never grew the fuck up. Thanks for bringing the muscle. I think that whole mess would have ended up differently if it was just me and Ran.”
AJ gives me a look that says clear as day he doesn’t expect me to be any kind of help in a fight. “No sweat, bro. They were disrespecting me with their shit, too.”
“Thanks, man,” I pipe up. “I owe you one. You got BVE going on there —big Viking energy,” I tell him, which makes AJ grin.
“I guess I better start putting it to use breaking down those grills,” he says as he stands up. Making a fist, he gives Errol a tap on the upper arm. “Just be gentle with this guy tonight,” he says, pointing his thumb at me with a smirk as he walks back to the grill station.
Luckily, his implication doesn’t filter through to my overloaded brain until a minute later when he’s out of earshot, because I can’t hold back my laughter again. “You hear that, baby?You’resupposed to go easy onme.”
“Pfft.” Errol just rolls his eyes, but I can see the smile he’s trying to hide.
53
AARYN
After going home for a shower and dry clothes, I come back just as the band is starting to pack up while AJ’s buddies disperse the crowd. I join Errol and AJ in what I guess passes for the office at Finn’s so they can tally up how much money they raised.
Since I’ve never been back here before, I glance around in curiosity.Yikes. It’s easy to see where Errol has already imposed a sense of order. Looking at the remainder —piles of papers, sticky notes, envelopes and God only knows what else — gives me a headache.
I’m impressed and proud of Errol’s dedication to this business. My earlier optimism from before the run-in with Bundy returns. With all the hustling they’ve both done in recent days, they’ll be able to keep Finnegan’s Wake from capsizing.
My high-flying mood comes crashing down when AJ scrubs a hand over his eyes. ‘Fuck, man,” he mutters, staring down at a calculator. I’m shocked to see tears glittering in the big biker’s eyes. I dart a glance at Errol, my pulse quickening, only to see the same dejected, near-tears expression on his face, too.
“We didn’t fucking do it,” AJ rasps, his voice breaking.
“We’re like seventy grand short,” Errol adds. His swallow bobs in his throat as he runs a shaking hand through his hair.
I’m stunned. This isn’t the way this story is supposed to go. We were the good guys — and the underdogs, to boot. This was supposed to work out. I watched the man I love stress himself out, lose sleep, push himself way out of his comfort zone and generally bust his ass to pull this off.
I’m not naive. I know getting anAfor effort means jack shit in real life. But still. “It’s just not fucking fair,” I say to nobody and the universe at the same time.
AJ is wiping tears away and doing a terrible job covering up the fact that he’s crying. Errol doesn’t bother hiding it. He drops his head into his hands and lets go. Hearing him and seeing his shoulders shake brings a lump intomythroat.
Guilt washes over me. I should have done more. I’m supposed to be fucking smart. I should have evaluated the whole mess of a situation objectively, realized that the idea of raising this much money in that kind of time was fucking impossible and shifted into problem-solving mode.
Listening to Errol cry makes me feel like a piece of shit. He rescued me from getting my ass handed to me by Bundy like the nerd that I am, and I didn’t even have the decency to have a smart-guy solution to this clusterfuck in my back pocket. I haven’t held up my end of this at all.
It suddenly hits me that I am bone-tired, dead-on-my-feet exhausted. I pull out my phone to check the time and see that I missed a call. The number has a Silicon Valley area code, but it’s not anybody who comes up in my contacts.
I bite back a groan as I tap to play back the message. One of the Marcus minions I’ve been in contact with must have gotten a new number. It’s virtually guaranteed to be a highly technical question about my software. The last thing I want to do right now is deal with this.
I don’t recognize the voice, but I sure as shit recognize the name on the message. I feel my eyes getting wide as I listen. It’s short, but when it ends, I hit play again, certain I must have misheard something. Errol looks over a minute or so later, wiping his eyes, as I stare down at my phone with my mouth agape.
