Page 33 of The Ache That Stayed

He crushed the cigarette under his boot and stepped toward the car. He looked at ease like he’d just gone for a fucking coffee break and returned.

That annoyed me more.

For half a second, we were younger again, brothers—blood uncomplicated, looking exactly like he used to, steady, unreadable. Then I remembered why I’d come.

A pulse throbbed in my temple.

Each tick was a warning. Each tick was restraint.

“Marce—”

I crossed the gravel in three strides and hit him without warning or speech. My fist landed against his jaw with a sharp crack before he could finish my name.

The sound was clean. Bone to bone. His head snapped to the side. He staggered once, then straightened. He took it without lifting his hands. That calm irritated me more than if he’d fought back, which made me hit him harder.

“Well… hello to you too,” he said, rolling his jaw.

“Fìgghiu di buttana!”

(Son of a bitch)

I hit him again.

“You disappear for two years,” I said, and hit him again.

“And you walk back into her space.”

Another blow.

“You expect what, a fucking welcome?”

His eyes met mine. No defiance in them nor apology. Just unnerving steadiness. Just the kind of calm that said he’d already accepted whatever I did next. Like he deserved it.

We stood there, close enough to share breath.

Neither of us stepping back. Neither of us blinking first.

Blood trickled from his split lip. He spat onto the gravel and wiped the corner of his mouth with his thumb, looking at it as if assessing damage.

“Finished?” he asked.

I grabbed his jacket and shoved him back a step. His jaw flexed.

“Why are you here?” I asked.

He didn’t answer immediately, just held my gaze.

“I intercepted movement.”

“There has always been movement. Always some threat round the corner—lurking, waiting.”

“This time it was different,” he said, voice low.

The wind cut through the bare trees, the branches scraping against one another like bone.

“Different how?”

“Someone had been asking around. About her.”