Page 23 of Violent Skies

“Fuck you, Riggs,” I grind out.

“They don’t know you can drive, do they? He never found out.” Riggs picks at the scab that is our unresolved past.

“No, and they won’t,” I remind him, and he gives me a pissed off smile in return.

“We spent too many hours in the front seat of the Mustang for you to disrespect that time without even batting an eye,” Riggs finally says.

I press my tongue to the roof of my mouth and try to ignore the image that creeps around in my memories. Fifteen years old, sitting in his lap in the driver’s seat while he taught me all the parts with practiced patience that he got from handling Koa.

Back when I wanted to fly.

Growing up across the street from Monroe, it was a natural progression to make friends with the kids inside. Koa was always a magnet, people just wanted to be around him because he was so loveable and warm. He made everyone feel like they had a place in his inner circle.

Riggs was the other side of the coin. Charming, but quiet, dangerously observant, and the only one who could say no to Koa. Ever. He rarely did but he knew he could if he wanted to. Being stuck between them was suffocating.

Koa was a hurricane.

Riggs was the shelter from the storm.

“That was a long time ago, Riggs. We were kids,” I remind him.

“No, that was before you chose him,” he corrects. “Blindly.”

“You make it sound so fucking easy,” I spit and his hands grip the wheel tighter. I sit up to get angry and he slams on the gas, forcing me back against the leather. “I wasn’t some pathetic idiot.”

“Could have fooled me.” Riggs’s jaw tightens.

“So what?” The venom seeps out and suddenly I don’t recognize my own voice. “You killed him over it?” I growl, wanting more answers than he can give and I know it.

“Yeah, Cress.” He continues to pick up speed, turning to look at me briefly. His next words are full of ice and they sting my skin when they leave his lips. “I killed Koa over you.”

The statement makes the air in the car too hot and I tear my eyes away from his.

“Now look at the mess we’re in.” I want to scream but I don’t. “Back where we started, poor and in trouble.”

Riggs laughs this time. “I don’t know, I sort of prefer being poor and in trouble. Beats a white picket fence and a loveless marriage.”

“You’re a fucking asshole.” I turn to look at him as he tears the car over the finish line. “And a murderer. I should never have come to you.”

“But you did,” Riggs says softly as the crowd forms around the car. He climbs from the driver's seat and leaves me sitting in the muffled sound of the celebrations.

Work in the morning feels exhausting, and it’s because we didn’t get back to the garage until two hours ago. Birdie never returned but I heard her come into the house while I was getting ready and she slammed her bedroom door so they all knew she was home.

The paperwork I’m trying to get through feels endless and every time I pause to catch my breath I hear him in the back of my mind. A loveless marriage. Koa loved me until the day he died, Riggs is full of shit and talking from a place of resentment, not knowledge.

“You hear that Marla is taking a couple of days off because of that idiot in three-nineteen?” One of the morning shift girls came around to the nurses’ station talking to a doctor as she flipped through a chart. “I’ve never heard a guy complain so much while bleeding out.”

“Marla should have let him. He didn’t even leave his real name. Insurance is going to have a field day.” The doctor sighs. “Morning Cress,” He looks up from what he’s doing and excuses himself from the station.

“What happened?” I ask, digging for the information mostly because I’m nosy and it’s a decent distraction from everything else going on.

“Some jackass came in bleeding out from a stab wound, and before we could get him stitched up he all but assaulted Mar, and then took off before we could even finish.” She groans, and stares down the hall at the room like the guy was still inside.

“It was a stab wound?” I’m stuck on that detail. I stabbed him. People get stabbed all the time in Phoenix. But… he came here, they had a parking pass. My heart is in my throat and I feel like I can’t breathe. He could have told them who did it. If it was him, we have no idea if the incidents are the same. Don’t panic. My life could have been over in seconds.

It was survival.

At least that’s what I tell myself as she yammers on.