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FORTY-SIX

JACK

MARCH

It was time to carry out my plan.

I needed Bryce to make a decision, to commit to either being the father the kids needed, or to get the fuck out of our lives for good.

And the best way to knock some sense into somebody was . . . well, to knock it into them. I had all the information I needed from the private investigator Sorrento sent my way.

Bryce was working for an ecological volunteer organization on Catalina, apparently doing kitchen work for the work crews.

Funny, since Mara said he pretended not to be able to cook.

Mara was sound asleep when I left, splayed out on her stomach with just a pair of underwear on. I smirked thinking back on our night before, how even when she was dominating me, she did it with love. She always gave me what I needed.

I knew her neck would be messed up if she stayed on her stomach, so I gently rearranged her, locking her into place with pillows so she wouldn’t roll and pop out her back.

I arrived in Long Beach at 5:30 a.m., an insane hour that I more often saw from the other end when I was on the East Coast for work. The first ferry left at 6 and I’d need all day to accomplish my goal. Of course, the little shit couldn’t just work in town. Another reason to pound Bryce’s ass into the ground.

I had to hike into the bush to get to him. I’d already registered as a hiker under a fake name. The PI had gotten me a fake ID, which I’d also used to book the ferry ride. I kept my sunglasses and hat on, careful not to make eye contact with anyone. I couldn’t risk getting recognized, and thanks to a clean shave, it would be less likely.

The rational part of me told me to just go have a stern talking-to with Bryce. Level with him. He hurt Aspen, which hurts Mara. And either of them hurting hurts me because I love them.

Fuck.

Fuck.

I knew I loved Aspen because he’s a great kid and I treated him like my own. I was proud of him, and when he fell, I was there to lift him back up.

Same with Hazel. She was my little buddy. She wasn’t old enough to get her feelings hurt by her biological dad, but I’d be doing everything I could to be the dad she needed. She wouldn’t miss Bryce because I would be enough.

But Mara.

It was clear as day.

I loved Mara.

I wouldn’t call a shady guy to stalk out her ex if I didn’t love her. I wouldn’t get all his details including what time he’d be where, packing a bag full of various items for a variety of situations if our encounter went sideways, and getting on a ferry at the asscrack of dawn so I could have the max amount of time to find him and carry out my plan.

I stood at the front of the ferry and let the cool ocean breeze blast me in the face. The sun rose behind me over the city, casting an orange glow over the approaching island. I vaguely wondered if that place that had great fish tacos was still in Avalon.

Now’s not the time for fish tacos, Jack.

But maybe it was. It would look less suspicious if I acted like a tourist, tooting around town like I wasn’t there to fuck up my wife’s ex. Then again, the taco stand wouldn’t be open at 7 a.m. I needed to focus on getting into the bush.

With my backpack and outdoorsy clothes, I looked ready to hike, and that’s exactly what my cover was. It was going to be an all-day affair to get all this carried out.

Logic told me this was insane. It was a premeditated crime. I went to extreme lengths to find this guy. I had to block a day to come out here, lie to my wife about where I was going, get my best friend in on the lie, have him also lie to his wife, and then do this absolutely insane thing.

One problem: I wasn’t one hundred percent sure what I was going to do once I found him. I had a strange assortment of shit in my backpack: hockey tape because zip ties would be too obvious, fuzzy handcuffs left over from an attempt at kink with Sydney (why?), bear spray so it wouldn’t look so glaring that I had pepper spray for humans, a handkerchief to cover my face (less obvious than a balaclava, easier to toss aside and dismiss as a hiker’s dropped neck scarf), and finally, the piece de resistance, a knife.

Just for cutting the hockey tape off his wrists if it came to that.

I couldn’t kill him. I didn’t want to kill him. I’m not a murderer.

I couldn’t be a murderer. I wouldn’t.

I got one of those shitty vending machine coffees on the ferry and because the water was choppy as shit pulling into the harbor, spilled half of it. I slugged the rest back in one sad, sludgy gulp.

But I couldn’t risk stopping in a coffee shop and getting recognized. I had to get dirty first. Then I’d be less recognizable.

Yeah.

He was living in this base camp commune thing for hippies without families, except that he did have a family. He just fucking bailed on them.

The more I thought about each detail, the more I wanted to burn every item he owned.

I had to hike six miles with the pack on. I underestimated the elevation changes. Never seen a 20% hill grade in my life, but there I was, scrabbling up on desert dirt and trying not to prickle my tender little fingers on cactus needles. This was the fastest way to his encampment, though, and he was due to be back to be on lunch duty for the volunteer crews.

The irony that he worked to help volunteer crews while shirking his own duties as a father was not lost on me.

Again, I did not bring any matches or accelerants, and that was a real fucking shame. Huge oversight, Leroy.

I saw Bryce from the back before he could see me, talking to somebody else working there. That’s when it started to feel real. I was only going to rough him up and tell him what he needed to do. Force him to make a decision about his family.

My family. His family that he abandoned.

This all seemed ill-advised now that it stood before me. But I didn’t come that far to turn back when I hit the goal.

I did my best to look inconspicuous. My heart raced and I was pretty sure they had to hear it from fifty yards away. I also had the crippling nervous urge to go to the bathroom, but I couldn’t exactly ask for a bathroom, then carry out my plan.

Shit was for later. And I could wash my hands in a stream or something. No DNA. Aqua dump. Was that ethical? Sure, deer shit in streams.

And there are buffalo on the island. People should be way more worried about their shit.

I pretended to take some cell phone pictures on the burner phone that was going to be a whale’s dinner later.

Relax, the whale would be fine.

Okay, fine, I worried about the whale.

And turtles and shit.

But what better place to dispose of a burner than the Pacific? Biggest fucking ocean on the planet.

I’d make a big donation to the Ocean Fund or the Save the Whales or something later.

My PI buddy had gotten me an aerial shot of the encampment with an exact location of Bryce’s tent and the makeshift kitchen. The trick was getting him alone. I’d already premeditated that one. I had a call going out to the conservancy about a rogue buffalo attempting to impale a tourist that would require urgent attention from hopefully just enough people.

It worked. Bryce was alone in the kitchen, putting together sandwiches for work crews. The little twat had the nerve to be carefully crushing up some spice to go on top of the turkey sandwiches, which made me roll my eyes. I tied the handkerchief over my mouth and nose, put on some gardening gloves, slipped the hockey tape roll into my pocket along with the knife, and approached him. I opened the tent flap and stepped inside.

“Well, well, well,” I started. “This sure doesn’t seem like Nepal.”

Bryce’s eyes widened and he flattened his back against the piece of stainless steel serving as his countertop. “What? The fuck? Why are you here?”

“The piper. Come to call.” Fuck, I had rehearsed this. My nerves were getting the better of me. “It’s time to pay the piper.”

“What? What do you want?”

I stepped closer to him. “I want you to either be a better father or get the fuck out of our lives.”

“If this is about the money, I don’t have any to give her.” He said it like he was trying to seem big and bad, but he cowered despite being taller than me.

“It’s not about the money, asswipe. It’s simple, really. Either call when you say you’re going to and own up to the fact that you’re in California and be part of their lives, or fuck off for good. None of this half-assed shit.”

He recoiled. “You don’t get to tell me what to do.”

Let the games begin.

I reared back and launched my fist into his cheekbone, and after a shocked moment, he came right back for me.

Bryce might have played hockey in college, but I was still an active player with a lot more fights under my belt. I hit him with a cross punch, hook, then upper cut that sent him flying back against the stainless steel countertop behind him. While he was wheezing, I socked him again in the eye.

He wasn’t completely defenseless, and he launched his fist into my stomach, sending me doubling over.

I’d been down this road before. The rage that filled me when that kid mocked JP coursed through my veins again. My control was slipping, some animal instinct starting to take over.

Bryce hurt Aspen.

Bryce hurt Mara.

Bryce had to hurt and I had to do it.

But I had to fight the darker urges. I was not there to kill him.

I punched him in the groin and shoved his teetering body to the ground, then flipped him to his stomach. I pinned his lower back under my knee and reached into my pocket to get the hockey tape.

“Don’t defile me,” he whimpered.

“Jesus, I’m not a monster,” I breathed. “Are you okay?”

I meant it more in a “do you need therapy” way, but he thought I meant physically overall. “I’ve had better days.”

“Can it, asshole,” I growled, sealing his wrists in one of my fists while I tried to open the tape with my teeth.

But in my tape struggle, he leapt to his feet and went for the absolute gutter of a knife on the counter, brandishing it at me.

Fuck .

I had my little pocketknife, but that wasn’t going to do me much good. Bryce might kill me.

Bryce, who betrayed Aspen, Hazel, and Mara.

Bryce, who bailed on his family.

I wasn’t going down without a fight.

Adrenaline surged, and all I could see was red.

It was fucking on.

Bryce lunged at my face with the knife. I grabbed his wrists before it hit me, but we arm wrestled back and forth until the knife sliced my cheek.

In his surprise, I grabbed the knife from him, whirled him around and sealed his back to my front with the knife at his throat.

“How the tables have turned, eh?” I said.

But Bryce wasn’t done.

He reached up to try and get control of the knife, trying to plunge it into my stomach behind his back.

This fucker was trying to kill me. Back and forth, back and forth, the weird angle made defending myself harder and harder.

Until he let go at the wrong moment and I sank the knife into his outer thigh.

Holy shit. Holy shit. I stabbed a guy. I stabbed him in the leg.

Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck.

He screamed like the world was ending.

I felt high. I felt scared. I felt like I could piss myself.

I went too far.

I stabbed a guy.

I stabbed my wife’s ex-husband.

But in the moment, I wasn’t all that sorry. This fucker had been trying to kill me and at worst, I landed him stitches and crutches. I was trying to survive, and he was lucky I hadn’t snapped his neck the first time I got him pinned.

If I didn’t think it would hurt Aspen that his dad died, I’d have considered killing him.

Or not, because I wasn’t a murderer. I was just a guy who had accidentally stabbed a guy who was trying to kill me because I searched him out to rough him up.

Okay, yeah, it was pretty bad.

I had to cover. I was shaking all over, but I needed to keep my cool so this wouldn’t turn into a thing. This went from what could be at worst a simple assault charge to potential murder if this went wrong. I needed to control the narrative.

“Oops. Looks like you tried to catch the knife while it was falling. Breathe my name or any indication that I was here, and I will come back and finish the job. Are we clear?”

“Yes,” he whimpered, writhing against me.

“And you’re going to do whatever Mara wants.”

“Yes.”

“You’re going to apologize to Aspen for missing his birthday and make sure he knows what a special little boy he is.”

The rage boiled again. Maybe he did deserve the knife.

“Yes. Yes, I’m sorry.”

“Good.” I kicked him facedown and knelt on his back to hold him down. “Make no mistake, motherfucker. I will kill you if you fuck this up.”

Tears streamed down his cheeks and the gravity of what I’d done sank in again.

I stabbed a man—I had to keep my cool.

“Better leave that knife in, Bryce. It’ll control the bleeding.”

I lifted the tent flap and headed for the hills, his screams for help becoming fainter as I hiked away.

And even fainter still when I put my earbuds in, queued up my favorite dad rock playlist, and let those more pleasant sounds fill my ears.

At least it would cover my pounding heart and screams of doubt.