Coal (Regulators MC 3)

No one knows that. Nope, I never told a single soul about the fight before it all ended. Everyone who was willing to show their support during their services and the cleanup process from the house was so kind. I didn’t have the heart to tell them I was this horrible daughter who hung up on her mom just hours before she died. No, I took their sympathy, and then I got the heck out of town as soon as I could.

Inhaling, I shake off the bad thoughts. I can’t go back in time. I can’t right the wrongs. I curl into myself and fight to ignore the wetness growing on my pillow from the tears.

“Oh, Mom, I’m so very sorry. I was young, dumb, and so very clueless to all you and Pops did for me,” I whisper to the air around me.

Getting up, I wipe my eyes then turn on my salt lamp. One thing losing my parents did was drive me toward a new career path. Art is something I love, but I learned the science to mental illness in psychology and found ways to balance the positive and negative ions in my life so that I wouldn’t be dependent on medications.

For some, doctors are able to find the right balance to make things right physiologically and psychologically. For me, I needed time on the typical anti-depressants. However, in my journey, I found detoxifying my life was best and maintaining a balance of positive and negative so I don’t step down the hole of darkness, never to resurface.

I know I hurt my mother with my words and behavior. It was selfish. Although unintentional, my lack of self-control and wild ways cost my parents more than money on my education. No, they lost sleep, and they lost positive energy during their time worrying over me.

For this to all creep back up, it means my energy is offset. I have fallen off balance, and until I get back to even, then this will only continue. I can’t go back over it again.

Nothing has felt right since I bumped into him.

Doesn’t Coal see that I don’t want to cost him? That I don’t want to hurt a single being? Even though he says things are right between us, they aren’t. I feel it.

I just don’t know what I’m going to do about it. I should probably be afraid of him. Only, I’m not. No, I’m intrigued.

Chapter Eight

~Coal~

“The question of the day is this: are these murders hired hits, or is this guy really knocking people off because they complained about their food?”

Ice’s question should be easy to answer. These people are being whacked mob style. Thing is, I’m not so sure they are.

“Sorry, boss, but I still have nothing to tie these murders together besides the food joint,” Screech explains.

“And there is no digging deeper?” Ice questions him back.

The hacker guru shrugs. “I dug so deep I hit China already. Nowhere else to go.”

Rubbing a finger over my bottom lip, I think about the implications of what Screech is telling us. There is absolutely nothing connecting these victims together, other than a place they ate at.

Not a loan from the mob.

Not a snitch to be found.

Only hungry men who apparently chose the wrong place to fucking voice a complaint about their food. The idea is completely ridiculous, yet we have nothing else.

“I think I should go and check the place out myself,” I pipe in.

“And do what?” Ice retorts sarcastically. “You gonna tell the head cook his fries suck and see if he tries to stab your ass with a paring knife?”

Screech laughs, while I ignore my brother’s tone and shake my head.

“You know better than anyone that the best way to get an impression of your target is to surveillance them. I’ll go in there and check the place out; get a feel for it. If I happen to see someone I think is a certifiable whack job who moonlights as a hired killer named Cook, I’ll let you know.”

Ice isn’t the only one who knows how to be a smartass. Most people wouldn’t take him on that way. I’m not most people. The two of us have been brothers in battle long before he ever became my prez. The man understands me better than my own parents. He knows the difference between me fucking with him and me being a straight-up asshole.

“You promise not to pull some crazy-ass stunt if you figure out who it is?”

I give Ice a droll look instead of asking him if he is serious.

The man points his finger at me. “I’m not fucking around, Coal. I know you think you can handle anything that’s thrown at you, but I don’t trust this motherfucker. If you see something suspicious, you call me for backup, understood?”