“Hello?”

It wasn’t Asa. It wasn’t Silas. It wasn’t my mom. It wasn’t anyone who I would have ever expected to hear from again.

“Hello, Ayden.”

I blinked for a second and stared in shock at my own reflection in the bathroom mirror.

“Mr. Kelly?” There was no mistaking that kind voice with the familiar Southern drawl. It was the voice that had broken me free from Woodward. It was the voice that had convinced me I was better than all the things I was doing wrong.

“I’m sure this is a surprise, but I had to call to tell you about Asa.”

I could see my own bewilderment reflected back at me.

“Asa?” I was sure I sounded as confused as I felt, but I was having a hard time putting two and two together.

There was a sigh on the other end of the phone.

“You know I always believed in karma. I thought that by helping you, getting you out of that trailer park and out from under your brother’s thumb, my universe would be in alignment, and for a while it was.”

“Have you been calling me the last month or so?”

“I have. I knew they were going to send Silas after Asa, so I wanted to check in on you. I figured as long as you answered, you were okay.”

I leaned against the sink because my knees were suddenly weak.

“What’s going on with my brother, Mr. Kelly?”

There was another sigh, and this one I could almost feel the heaviness of. I owed this man my life, but I had a sudden, sneaking suspicion he was about to move to the category of “no good things come out of Woodward.”

“Asa didn’t give you the entire book when you paid him off. There were a couple of pages missing from it and the motorcycle club isn’t happy.”

That was just like Asa. Leaving good enough alone was never his style and greed was just too powerful a motive.

“Asa is long gone, Mr. Kelly. I gave him enough money to sit on a beach and sip margaritas for as long as he wants. I can’t get those pages back.”

“Oh, I know that, Ayden, and you don’t have to worry about the missing pages. The club already retrieved them, and that’s why I’m calling.”

My stomach rolled and I felt the blackness start to swirl.

“Is my brother dead?”

There was a lot of silence on the other end of the phone and I thought I was going to pass out.

“No, but you might want to come home, because I honestly don’t know how much time he has left. He’s in bad shape. He’s at the hospital in Louisville.”

I gagged a little and sank to the floor. The cold tile on the back of my legs brought a little clarity to my rapidly spinning mind.

“How are you involved in all of this?” One thing was clear to me now, this man had never helped me out of the pure goodness of his heart.

“I wish I wasn’t. I wish I could have just watched you drive away and never thought of you again, but that isn’t the case when you live in a small town like this.”

“Mr. Kelly, please just get to the point.”

“My name is in that book, has been for years.”

I coughed a laugh out that sounded more like a wounded animal dying.

“So you saved me, just to sacrifice me when it was convenient for you?”

“Your brother courts trouble, Ayden. Blame him, not me. When I decided to help you I had to get the money from somewhere and there was no way a teacher has those kinds of funds lying around. I gamble, I have for years, and sometimes my luck is better than others. I was on a hot streak when I helped you out and now . . .” There was a long drawn-out pause and I could almost feel him struggling with the words to use to minimize the damage this call was creating in the fabric of my reality. “Now all that luck is gone and it was get Asa and the book or end up in a morgue. I’m so sorry you had to be involved Ayden.”

“Why on earth would Asa go back to Woodward, knowing what was waiting for him there?”

I was so lost, so confused, but one thing was obvious, this was just one more person who had used me as a means to an end. One more person who couldn’t see past what they thought I should be. As it turned out, being the only person that knew where to find me, the only person back home with a clue as to how my life was progressing out in the mountains, had proven too good a bargaining chip for him not to use.

“Because I called him and passed on the message that if he didn’t come back, the club was going after you.”

I hissed out a breath through my teeth. “You would have sent them here?”

“It’s a lot of money, Ayden. One day, maybe you’ll understand. I’m the one who called the ambulance when they were done with your brother, so maybe instead of judging me, you should thank me. After all, the life you’re living now, no matter how you came by it, is because of me. I knew I was absolutely doing the right thing when I saved you from this town. I knew you had greatness in you and I wasn’t wrong. You have become a remarkable young woman with so much potential. It does a guilty part of me good to know I had a hand in that.”

“Asa came back because of me?”

That didn’t make any sense. My brother was selfish, he was arrogant, and really, the only person he cared about was himself. The idea that he would have sacrificed himself for my safety was just crazy.

“He did. He knew whatever the club did to him wouldn’t compare to what they would have done to you, if they got their hands on you. For what it’s worth, your brother got less than he deserved, and if he pulls through, maybe he’ll have learned a lesson. I really am sorry it had to go this way, Ayden. You deserve better.”

The phone went dead on the other end of the line. I let mine rattle from my numb hand onto the floor. I put my forehead against my knees and concentrated on not passing out. It was all a lot to take in. My brother, Mr. Kelly, the way things were with Jet, all of it came tumbling down around me, like a house of cards. Thoughts of things I should have done differently started slamming into my head, left and right. The decisions I had made, bad and good, began chasing each other in a circle so fast that I was dizzy and sick at the same time.

I heard the bathroom door open and looked up at Cora with startled eyes. I must have been quite a sight, because she freaked out a little when she called my name.

“What in the hell is going on? I thought you fell in the shower or something.”

I just gazed up at her, this little punk-rock pixie who I loved, and realized that Mr. Kelly was dead wrong. The life I had now had nothing to do with anyone but me. These people loved me for me and would love me in spite of me. They loved whatever me I gave them, no questions asked. Bad choices and a life lived unwisely before I got to this point weren’t worth suffering an eternity for, and trying to save Jet from me was stupid. He was the only person I had ever cared about who wanted me just for me, and not for what I could do for him. If I had let him, he would have loved every part of me, and made sure that both of us were safe from the things that the past kept trying to drag us back into.

I blinked up at Cora right before she was going to smack me to get my attention.

“I have to go home.” My voice cracked. I think all of the things that made me who I was were starting to leak out, but I wasn’t afraid of anyone seeing it anymore. I wasn’t afraid of seeing it in the mirror every day anymore.

“Home? Home, like Kentucky? Why?”

“My brother is in the hospital. It doesn’t sound good.”

She got on her knees in front of me and put her tiny hands over mine, where they were resting on my knees.

“Oh no, do you need me to go with you? Do you want me to call Shaw? I didn’t even know you had a brother.”

I just shook my head and let it flop back until it banged against the cabinet door.

“No. My mom took off with some trucker named Earl or Daryl or something. Not like she would come back anyway. Mother of the Year she is not. It’s just me and Asa, and normally really it’s just me, but he got hurt trying to do something right for the first time in his sorry life. Now I have to go back home and hope he pulls through, so I can kick his ass and thank him, in that order.”