T2 - Racer's Heart

Chapter 7

"Why would he need my help?"

"He got clipped in the shoulder and I can't take him to the hospital. We're in the big garage, I'll see you."

Cursing the world I ran around the apartment grabbing things that I would need and stuffing them in a plastic bag before running to my car. I'm an idiot, I let myself get involved in these things. I let myself be dragged into these situations by my family and the man that I love like an idiot.

I got there quickly and knocked on the door, which Brian opened. Before he could try to say anything or touch me I moved away.

"Is this your way of keeping me away from him?" I asked.

"You're the only one I could call." Brian replied.

"He's my cousin, of course."

"Charlie . . ." Dom said with a smile.

"Don't even try to be cute or a smart ass because I'm not in the mood. As a matter of fact I'm in a mood and you know how that goes."

"Yeah, not well."

"Sit and stay and stay quiet." I ordered while I got everything set on a small table.

It took me a few minutes to get everything ready and check him out. This'll be a quick patch-up job.

"The bullet's not in there. I'm gonna clean it and stitch it up, it's gonna hurt." I told my cousin.

"I bet you're gonna enjoy this." he said.

"More than a little."

"I'm gonna go get something to eat." Brian said.

"You do that." I said.

"Give him a break, would you." Dom said, grimacing.

"None of your business so stay out."

"He told me what happened, everything that happened."

"Didn't I tell you to stay quiet?"

"Charlie, you can't stay mad at us forever."

"Wanna bet, where do you think Mia got it from? Now shut the hell up."

"Charlotte . . ."

"I'm gonna clean this up, go do something away from me."

I kept to myself while cleaning, ignoring Dom and Brian when he came back. He put all the food cartons on a little table and called us over. I silently served my food and put the cartons on the table but before we could eat I had to intervene.

"Dom, what are you doing? You reached first, you have to say grace." I told him.

He looked at Brian who just shook his head.

"She makes me do it all of the time man, house rules." Brian said.

"Thank you, Lord, for blessing this table." Dom said.

"With food, family, and friendship." Brian said.

After we finished eating I wanted to leave, my intention was to leave but I couldn't find a good enough reason to walk out of the door. Yes, I'm pissed at both of them and yes I will continue to be but for the life of me, I couldn't leave. Dom was in the garage looking through Letty's things and I was just sitting at the table thinking about my situation.

"You asked me once why I let Dom go." Brian suddenly said.

"Yes, and?"

"I think it's because, at that moment, I respected him more than I did myself. Yeah . . . one thing I learned from your cousin is that nothing really matters unless you have a code." he said.

"And what's your code, B?" I asked.

"I'm working on it, Charlie, please don't go."

"This isn't the time to talk about this."

"I know but . . ."

Suddenly Brian's phone started ringing and the look of panic on his face was scaring me. I plucked the phone out of his hand and saw Letty's name flashing on his screen. Looking at the garage, my cousin was storming over to us.

"Shit . . . hey, Dom . . ."

"When were you gonna tell me?" he growled.

"Dom, what are you doing?" I asked.

"When were you gonna tell me you were running Letty?" he asked.

"Let me explain . . ."

"When were you gonna . . ."

Before Brian could reply Dom just started wailing on him, and I mean wailing. I know the damage my cousin is capable of so I stood away from him.

"Dom, stop!"

It took a few minutes of pure anguish for things to calm down and my heart was in my throat. I don't know what to do here and I can't get involved.

"She did it for you, Dom! She did it for you! Letty came to me to clear your name in exchange for bringing down Braga. She just wanted you to come home! I'm sorry, Dom! I'm sorry!" Brian shouted, making him finally stop.

I ran over to Brian to check on him and felt my heart calming down a little bit. He'll be a little bruised but nothing too bad, nothing's broken.

"Are you okay?" I asked, helping him off of the floor.

"Yeah, I'm good, don't worry." he said, brushing his hand over my arm.

"What's gonna happen now?" I asked.

"I don't know, I've gotta go to the office. I'll see you tomorrow." he sighed.

"Maybe." I told him before he left.

I know that as soon as he looks at me Dom's gonna know that I knew all about it. He's not dumb and he can read me like a book, always has been able to. So taking a deep breath, I walked over to my cousin and just stared at him.

"Why didn't you tell me?" he asked.

"I wasn't supposed to know."

"How did you find out?"

"It's a bit of a medium length story."

"We've got time, so start from the beginning."

"You said that Brian told you everything, right?"

"Yeah, what about it?"

"I moved to Florida because I couldn't stand being here without my family. It felt like the walls of my apartment were closing in on me and in the house that feeling was worse so I called up a friend."

"Verone."

"Yeah, I did some work for him in New York while I was in school. Won some races and moved some cars for him. He said that if I ever needed anything to call him and I took him up on that. I expected to find him in New York but he wasn't there."

"He relocated to Florida." Dom said.

"Yeah, paid for a first class ticket so that I could travel comfortably. He sent me in with that undercover cop, I didn't know that at the time, to find some new racers for him and that's when I saw Brian."

"He told me about that you tried to ignore him, well, you did ignore him for a while."

"I wanted to blame him for everything and I did but it wasn't his fault, Dom."

"It took me a while to figure that out but I did, I know." he said, cupping my cheek as the tears started to fall.