Light My Fire (Running In Circles Book 2), page 13
Oscar smiled at him. “No worries. I need to get this one tired out before the real storm hits. See you around?”
Antoine didn’t want to make any promises. His job there was almost done and while he was feeling some type of way that they were all latching on to him like they genuinely cared, he knew he wouldn’t be welcome after his contract was up. That was how it always went, and there was no sense in trying to change things.
He shoved his sunglasses on his face and made his way to the curb where Nellie was waiting.
She had a station wagon, a little old and rough on the inside, but the engine was quiet and the seats were soft. She gave him a smile as he climbed in, and he could hear gentle classical music playing on the backseat speakers.
“You get any sleep?” she asked as she pulled away from the house and onto the main road.
Antoine shrugged. “Not as much as I would have liked, but I don’t feel too bad.”
“I appreciate you coming out with me, though. I’m going to swing by Adam’s and grab some lunch for us to take out there. We can picnic.”
Antoine frowned in confusion, feeling a slight burst of panic. Was this a date? This could not possibly be a date. He kept quiet about it as she navigated the streets and ended up near the mayor’s office where the Lofty Latke was parked. He didn’t get out after her, and she didn’t seem to expect it as she jogged to the window and passed over a wad of cash before taking two bags in hand.
Adam leaned his head out and waved at Antoine who returned the gesture automatically before dropping his hand to his lap. Double fuck. Nellie got back in the car and it smelled amazing—like something fried with Mediterranean spices.
“He’s been getting into lunches, trying out new stuff. He bought a fryer so he’s giving out falafel with all the wrap orders. I hope you don’t mind,” she said.
Antoine waved her off. “I travel way too much to be picky.” And it was true. He had favorite foods, but he subsisted off diner burgers and fried chicken more than he didn’t. And Adam’s breakfasts were to die for, so he could only imagine what else he was capable of.
Antoine was grateful for the comfortable silence that settled on the drive. It was only twenty minutes from the historic district, but it felt shorter as he found himself captivated by the tall, lush forest and all the hanging Spanish moss. He knew the area by proxy of his accident from the damn peacock, but he hadn’t been paying much attention as he rounded the corner that last time.
Now, Nellie took the little dirt road that had a sign for lake parking, and she veered left. “Will and those guys live out here if you want to stop and say hi later.”
He made a non-committal noise. He didn’t want to reject more people, but he didn’t want to encourage more friendships with expiration dates, either. He kept to his silence as they took a poorly maintained road, and eventually she pulled into a makeshift parking lot with only one other car and a small cabin with Ranger Station painted on a sign.
“Looks like Roman’s out and about,” she said, nodding at the ATV parked under the larger tree. “He’s probably wandering around nearby.”
“He’s the ranger out here, right?” Antoine asked as he unfastened his belt and stepped into a small pocket of sun peeking through the trees.
“He is. He was practically my brother growing up until the fire happened,” Nellie told him. “Things got weird with the boys after that.”
Antoine winced. “It must have been tough when all that happened.”
“The first few weeks were the worst. Fitz was in and out of consciousness and they had trouble keeping the infections at bay. At one point, they told my parents that he would probably lose his arm, and my mom just…lost her shit.”
Antoine winced. “Mom guilt isn’t easy.”
At that, she laughed and beckoned him along down a partially tamped down trail. “That’s something I know intimately. I kind of smother Owen sometimes, I think. Fitz had to talk me into letting him join the Scouts, and that boy has had more fire safety training than anyone I know.”
Antoine laughed. “Not a surprise.”
She grinned at him, and she looked very pretty there in the wisps of yellow glow. It was a wonder she wasn’t with anyone, but he had a feeling it was more her choice than rejection. “Roman was always kind of their leader. He felt responsible even though it was Fitz’s dumbass idea to zip the t-shirt into the tent flap.”
Antoine lifted his brows. “He did what, now?”
“Roman was trying to get his rocks off with some girl down by the lake, so Fitz left the lantern on for him. He tried to cover it by making a little dome with his t-shirt zipped up in the zipper so they wouldn’t get caught being awake after curfew. The cloth jammed it, so when his sleeping bag caught fire, they couldn’t get it open.”
“Jesus,” Antoine breathed out.
Nellie nodded, looking miserable for a second, then led the way toward a smaller path, and it was only a few feet long before it opened up to the bank of a massive lake that stretched for miles.
“Roman saved his life. Everyone else just panicked, but he rushed back and took his knife and cut the tent open. Fitz thinks he owes Roman his life, and Roman thinks Fitz owes him hell on earth because he blames himself for taking off.”
“That’s,” Antoine said, but he didn’t want to unfairly judge. His parents felt different measures of guilt for Marcel’s blindness, even though it was nothing more than genetics. Not to mention Marcel had never given a shit that he couldn’t see. But Antoine had tried to blame himself too when Marcel’s life didn’t work out the way he wanted it to, which only made Marcel resent him even more.
It was a tough lesson to learn, and a difficult habit to break.
“Roman and Fitz are better now, sort of, but that changed their whole dynamic. Aksel went on to be a doctor, Fitz decided to spit in the face of the universe and joined the fire department. Roman went on to become the hermit, and somehow they all ended up back here.”
She stopped, and Antoine wanted to press her for more, but he reminded himself that these were not his people.
“Anyway,” she said, and she indicated a cement picnic bench so they both took a seat facing the water. “I got a call from a land developer two days ago.”
Antoine’s eyebrows shot up. “Oh.”
She bit her lip and her brows furrowed low—and it was in that moment he could see the stark resemblance between the siblings. “A portion of this area is privately owned. They have a contract with the government since a lot of this is preserved land, but I guess they’re looking to sell to someone who wants to build either a private community or vacation rentals.”
Antoine leaned his elbow on the table and dropped his chin into his hand. “That’s…a choice.”
She laughed. “Yeah. People are not going to love it.”
Antoine winced. He could only imagine the reception about that considering the way the locals were pissed at him for wanting to make minor adjustments to protect their buildings.
“And I’m guessing if you get in on it, you could make a big commission,” he chanced.
Her laugh was tight and stressed. “Huge. It would help take care of Owen’s college. I could pay off debt. It’s…it’s a lot to think about.”
“There’s nothing wrong with that,” he told her, and she gave him a long look. “I know the risk, and I know people will blame you.”
“God. Fitz would…” She licked her lips and then turned her gaze out toward the lake. “He hates change. He’d never forgive me.”
“You don’t have a choice,” he reminded her.
“I do, though. If Fitz was in my position, he’d tell them to go fuck themselves, and then stage a protest when the bulldozers arrived to clear the land.”
Antoine bit his lip because he could absolutely see that. “Have you talked to him?”
Nellie laughed and shook her head. “You’re the first person I’ve told. I needed an outside perspective. Someone who wasn’t invested in this place.”
It stung, but she was right. “I get it.”
“I thought about asking Remi, but he has no real power over this. I know it’s his job to encourage tourist revenue, and offering vacation rentals or even a lakeside restaurant would do that. I just don’t…I don’t want to ruin nature. But I also don’t want to lose my house.”
Antoine gave in to his desire to comfort her and he took her hand. “Fitz will forgive you if do something for financial security. He loves you. He loves your son. It won’t ruin anything for good.”
She gnawed on her lip. “You think?”
“I think the worst thing you can do is not talk to him and leave it up to chance. He deserves to know where you’re at. The only way to ruin your relationship with him is to tell yourself you know what’s best for him instead of communicating.”
“Why does it sound like you’re speaking from experience?”
He laughed and let her hand go. “Because I am. My brother moved to Colorado a few years ago to spite me and my parents. He met a guy and settled down, got engaged. And I haven’t been allowed to meet him because I spent a lot of our young adult lives being a dumbass who didn’t trust him to make his own decisions.”
“Oh,” she said quietly.
He offered her a sad smile. “Our lives were unconventional growing up. My dad was at a different University every other semester, so we were dragged all over the country, and it wasn’t easy never having a home.”
“I can’t imagine,” she said quietly.
Antoine shrugged. “I took my insecurities out on my brother. I sort of…had this expectation that he was always going to need me, and when he moved on without me,” he stopped and licked his lips. “I lashed out, and I broke something between us.” Antoine closed his eyes and shrugged, desperate to get away from the ache in his chest. “Do you want to eat?”
She didn’t seem disturbed at all by his rapid change of the subject—and he appreciated her all the more for it.
“Yeah, lets eat. We can save all this heavy shit for later.”
He laughed softly as he got more comfortable on the bench. “Thanks. And for what it’s worth, I think he’ll be on your side.”
Her look was skeptical, but he didn’t blame her, and he appreciated the easy silence between them after that.
Antoine debated about going to the Farmer’s Market as the sun started to sink low that Thursday. He was now in a holding pattern, waiting for the council meeting and their decision about his involvement after. It meant he had a lot of free time and no idea what to do with himself. He’d been steadfastly avoiding any place he might run into Fitz, and so far, it had been working. He went to the supermarket so he could cook all his meals at the rental, and he kept his nightly walks to his street, not straying anywhere close to the fire station.
But Antoine wasn’t the sort of person who could live cooped up, and by Thursday he was damn near crawling out of his skin. He knew he had to be an adult about this. He’d hooked up plenty of times before, so his moment with Fitz wasn’t out of the ordinary. He wasn’t going to fall in love with some guy who gave him a hate-fueled hand job, and he didn’t think Fitz was sitting in his house pining away for him either.
It was time to man up and rejoin society.
Rummaging through his things, he found a light button up and a pair of jeans, and rolled his sleeves to the elbow before grabbing his shoes. He passed by a mirror and paused giving himself a long look. What exactly did Fitz see when he looked at him?
He always thought Marcel wore their face better. He was more muscular from the yoga, two inches shorter, wore his hair long and always had at least three or four days of scruff on his chin. Antoine could never stand the itch of growing a beard and didn’t want the maintenance of letting his hair stay long.
He wasn’t a fussy guy. Yes, he liked designer, but he liked simplicity more. It was the one thing he and Marcel agreed on. But he never really felt at home in his skin the way his brother did. It probably had something to do with the way Marcel experienced both himself and the relation to things he couldn’t see.
That was something Antoine would never be able to understand.
And right now, he was too much of a mess to be very introspective. His ribs still ached, and every time he thought about Fitz, his heart felt like it wanted to beat out of his chest with a mixture of both rage and desire.
He just wanted to get over him, damn it.
Grabbing his things, he headed out the door and took a deep breath of rain-soaked, humid air before snagging the umbrella from the stand. The walk into town wasn’t long, and he would be able to stop by the ATM for cash so he could at least contribute something to the economy.
He was jumpy at the cars passing by, his ribs still tingling at the ghost of impact from when he’d hit the curb, but he made it to the busy park in one piece. There were tents everywhere, and it was easy to get lost in the rows of handmade goods.
“If I offer you a cupcake and promise there’s nothing to choke on, will you take one?”
Antoine spun and saw Wilder leaning against the table of his small booth, and he offered a smile. “If I promise to chew my food more carefully, will you finally forgive yourself?” he countered.
Wilder’s cheeks pinked and he ducked his head. In the glow of the tall portable lights, Wilder’s face looked gaunt, and Antoine felt a small rush of worry for him. But his hands were steady as he pulled a chocolate cupcake from one of his covered domes and put it in a box.
“Hey, are you feeling okay?” Antoine asked, raising a brow. “You look tired.”
Wilder offered a gentle smile. “Yeah. Sometimes I get really bad vertigo, and this last spell kept me up all night. It’s better now.” He held the box out to Antoine. “Here. Espresso and dark chocolate.”
“You are a dream,” Antoine told him as he took it. He tried to pay, but Wilder glowered until he put his cash away. “You know you can’t pay bills on thank yous.”
“I’m not going bankrupt over a cupcake,” Wilder assured him, and Antoine sighed, but smiled. “Are you shopping for fun or for someone in particular?”
“Neither, really,” he said. “My brother might fly out while I’m here, so I thought I’d pick something up for him.”
“Evren has art,” Wilder said. “He’s got paintings and photo prints.”
“The mayor’s husband, right?” Antoine knew him from the photos in Remi’s office, and from the few times he’d seen the tattooed artist slinking out the door right before Antoine’s meeting with the mayor.
Wilder nodded. “Yeah. He does a pretty big variety of stuff. You think your brother would be into that?”
Antoine bit his lip. Marcel could see colors and shapes, but art had never really been his thing. “I’ll check it out. And hey, I’ll bring him by the shop when he comes to visit. He’d totally love to meet you.”
“Who would love to meet Wilder?” came a voice from Antoine’s right, and he turned his head to see a dark-haired man with closed eyes and a white cane moving into Wilder’s booth.
Wilder rolled his eyes. “None of your business. Tristian, this is Antoine. Have you two met?”
Tristian grinned as he leaned against the table. “The guy you tried to murder with a cupcake?”
“That would be me,” Antoine said with a laugh.
“He’s shopping for his brother,” Wilder explained.
Antoine hesitated, then said, “He’s blind, actually. Any suggestions for booths you like?”
Tristian perked up. “No shit? Um…I mean, Fitz has hats and scarves. Everyone says they’re hideous, but they’re soft.”
Antoine tried not to groan because while Fitz was the last person he wanted to run into, the idea was a good one. “I might check him out.”
Tristan’s fingers danced across some of the cupcake domes. “There’s always more sweets too. Those are my go-to.”
Wilder rolled his eyes. “You’re just biased because you’re my friend.”
Tristian’s grin was unrepentant. “Sue me for wanting you to make money.”
Antoine felt suddenly unwanted, like an interloper in their friendship, and he cleared his throat. “Thanks for the advice. Maybe I’ll catch you later?”
“Bring your brother to Mangia e Zitto. My husband owns it. Just tell them I sent you and you’ll get a discount.”
“Thanks,” Antoine said, then turned on his heel and headed into the crowd.
He hadn’t noticed where he was going until he found himself in front of a table full of handmade, uneven scarves and hats with strings sticking out all over the place and mismatched colors. He knew exactly where he was without looking at the sign or the man sitting behind the table. He let out the smallest sigh as his fingertips traced the scarf at the edge of the tablecloth and he hated that Tristian was right. It was soft.
“Not really your style, is it, Hollywood?”
Antoine dared himself to lift his gaze and look Fitz in the eye. He wasn’t alone this time. A man just a hair taller than him, but thinner and a little more wild looking, leaning heavily on a cane, stood at Fitz’s right shoulder.
“Just because I like Gucci doesn’t mean I can’t appreciate handmade,” he countered. He dragged the tip of his finger over one of the hats. The texture was soft and almost silky, and it had bumps in random places. He heard Fitz make a soft noise when he picked it up, but he closed his eyes and ran his hands over it and knew immediately that his brother would love it. “How much for this?”
“I’m not letting you buy that. I don’t want your pity sale,” Fitz countered.
Antoine opened his eyes with a sigh. “This isn’t pity.”
“Please,” Fitz argued with a scoff. “Look at you, Hollywood. You don’t want my shitty, homemade scarves.”
Antoine bit the inside of his cheek. “First of all, why do you have a damn booth if you’re going to turn down customers? And secondly, I’m shopping for my brother.” When Fitz raised a challenging eyebrow, Antoine rolled his eyes. “He’s blind. He likes soft shit, and he lives in Colorado where it gets cold in the winter. He’d like this.”
