Chapter Text
CHAPTER ONE
-o-
Everyone said it, they always had.
JJ Maybank was a dead end. He was a mess you couldn’t clean up, a bomb ready to blow. Tick, tick, tick, all these years.
No matter how many times he tried to defuse it.
The whole town seemed ready to ignite him.
It wasn’t his fault, after all.
Some apples didn’t fall from the tree.
Everyone knew how this story would end, right from the start.
JJ Maybank didn’t get a happy ending.
Everyone just knew – sooner rather than later – it would definitely end.
-o-
It wasn’t so much a choice.
A choice implied conscious thought.
And JJ was beyond that now.
He felt it slipping, bit by bit. Not just at the courthouse. Not even since the race.
No, it’d been slipping long before that. It slipped the day he finished the dock and brought the boat home. It slipped the day JJ blew all the money on the land.
It slipped the day all the money came into their account, right?
Or really, if he thought about it, it’d been slipping since the day he was born.
They all said it would end up like this.
Broken and humiliated and broke.
So what the hell, he thought.
If they were right, then he might as well prove them right.
He stalked out. He picked up the chair.
The window shattered.
If he was broken already, then why not see how much more it could break.
They had told him all along this was who he was.
Go figure, he thought as it all came down on top of him, they were right.
-o-
Luke Maybank had seen this story.
Right?
He’d seen it all his life. Lived it.
When things got hard, the decisions got desperate and the risks got big. When they came at you swinging, you kicked back harder. If it was going down, then it was going down hard. You didn’t just end shit. You burned the whole thing to the ground.
Because there was always a bigger bet.
You always had something to lose.
You were going to end up with nothing anyway, so who the hell cared if it was your own damn fault?
Luke knew this story, sure enough.
He’d just never seen it played out with his son.
Was that what JJ was to him? Was the boy still his? Did he have any right to him?
It was hard not to feel it.
And it was damn near impossible not to see the resemblance.
A Maybank digging his own grave, just waiting for someone else to bury him.
That was what it was, then. When JJ broke that window. When JJ fought that cop. When JJ slipped out of that cop car and ran away.
If he’d ever doubted that JJ was his son, there it was.
He watched him run, disappearing into the crowd. His bridges burned. His fortune squandered. His chances spent.
Luke had taught him many things. Fishing and surfing. Sailing and fixing shit.
Drinking hard and getting too much.
But he never taught that boy to succeed.
Worse, he thought as the cops rallied after him. He’d never taught that boy another way. If the cops didn’t kill him, they’d throw him in jail. It was only a matter of time before that girl of his left him. When JJ turned to alcohol, the others would leave him too. There’d be no one left to tell him the pills weren’t no fix.
All the lessons JJ learned, the only one he seemed to remember was that he was a worthless piece of shit.
He did this, he realized numbly.
This was his fault.
He hadn’t meant for it to be like this, for what it was worth. Barracuda Mike wasn’t all sides legal, but Luke did hard work. He was sober, and when they’d offered him the deal — the land for immunity — he’d taken it. He hadn’t imagined the consequences.
But he’d been thinking about himself, right?
He hadn’t been thinking about JJ. He hadn’t been thinking about the baby he’d taken in, the one he’d kept despite the fact that he knew he wasn’t his. He hadn’t been thinking about the kid he’d abandoned and left on his own. He hadn’t been thinking about the little boy who had loved him, even when he didn’t deserve it.
And he didn’t deserve it.
Luke didn’t deserve anything good – not now, not ever.
He’d broken that boy’s body. He’d broken that boy’s heart. He’d broken that boy’s spirit.
And shit.
He hadn’t even been his in the first place.
Luke didn’t know how to fix it.
But standing there, he thought he might know one person who did.
-o-
Ever since John B had known JJ, he knew that things sometimes went sideways. He knew that the worst case scenario was always more likely around JJ, and if there was someone who knew how to make a bad situation worse – it was JJ, through and through.
He just – attracted disaster.
No, he was drawn to disaster.
It was all he knew. He lived it and breathed it, and his impulses all pointed him to the five hundred wrong options instead of the one sensible one. He was reckless and keen to act without thinking, and his penchant for self destruction had only deepened as they got older.
The last 18 months had been better.
But JJ was still JJ.
He was still doing a JJ thing.
Usually, John B just waited that shit out. He would let JJ implode – run off, smoke some weed, pick a few fights – and come back on his own.
This time, though?
John B was pretty sure waiting wasn’t an option. JJ had already defaced public property, fought a cop, and broke out of custody. So, you know, waiting to see if it was going to get worse was probably pointless. Not only was it bad enough, but JJ was inevitably going to make it worse.
He shouldn’t have let JJ come, and he knew that. He knew how high JJ’s emotions were running. Ever since he learned they might lose Poguelandia, he’d reverted back to self-preservation mode. In that mode, JJ came up with the dumbest, shittiest schemes that grew ever more desperate.
That was how he ended up stealing 25k from a drug dealer. It was how he ended up running drugs. And it was how he ended up betting on himself – and losing on himself – with the last of their nest egg. JJ stopped thinking in survival mode. All he did was act.
And act badly.
How much worse could this get?
John B didn’t want to know.
“Maybe he’s just going to lay low,” Pope suggested, but he sounded vaguely desperate. They were navigating the back streets, trying to keep a track on the mob as it moved through the town without actually being a part of it. They were breathless – ready to run – but with no idea where to go or what to do.
In the distance, they heard glass shattering. A car horn went off, and people hooted wildly.
“I’m pretty sure laying low went out the window along with the chair he threw,” Sarah quipped dully. Her gallows humor was spot-on, and painfully easy.
John B bit his lip, scanning anxiously across the landscape. Places he knew – places JJ knew. He knew JJ better than anyone – even Kie. If JJ was trying to escape, he’d probably go to the Snapper. If he was ready to lick his wounds, he’d be dumb enough to hit up Poguelandia. Maybe even what was left of the Chateau.
But JJ wasn’t trying to escape, he had a feeling.
“Cops will be swarming the island,” Cleo said, somewhat unhelpfully, but her voice was couched in the anxiety they all felt. “I’m not sure how long we think he can keep running.”
“JJ won’t turn himself in,” Kie said flatly. Her face was hard, and she wouldn’t look at them. “He’s not thinking anymore. He wants revenge.”
Not quite revenge – but justice. The justice they’d never get unless they made it themselves. JJ had spent his life fighting against an unfair system, designed to keep him down. Everyone told him he was a worthless failure, and when he couldn’t prove them wrong – he eventually just wanted to prove them right as painfully and vindictively as he could.
JJ never got it, really. That when you burn the house to the ground, you’re on fire, too.
It wasn’t hard to see now. JJ things? Were going to get JJ killed.
“So what are we supposed to do?” Pope said. “We have to get him to calm down and talk this out. Shoupe will listen–”
“As long as JJ doesn’t make this worse,” Sarah said, and they grew quiet as a crowd of people passed, hollering and screaming, moving toward the main street where the people were still gathering.
The tension in the air was palpable as the night fell. With the darkness coming – with the crowd growing – what JJ had started, the whole damn town seemed set on making worse.
“It’s not like he doesn’t have a point,” Cleo said sharply. “What they’re doing to us – what they do to all of us – isn’t fair.”
Kiara stopped, turning on them with a glare. “But what does it matter now?” she snapped. She gestured back to where they came. “They still took Poguelandia. And JJ’s still a wanted man. I don’t know how this ends without JJ in prison.”
Or worse, John B thought, but he didn’t say it.
Kiara sighed, breathing out a hard breath and shaking her head. “We have to find him,” she said, running a hand through her hair. “Any idea where he’s going to go?”
She looked at them each – and the others shrugged.
She stopped when she looked at John B.
It was a funny thing, what had shifted between him and Kiara. He knew that he was part of JJ – and that made him a part of what JJ had with Kie. JJ had never had a serious girlfriend before. Hell, JJ barely understood how a normal family acted. It was all new to him. When he was prone to panic, John B was often the one who steadied him.
Kiara knew enough not to be jealous of that. She knew enough to trust that.
She knew enough to know what he was thinking now.
“This is bad,” she said, looking straight at him. “Isn’t it?”
He wanted to say no. He wanted to lie and pretend. He wanted to be 16 and shrug, saying JJ was doing a JJ thing and acting like it would be all alright.
But he wasn’t sixteen. And JJ’s things?
He couldn’t pretend, could he? All these years, he thought he was keeping JJ off the ledge when really he’d been there all along. He’d never left.
He’d spent his whole life there, and the last 18 months, he’d just stopped looking down.
Teetering on the edge now, down looked like the only option.
And John B didn’t know how to get on the ledge to help him off – without taking them all down in the process.
It was hard to think about, that JJ was his father’s son. That JJ may be more like Luke than any of them wanted to think. That with a few bad breaks and a few bad choices – it could get away from JJ. It could get away from all of them.
In 18 months, John B had been so busy thinking about the future.
He’d forgotten how much they were still haunted by the past.
If he didn’t do something – there would be no future. Not for him, not for JJ.
Not for any of them.
“He’s not going to lay low,” he said, nodding at Kiara sadly. He couldn’t lie to her; not with this much on the line. “If he thinks we really have nothing to lose–”
“He’ll throw it all away,” Kiara concluded for him. She pursed her lips and nodded.
The others fell silent, because they knew what it meant.
They understood what was happening.
Without Poguelandia, JJ didn’t see a future.
Without a future, JJ wasn’t going to bother. He was going to burn down things right here, right now. And sooner or later, John B wasn’t going to be able to pick up the pieces – much less put them back together.
“Come on,” Kiara said decisively, nodding toward the main street where the crowd was still gathering. “We should follow the mob.”
Because disaster would follow JJ.
Or he was following it.
Either way, it was their one way to find JJ.
-o-
Luke had sworn to himself he’d never go back.
At first, because thinking about Larissa was too hard. He didn’t like it, how pretty she was, how sweet. The way she smiled, the way she meant to do good but had no idea how.
It had been hard to think that she never figured it out.
Then, after a few years, he’d been afraid of losing JJ. Raising that boy was something he’d never expected. Watching him learn to walk. Hearing him call Luke daddy that first time.
He hadn’t thought about it at all for a while. Things were too busy. Shit, they were too happy. JJ was growing, JJ was learning. He was a good boy, a smart boy, a sweet boy. No point in going back, not when the Cut was all the kid knew.
That might have been enough. It should have been enough. But when the drinking started, when the bills stacked up. When his girl left and he took those first doses of pills.
The first time he raised his hand at JJ, he swore it’d be the last. But the alcohol was hot in his gut, and the pills helped him sleep. And there wasn’t any money.
The second time was easier. The third easier still. When he lost count of the bruises on JJ's skin, he lost count of all of it.
Then it was shame that kept him away. That he’d taken something precious and squandered it. He’d stolen something that wasn’t his and broken it. He’d taken Larissa’s baby and shattered him, as much as life had shattered her.
He’d been wrong, though. That was no kind of surprise, but there it was. He had been wrong on everything with JJ and never once did he ask himself what was best for him.
Luke had done it for himself all these years. He was a bad man, the worst kind of man, and he was well past looking for redemptions. The law could clear him, but that didn’t make him less guilty.
Which was why Luke was going back now, after all this time. Because it wasn’t about him anymore.
He couldn’t save himself maybe.
But he could save JJ.
It couldn’t be too late to save JJ.
Luke had broken all his other promises. So, what the hell? It was about damn time he broke this one, too.
That was how he found himself, on Barracuda Mike’s boat, speeding across the water toward Goat Island. The lights of the OBX faded behind him, and he spared a look back. He wondered what JJ was doing now.
Breaking shit. Tearing things apart. He had a rage in him, and Luke knew it well. It was the rage he felt. The rage he pummeled into JJ every time he got drunk or high. Anger at a life too short. An existence too hard. An island you called home that never wanted you at all. He’d stayed, all those years for JJ. No one else had wanted the kid, he’d told himself. Leaving him would be the cruelest thing.
Of course, he’d been wrong about that, too. In his absence, JJ had flourished. Gone off and found a treasure. Made a home, fell in love. Had a family.
So when Luke came back — when Yucatán had been a bust — he’d kept his distance. He laid low. He was just sober enough to see that JJ was better off without him. Probably always had been.
The night had a chill to it, and the breeze on the water was downright cold. He shuddered against it, gritting his teeth as he adjusted his grip on the wheel, willing the engine to go faster.
He’d tried to make sense of it, JJ’s success. He’d thought about it long and hard, making runs for Mike and playing card games with the crew. He still lost as much as he won, but he was sober enough to know the difference now.
And he was alone enough that it didn’t mean shit anyway.
Mike wasn’t a bad guy, after all. Rough around the edges, but more bark than bite. When he got sense that Luke wanted to play it straight, he’d offered him a place to hole up. Luke traded his labor for a place to stay, a place where no one would whisper about another Maybank on the island.
They whispered enough as it was — about JJ. The Pogues were keen to see him succeed, like his success was theirs. The Kooks, when he cleaned their boats and moved their shit, we’re incredulous. They said he’d blow it sooner than later.
Now that they’d taken it from him, they’d turn up their damn noses like they were right.
Luke had half a mind to go back and join JJ. Just burn the whole thing down, take what you could get. But Luke had taken too much already. He knew how hollow it felt, to take what wasn’t yours. To love what you had no right to cherish.
It drove a man to drink.
It pushed a man to pills.
It tore you apart, bit by bit, until you didn’t recognize yourself at all.
He’d raised JJ with good intentions, but they’d been a lie. Love with pretense always showed its true colors, and JJ wasn’t his. Beating him bloody and bruised proved that. That boy was never his.
It was time to give him back.
It was time to set this right.
All boys needed their daddy.
And Chandler Groff needed to step up.
-o-
JJ hadn’t thought it through. He was impulsive, always had been. Act first, think never. People called him reckless.
JJ had likened it to a survival instinct. Thinking just got depressing, and what was the point? Thinking never changed the fact that everything was stacked against him. It just made him acutely aware just how screwed he was.
Acting let him skate by. Either it worked out.
Or, you know, it didn’t.
Either way, he didn’t have to think about it. Whatever was – was.
That was how he helped find the gold, a pinnacle of success.
It was also, in retrospect, how he ended up holed up on a standout with the cops. He’d rioted. He’d stolen shit. He’d destroyed things. Hell, arson was on the list. About the only thing they couldn’t nail him for was murder, and whatever.
Just whatever.
Maybe he should have seen it coming.
Everyone else did.
And better yet? It was all his fault.
All of it.
It was his fault they spent all the money. It was his fault they’d lost the nest egg. It was on him for losing Poguelandia. Him. Just him.
There was no one else to blame.
He hadn’t just ruined his own life.
He’d taken his friends down with him.
He closed his eyes and tried to remember how to breathe. This was what he wanted, wasn’t it? To make other people hurt as much as he hurt? To let other people lose just a fraction of what he’d lost?
Reaching up a hand, he tried massaging his chest. The old trick used to work, but it was getting less and less effective. The pressure in his lungs was still building, and taking a breath was hard. He couldn’t fix it. He couldn’t fix any of it.
Why did everyone else get to be happy? Why did Topper get to burn down the Chateau and strut around the OBX like it wasn’t attempted murder? Why did Rafe Cameron get to gun down the sheriff and still operate a profitable business? Why did they get to be successful? Why was the future written for everyone but him?
Could he go out, hands up? Could he do that for Kie?
Or could he make a run for it? Be like his dad — shit. Not his dad. Luke, whoever that bastard was to him now.
The lights danced on the ceiling, and he could hear the mob he’d created. Shoupe yelled over the melee and JJ had to decide.
He thought about it now, of all times. Just for a split second.
He thought about going out, hands up. He thought about letting Shoupe put him on his knees, arms behind his back. He thought about the back of a police cruiser, a jail cell, and a courtroom. There was no mercy for Maybanks. None.
And he thought about going out, running hard. He thought about it, one last stand.
He wondered if it would hurt, taking a bullet. He wondered if they would shoot to kill.
A bullet to the head.
That would stop the thoughts.
Once and for all.
But Kie was there, and the others too. Could he do that to them? Could he be that selfish?
Or would they understand it was better this way? Would they see it, just like he did, that they were better off without him?
JJ hadn’t thought it through or he would have seen the inevitable end.
He released his hands, wincing. There was no point in trying to fight it. There was no point trying to fight any of it.
His story was always meant to end in heartbreak.
No family. No home. No future.
JJ’s story was just always meant to end.
-o-
It was quiet out on the water at least. The lights from town receded as he cut through the water, and everyone was so preoccupied with JJ’s little riot to pay him much heed anyway. He had to remind himself, though, he wasn’t on the run from anything right now. His little land deal had saved his skin. He’d thought it was nothing, trading his land for his freedom. He hadn’t expected JJ to get caught in the crossfire.
Luke was many things, but a long-term thinker wasn’t one of them. That was how he ended up with JJ; that was how he ended up beating the shit out of a kid he’d sworn to himself to protect. His improvisational skills left something to be desired.
As he navigated, though, this felt different. This wasn’t an impulse decision, was it?
No, this move – going back to Goat Island – was long overdue. It was something he should have done 19 years ago before he let shit spiral out of control. That was the problem when you used your heart. Your heart told you to love a kid that wasn’t yours.
Then, when shit went wrong, your heart told you to raise your hand to him – just once.
Just twice.
Just – no.
The heart was a son of a bitch.
And so was Luke.
He had to count on the fact that maybe – just maybe Groff wasn’t. Or, at the very least, that he was better than Luke. That didn’t take much now – did it? All he had to do was not beat the kid and they’d be set.
It had been years, but Luke remembered it all like yesterday. Coming up to the island – it was like nothing had changed. The old dock was exactly the same. The grounds hadn’t been kept up particularly well, and he recognized the trees and bushes.
The night was dark – rain was coming – and he moored himself with a practiced familiarity. He didn’t waste time, adjusting his coat against the growing chill in the air as he took long strides up to the house.
As a worker, he’d stuck to the back areas and service entrances. He hadn’t worked here in 20 years, though. He was done slipping through the cracks. He wasn’t going to slink in through the back. For JJ, he was facing this one head on for once.
But hell, his nerves. Walking up to the front door to confront the father of the boy he’d raised. It took gumption. It took the abandonment of all his senses.
It took the overwhelming need to do this right for once. For all the times JJ had gone hungry. For all the parent teacher conferences he’d missed. For the bloody noses, split lips, black eyes. For all the times he’s told the kid how worthless he was.
He knocked on the door.
The wind was picking up, and there was distant thunder with a few flashes of lightning somewhere along the horizon.
So he pounded on it instead.
To his relief, he didn’t have to wait long. It was almost like Groff was waiting for him when he opened the door. They stood there, face to face for the first time in 20 years, the recognition dawning slowly.
Then understanding coming just a second later.
“Luke Maybank,” Groff said, like he was just remembering it. Like he hadn’t thought about him in all these years.
Like he hadn’t left his son with him.
It sent a chill down his spine. All these years, he’d thought he’d stolen someone else’s baby.
And Groff was standing there like he hadn’t thought about it at all.
The sudden realization was almost impossible to fathom. In that split second, Luke realized his mistake. Groff wasn’t going to be mad Luke kept JJ.
Groff was going to be mad that he’d come back at all.
And it all came back. His doubts about Groff. His hesitations around Larissa. The gnawing uncertainty every time he saw that man with his child. He’d fallen in love with JJ in a heartbeat.
Groff had barely been able to touch him.
What the hell was Luke thinking?
What the hell was Luke doing?
“I never thought I’d see you again,” Groff mused, and he had the audacity to smile, like somehow they were old friends. Partners.
“Funny,” Luke said. “You told me you’d come back.”
At that, Groff laughed. “I did, didn’t I?” he said. “It’s a hell of a night for this.”
“Probably as good a night as any,” Luke said. He tightened his jaw and pursed his lips.
“I suppose it is,” Groff said congenially. “I’m getting all sorts of visitors tonight!”
Luke frowned. “What?”
Groff waved his hand through the air. “No matter, no matter,” he said. He stood back from the door and gestured inside. “I guess you should probably come in.”
It wasn’t so much an offer as an inevitability, and Luke crossed the threshold.
For the first time in 20 years, it all came back to him in a rush. Larissa coddling her newborn. Wes doting on his grandson. The old house he’d tried to keep up. The young family he’d tried to support. The infant who had everything – and somehow nothing.
He’d let himself forget, was the thing. All the drugs, all the alcohol. He’d let himself forget how it started. Groff shut the door behind him, gesturing him further inside, but Luke couldn’t. Luke wouldn’t. He rounded on Groff right there, right there.
“You never came back,” he said, laying it out plainly. “You never came back for JJ.”
Groff blinked at him, clearly taken aback. “I – what?”
It was almost mind boggling. To have him sit there and act like he had no idea. Like he hadn’t thought about it at all. His son.
“You never came back for your son,” he said, letting the words carry the weight of what he was trying to say. “He was your son, and you never came back for him.”
Groff stared at him for another second, as if trying to make sense of what he was saying – and Luke saw it. The way his expression shifted.
He’d assessed the situation – he’d assessed – and come to a clear conclusion.
Before he opened his mouth, Luke knew what was coming. Groff was about to play him.
The bastard had abandoned his son with Luke and he was about to play him.
“Time went by and it got harder and harder to come back,” Groff said, and he almost mustered up enough emotion to sound sincere. “And you had made a home for him, you’d made him your own. I’m sure he was calling you daddy–”
“Bullshit,” Luke said, because he hadn’t come here for that. JJ was in trouble; this wasn’t a ploy. This was for JJ. It had to be for JJ. “He was your son, and you never came back.”
“I was in no place to be a father,” Groff said, as if to elicit sympathy. “Grieving as I was. And working. I didn’t have the time – and I didn’t know how–”
“You have a whole damn island,” Luke pointed out, and he nodded around. The mansion was in disrepair, but he knew the wealth behind it. He knew what it used to be. “And I know the old man loved that kid.”
Groff nodded sagely, and his eyes actually welled up. Tears.
Luke wasn’t sure if he wanted to throw up – or punch the man, right then and there.
“And how could I explain it?” Groff said. His smile was simpering. “He buried his daughter. He buried his grandson. I couldn’t reopen that wound – not after his loss–”
Luke shook his head. He couldn’t do this, the emotional manipulation. He was too tired, too sober, too wrong. He needed to do this right.
Which was a problem, of course. When was the last time he’d done anything right? Had he ever? He was a freakin’ Maybank, for goodness sakes. Making a mess of things was sort of what they did. If Groff had cared about his son at all, Luke was the last person in the world he would have trusted with his baby.
But Luke always was kind of an idiot. He never put shit together until it was far, far too late.
“Look,” Luke said, shaking his head and getting this back on track. He took a breath and forced himself to focus. Groff was trying to play him, and Luke couldn’t let him. “Whatever happened – I guess it happened.”
Groff’s face brightened. That was clearly what he wanted to hear.
“But the point is what’s happening now,” he said, pushing forward with his plan. Groff couldn’t be entirely heartless – and Luke did have one card to play. If Groff wanted to keep JJ a secret, then Luke could play to that. He had wanted to appeal to Groff as a good father, but if he needed to appeal to him as the smarmy bastard he was – then whatever. Anything for JJ.
“JJ’s in trouble.”
Groff looked vaguely surprised – and mostly disinterested. “I saw him recently,” he said. “Wes hired him for some business. I believe we compensated him fairly–”
Luke shook his head. “Not enough,” he said. And he frowned. “You saw him?”
Groff nodded, as if it was no big deal. “He didn’t know the difference.”
He screwed up his nose, confused by that revelation. “You just – saw him?”
Groff shrugged now, completely oblivious to how outrageous that idea was. That he saw JJ like it was nothing.
His son.
This man was a monster, that was all. Luke didn’t know how. He didn’t know why.
But it took a monster to see a monster, and Luke had been a monster most of his life. He knew what it was. He knew what it looked like.
“It’s – whatever,” Luke said, reminding himself why he was here. What he needed to do. “JJ lost everything, and I think he just lost his shit. Went batshit crazy on the town. We need to find him. We need to get him some legal help. Or just get him the hell off the island – to the Yucatan – something–”
Now Groff looked confused. “I’m not sure I follow–”
Luke took a hard, measured breath. “JJ’s in trouble,” he said as plainly as he could. “I’m in no position to help him, and you’re his father.”
Groff blinked a few times, mouth hanging open. “JJ barely knows who I am,” he said. He knitted his brows together.
“All the more reason you owe him,” Luke said. He reached up, jabbing his finger toward Groff. “He’s going to go to jail if you don’t. Or worse.”
The thought of it made his stomach drop.
But Groff looked hardly phased at the idea. “Well, I mean, you’re the one who raised him–”
“Groff, I got nothing!” he snapped, and he turned away hotly, running his hand through his hair restlessly. He looked back at him, almost desperate. “I can’t pay for no lawyer. And he hates me. I don’t think I could convince him to trust me anyway.”
“Oh, I’m sure that’s not true,” Groff said. “And if it’s money, then I get it. I mean, I’m surprised you didn’t come back here earlier. The compensation I gave you – I know that’s not enough. A lifetime of child rearing costs? I can only imagine–”
Like that was the problem. Like the issue was compensation.
Not the fact that Groff had abandoned his son with the worst excuse for a human being on the whole damn island.
Shit.
He wanted Groff to help JJ.
Groff just wanted to pay Luke off.
“I could tell people,” he said, because he would play this card. For JJ, he’d play this card. He’d taken too much from that kid. He had to play this card. “I could expose you.”
Groff, though, just laughed. “And what?” he said. “Get yourself arrested for kidnapping? I thought you just weaseled your way out of legal trouble–”
Luke’s brow darkened. Groff hadn’t been oblivious as he suggested. He’d kept tabs, then. He knew who Luke was. He knew who JJ was.
Hell, he probably knew just how much trouble JJ was in.
And he hadn’t helped.
Not once.
“Look,” Groff said, lightening again. “I’m sure money can help. You can use it for your own trouble – you can use it to help JJ – it’s up to you!”
He felt indignant suddenly. Like this had always been a cash grab. Like he’d taken JJ for the paycheck.
Luke had done a lot of things wrong – more than he cared to remember, more than he could ever forget – but he hadn’t taken JJ for the cash. If he had, he would have come back a long, long time ago.
“You can’t write a check and make this go away,” Luke said. He stepped toward Groff again, the sight of JJ still heavy on his mind. JJ was out there now – on the run and desperate.
Desperation made you stupid. Luke knew that.
Shit, Luke knew it so damn well.
It drove you to make the biggest mistakes of your life.
Too much alcohol. Too many pills. Your first try at crack. Gambling and finally raising your fist at the only good thing you’d ever done.
Maybanks were self destructive assholes, weren’t they? Luke had taken himself apart bit by bit, every time he hit JJ. And JJ–
Well, JJ had never had a chance, had he? A mother who couldn’t care for him. A father who didn’t want him. And an asshole who promised to care for him, who beat him into the ground instead. There were a thousand excuses, and none of them meant shit. He couldn’t absolve himself.
And he sure as hell couldn’t absolve Groff.
Groff, though, seemed convinced he could do this. “Oh, come on, Luke,” he said, easy as he could – like they were old friends. He smiled. “It’s a little bit about the money – and trust me. There’s a lot of it. For a guy like you? There’s plenty.”
Luke frowned. It wasn’t that Groff was wrong – it was just that for the first time in a long time, Luke had his priorities right. He’d compromised too many things for a quick paycheck. And he’d blown all those paychecks on himself.
If this was about JJ, then this was about JJ.
“Are you really going to buy me off?” Luke asked him, plainly incredulous. “When I tell you that your son needs help?”
Groff gave him a benign look, like it didn’t bother him in the slightest. “This is the kind of cash that sets you up for life,” he said. He leaned forward and dropped his voice. “I can set you up for life. We can work something out, Luke. Something fair – to you – and to JJ.”
That was the point, wasn’t it?
Groff had found it. His weak spot.
“How’s that?” Luke asked, hesitating slightly now. His eyes flicked around the house, which was in a worse state than he’d ever seen it. The disrepair was evident. “This island of yours is worth a fortune, but land equity don’t pay the bills.”
“I told Wes that for years. I would have used the island to save him – and Larissa’s legacy,” he said. “Now that he’s gone, now that I’m set to inherit–”
Luke shook his head, unconvinced. “It’s not worth that much.”
“Fine,” Groff said, because he knew he couldn’t play Luke, not when he’d been here for so much of it. Luke knew there was money in the family, but he knew it was only worth as much as Wes was willing to part with. He’d been sentimental back then. After losing his daughter and grandson? Luke had heard the stories. He knew the old man had shut down.
The decrepit island told the story plain enough.
Groff moved his tactic diffidently. “The island is chump change anyway,” he said. “In the years since Larissa’s death, I’ve done some traveling. I’ve tried a few things. And I have a bigger play.”
His face shifted suggestively, and the words were meant to be enticing.
Somehow, Luke just felt skeptical.
He knew how good Groff’s promises were.
Which was to say – not at all.
He swallowed, putting his guard up. He could cut and run now – but that wouldn’t help JJ. And he still needed Groff, one way or another. He needed Groff. “Bigger?”
Groff’s eyes positively lit up. “Let’s just say that treasure hunting is in JJ’s blood, so I”m not surprised with all he’s done,” he said. “It’s one of the reasons I came back. When I learned that my son – my little boy – had an eye for treasure, just like me. I mean, El Dorado? He found El Dorado!”
It almost sounded proud.
It also sounded opportunistic.
Mostly, it sounded like bullshit.
“What the hell are you even talking about?” Luke said. “I don’t know nothing about treasure.”
Groff rolled his eyes, almost as if in exasperation. “It’s complicated,” he said, waving his hand through the air. He glanced at a clock and bit his lip. “And honestly? Time is a little short.”
Luke snorted. “You have plans?”
Groff made a face. “Well, not exactly,” he said. “But all of this timing is coincidental. I’m not the only one hunting this treasure.”
“What treasure?” Luke repeated. “And what the hell does any of it have to do with JJ?”
“JJ’s part of this treasure, too,” Groff said. “It’s almost his birthright.”
“So give it to him,” Luke said. “If it can save him–”
“Possibly,” Groff said. “But I can’t do anything until I take care of a little other business.”
Luke shook his head, and now he was the one exasperated. “Groff–”
“I know, I know,” he said, clearly attempting to placate him. He gestured to Luke. “It’s just – I may have crossed a few people, and all signs indicate that they have tracked me here.”
“How is that my problem?” Luke demanded.
“Well, it’s not,” Groff said. “But they know JJ is involved–”
“Why the hell is JJ involved?” Luke said, not following this at all.
“It’s complicated!” Groff said. “And the series of events was uncanny, let me tell you. When I found out my son was a bonafide treasure hunter – and that his very own legacy needed someone just like him to unearth it.”
“Did you get him involved with something?” Luke asked. “If you put him in danger–”
Groff gave him a look and smirked. “What about the trouble you put him in? All those years of drinking. Even when I was traveling, I heard tell, Luke. I heard tell.”
His face flushed scarlet, but he kept his mouth shut. He was aptly damned, and he knew it.
Groff did, too. He stepped forward, clapping Luke on the arm. “But you can make it right. Just like I can,” he said. “I had originally hoped to find what I needed and be gone before my past caught up with me here – leaving JJ none the wiser. But Wes – complicated that. And my timeline slowed considerably. So I’m afraid that past may be here already.”
“Still not sure how that’s my problem,” Luke grumbled.
“If they’re after me, it’s only a matter of time until they’re after JJ,” Groff said. “This is his treasure, after all. And he’s found some of the major clues.”
Of course. Groff had used JJ to get what he wanted.
He hadn’t told him the truth. He hadn’t been there for anything that JJ needed.
But he’d managed to put him in danger anyway.
Luke was reconsidering the notion of decking Groff as his fingers flexed into a fist at his side.
“But you’re here!” Groff said, lifting his hand and putting it in the air as if genuinely pleased. “And a man of your talents could help with this sort of people.”
He flattened his lips and stared Groff down hard. He was lying about a lot of things, but not the danger. That shit was real. His inclination was to cut and run, burn this bridge and burn it good.
But his gut was shit. If the last 20 years had taught him anything, it had taught him that. Luke was too inclined to all the wrong things, and it was about damn time he started doing it right. “How do you figure?” he said, giving Groff just enough of a lead.
Groff brightened once more. “Well, let’s just say that my former associates aren’t exactly of a legal profession,” he said.
Which was to say: neither was Groff.
It had never made sense, really. Where Groff came from and how he ended up with Larissa. She was old money – the oldest in the area – and Groff had waltzed in and charmed her out from the nose of dozens of reputable suitors. There was talk of a distant fortune. Some said he was a self-made millionaire.
But Luke was starting to wonder.
If he’d been a grifter from the start. And poor Larissa had been nothing but a mark.
And JJ? What did that make him? Collateral damage? A necessary part of the ploy?
No, it just made him expendable.
An inconvenience, it seemed.
Until he made himself relevant, 20 years later.
Groff continued, hardly needing any encouragement. “They think I took something from them – which is, of course, ridiculous – what I have is mine, plain and simple. They’re not entitled to it, any more than they’re entitled to what it can find me.”
Luke shook his head. He was getting the big picture now, but Groff was losing him in the details. “What do you mean?”
Groff seemed to recognize he was meandering. “Look, I just know that I am a target here. And I would leave – but I have to wrap up the details of Wes’s estate, you understand. And the treasure hunt – well, I need more time,” he said, as if it were completely reasonable.
“So, tell them that,” Luke said with a shrug.
“Well, they’re not exactly the listening types,” Groff said. He wrinkled his nose. “I’m afraid they may shoot first and ask questions later.”
Luke wasn’t quite sure why the hell he was supposed to care.
So Groff made his point clear. “And since JJ’s been involved in procuring some of the items as well, then I fear he may also be in the crossfire.”
The bastard. Whether or not JJ was in danger, he couldn’t say for sure.
But would Groff put JJ in danger?
Well, he’d left JJ with Luke all these years, so he couldn’t put it past him. “These people,” Luke said stiffly. “They’re what? Mercenaries?”
Groff held up his hands. “Your words, not mine,” he said. “And not my style, for the record. Too much blood for my taste. It’s messy. And I don’t like messes.”
Luke snorted. Messes like infants he didn’t want to raise, it seemed. “If they’re after you, then leave JJ out of it. Plain and simple.”
“But he’s already in it,” Groff said, a little emphatic now. He made his expression deeper, imploring him somehow. It would be convincing, were it not so damn practiced. “I know you want to protect him.”
“Then it sounds like I should get him as far away from you as possible,” Luke said, as if it were that simple.
But the tactic worked. Groff’s eyes widened in obvious concern. “Yes, you should,” he said. “And if you help me, we can work together to clean up this mess. He’s – in legal trouble you said?”
It was a smooth transition. It would have been smoother had Groff been actually paying attention. Everything he said was a lie – or enough of it. There was no way to sort the truth from fiction, and Luke couldn’t make the mistake of trusting him.
Larissa had, and she’d ended up dead.
Hell, Wes had, too. And they’d just buried the old geezer, too.
That left JJ.
One last loose end.
To this so-called treasure. And shit – Luke realized with cold clarity. To the entire Genrette fortune. Groff talked like he was set to inherit Goat Island. But this island? This house?
This was JJ’s.
This was Jackson’s.
He stepped back almost unconsciously, bringing his full defenses to bear. It was a protectiveness he hadn’t felt in years, something he’d honed in those early years when he’d actually done it right. The first time he’d heard the baby cry. The first time he’d kissed the kid goodnight. He’d put on bandaids, picked him up when he fell. He’d loved that kid, even if he’d forgotten how for a while.
Sobriety was a hell of a thing.
And parental instincts could be dulled, but apparently they couldn’t be forgotten.
Reeling, he tried to figure out what to say. He’d made a mistake in coming here. If anything, he’d just made JJ more vulnerable.
Because Groff knew the gig was up now. And Groff was willing to play any card he could to get what he wanted. If there was a loose end, he was going to tie it up.
No way, though. There was no way Luke was going to let him finish off JJ like he’d finished off Larissa. Like he’d finished off Wes.
There was no Genrette curse.
There was just an opportunistic madman, taking them out one by one.
With JJ being the last Genrette standing.
“Well, I don’t know,” Groff said, his demeanor shifting again. The forced sympathy was gone. In its place was something cool and sinister. “Maybe I should bring JJ here after all. Now that we’re talking about it, it seems like maybe he can help me – as much as I can help him.”
It was a threat.
Damn it, Luke had just made this whole thing worse.
He shook his head, stepping back again. “Just leave him out of it.”
“You came to me, Luke,” Groff said, knitting his eyebrows together plaintively. “If you want to protect him, maybe you should stay.”
He exhaled hard. “No,” he said, and he pushed back Groff toward the door.
“I can’t promise you what will happen,” Groff said, and the words carried a warning.
Luke stopped short and turned back.
Groff shrugged, as if there was nothing he could do about it. “If you walk out, I can’t promise you what will happen to JJ,” he said. And then, his lips turned up into a sickening smile. “You do love him, don’t you? Between all the drinking and the drugs. You really did love him, didn’t you?”
His face burned, and his throat constricted. “Just leave JJ alone,” he said. “Pretend like I was never here.”
Groff kept smiling. “Whatever you say, Luke,” he said. “Whatever you say.”
Heart pounding, he opened the door and let himself out. He slammed it behind him, stalking off down the porch, the steps, and all the way back to the boat. He was unmoored, starting up the engine when it finally sunk in.
Groff was a murderer. Groff was a con artist and a monster.
And Luke had just served up JJ to him on a silver platter.
JJ didn’t trust him, and Groff knew everything he needed to play JJ like a fiddle. The boy was running scared – the boy was running terrified – and Luke knew how hard that boy loved. After everything Luke had done to him, he still loved him.
He’d love Groff, too.
He’d love him long before he would ever doubt him.
He wouldn’t see Groff’s betrayal coming, not until Groff’s knife was lodged in his gut.
He pulled away from the island, feeling numb at how this had turned out. He half hoped the cops had caught JJ by now – or that the boy had enough sense to head to the Yucatan after all. But he knew JJ.
He knew his boy.
He’d come to Groff.
And Groff would use him to his own gain.
Which meant that Luke could either give up, washing his hands of it. He looked back at Goat Island, receding on the horizon behind him. He thought of Larissa playing with Jackson in the garden. He thought of Wes, bouncing the baby on his knee. He thought of the family JJ should have had and the home that was supposed to be his.
No, it was time. It was time to do what Luke should have done 20 years ago. It was time to stop Groff once and for all.
-o-
Kooks thought it was simple, their power imbalance. They saw it as the natural way of things, a God given right for some. Most of them didn’t even see it as luck, a system they happened to be on the right side of, and instead had the hubris to think they’d earned it. That they worked harder, lived better.
Privilege made you blind.
As a cop, Shoupe had to see it for what it was. He lived on the Figure Eight, it was true. But he could still remember Sue Peterkin, telling him with a sigh, "You're the law for all of them. And when you do it right, they’ll all hate you for it in the end.”
Sue was dead, of course, and Shoupe was up for re-election. And he thought the Kooks played it dirty — he did — but the Pogues went around rioting, and what was he supposed to do?
Pogues thought it was simple, too. Just fight the system, overthrow it if you had to. Burn it to the ground, and then what?
And then what?
Poverty made you blind, too, just in other ways. Two halves of the same island, screaming at each other and taking what they don’t have.
“What should we do?” Thomas asked, bouncing on the balls of his feet restlessly. Next to him, Plumb looked equally grim, hand on her holster.
The crowd was growing agitated behind him, and crowds had broken off, moving down the street as the looting began. Another car alarm went off, and more glass shattered. He was losing control here, if he’d ever had it at all.
He huffed, glancing at the cruiser. Pope Heyward was in cuffs in the back. Cleo looked ready to murder him, while John B and Sarah Cameron pressed close. Little Kiara Carrera was looking out, as if she thought she might be able to find JJ.
Shoupe was pretty sure JJ was long gone. The fire department was clearing the realty shop right now, and everyone was looking to him to impose order on this chaos.
As if he could.
As if he wanted to.
Couldn’t these kids just manage their money so as not to forfeit the land?
Couldn’t these Kooks just have a heart, and let someone carve a place for themselves?
Couldn’t they all just go home?
The answer was no, of course. Shoupe had to contend with that. Kooks and Pogues had the luxury of blindness, but he didn’t. Not when he had to be the bridge that kept this damn island together.
“Vic—” Thomas started, clearly agitated. Plumb was damn near pulling her gun.
He sighed. “Tell them to book the Heyward boy,” he said. “Full obstruction.”
Plumb looked relieved by that, and her hand relaxed.
“I want units on all the main streets,” he ordered next. “Our main goal is containment for now. Arrests should be only for flagrant behavior. If we get everyone we see for shoplifting, then we’re going to be spread too thin.”
“But they’re looting—” Thomas started to object.
“And the goal is for that to stop,” he reminded them tersely. “If we go after petty offenders, we’re missing the big picture, and I don’t want to call the state and admit we can’t manage our own damn island.”
That much appealed to Thomas at least. Plumb stepped forward, nodding at the Pogues. “And them? Maybank is still out there. This is on him.”
His jaw worked, and he flexed his toes, wishing for another answer. He felt for JJ, he really did. He wanted to help the kid, not put him away.
At this point, however, Shoupe had to be realistic. If he could get JJ through the night without taking a bullet, it would be a win. If an overzealous cop didn’t get him, a vigilante Kook would. JJ might have thought he had nothing to lose, but half the island was set on proving him wrong.
Shoupe couldn’t ignore that, and he couldn’t ignore the destruction to property, resisting arrest, arson, and probably theft. JJ was in trouble, and he wasn’t sure the kid had any idea just how much trouble. The best thing for JJ — whether he knew it or not — was getting into custody, and fast.
Then they could talk deals.
Then they could talk bargains.
Then they could talk.
“The others are free to go,” he said, turning away from them as he finished his orders. “But I want an APB out on JJ Maybank. Non lethal force — and I mean that, non lethal — but he’s not getting away. It’s time to bring him in.”
-o-
Most of JJ’s life was spent running from things. Running from school; running from Kooks. Running from his dad – just running. When he was feeling brash and stupid, he ran to his problems head on and hit first.
That was how this had started. Back in the courthouse. He’d been running from a verdict he couldn’t live with, one that was so patently unfair.
And he’d run right into the back of a cop car – and out the other side. He’d run downtown. He’d run into the realty office. He’d rioted and looted and burned shit. All the stupid shit JJ had done in his life, this was the stupidest. This was the stuff you didn’t walk away from. This was the stuff that put you in jail and turned you into Luke Maybank once and for all.
That scared JJ more than anything else, honestly, which was why he was still running now. Shifting through the streets, weaving across the island with familiarity. His adrenaline had spiked a long time ago, and in its place was something weary and hard. He could rest, though. He couldn’t stop. So he just kept running. Aching knees, burning thighs. Chest tight and breath short.
The cops were looking for him – no doubt his friends were, too – and JJ couldn’t face either of them. The cops would beat his ass and throw him in prison with no hope for release. And the Pogues? He’d already screwed them over, hadn’t he? With the property? With the Enduro? With town-wide riots that shredded any credibility they might have had left?
JJ had run from that as long and hard as he could. The fact was this was a small island, and there were only so many places you could go. And he wasn’t thinking now, was he? He hadn’t thought about any of it. Pure impulse, nothing but reaction. Corner after corner, street after street, until he hit the coast.
Just like that, he was out of space.
Out of time.
Out of options.
What the hell was he going to do? He couldn’t keep running – he didn’t even know if he wanted to. He couldn’t go back to his friends. Could he? Could he put that on them? After everything else he’d done? Why would they want him? Why had they ever wanted him?
Faced with the ocean – faced with the end of the OBX and himself – he had to make a choice.
To turn himself in.
Or just keep going.
That was the thing with JJ. He ran.
But when he knew it was over – when he knew he was down and out – JJ was a quitter at heart. All or nothing. When he went, he went hard. When he was done – he was done.
It was just – he probably needed to work on that. Not that he shouldn’t quit. Hell, no. If anything, he just needed to quit earlier. That way he’d stop causing so many problems and leaving them for other people to clean them up.
He wasn’t worried about the Kooks. All those shopkeepers were insured to the hilt. They’d get a payout that covered the damage – and more so. And all their little Kook friends would come back and say how sorry they were for it, those stupid Pogues. Those Maybanks.
The joke was on them, wasn’t it?
JJ wasn’t a Maybank.
They all hated him, and he was one of them.
JJ Maybank wasn’t even real. Jackson Groff. He was Jackson Groff.
The more he told himself Luke was full of shit, the less he believed it. The more he knew.
All his life, the way nothing worked out. Every day he was alive, how nothing fit. How he didn’t fit, like he was disconnected from reality in some way. A Pogue, he’d told himself. His only consolation. A Pogue.
That wasn’t his either.
What was his?
How did he have the worst of Luke’s legacy – the bruises and the doubts – but none of the good? How did he have the burden of being a Kook without any of the privilege?
JJ could run from the cops. He could run from his legal problems. He could even run from his friends, when push came to shove. But himself? Could he run from that?
Could he even quit it?
He wanted to, maybe. Right now, it was tempting. To end it, to be done.
But at this point – he didn’t even know what it was. He didn’t know who he was. All this shit he was running from – and the answers he needed weren’t here. It was time to stop running from everything.
JJ got on the boat, untying the rigging with a sudden determination. It could have been panic. It could have been desperation. It could have been nothing but autopilot.
Or maybe he was just finally running toward something.
The answers of who he was.
And what worth he might finally have.