Darkness

8. Cain

Eight

Cain

I hear the elevator door open behind me, already knowing it’s Lincoln. I don’t bother getting up. I’ve been sitting here for a few hours now, only watching one person. The girl who’s been on my mind more than I’d like to admit since I’ve met her.

There is this pull towards her which I can’t explain, but whatever it is, it’s starting to take over my day.

Lincoln sits next to me on the couch. “You sitting in the dark, so she can’t see you watching her?” Lincoln looks over to where I am, but I don’t say anything to him because he already knows the answer. “How long have you been sitting here?”

“What’s the time?” I ask.

I didn’t want to touch my cell because she would know I was here, as she’s been looking up at my window a few times. She knows where I live.

“Just after midnight.”

“Three hours.” Grabbing my glass off the table, I drink the rest of my whiskey, waiting for Lincoln to continue with his questions.

“And? What have you found out?”

“She enjoys stupid reality TV. She likes to dance or do some skating moves. In the three hours she’s been home, she’s looked over at the door twenty-six times, has a baseball bat next to her, and she has looked up to my window a few times.” Placing the empty glass on the table, I lean back on the couch, watching her move around her apartment.

Every time she’s been standing, my sight goes straight to her legs. Fuck, does she have some sexy legs. Not just legs, her whole body is gorgeous, and the thoughts going through my head about touching that sexy body have been going crazy. Especially when she came out of the bathroom and put on her night clothes. I can see straight into her bedroom too, which is perfect. I’m not a sick bastard who gets off on watching girls walk around naked in their bedroom, so I turn away. But it does piss me off at the thought some other fucker watching her too.

“So, not someone who is looking into you, but someone who is scared of something.” Lincoln points out that he was right, and I was paranoid about being watched.

“Is that everything?” I point to the file in his hand.

No matter what, I can’t shake off the thought that someone is watching me. It’s been going on for a few months now. I know I’m always going to be a target and I’m ready for it. The chances of me living a long life is slim, I never worry about my life. It’s the ones who I’ve invited into my life I worry about.

I could have stayed hidden, been the ghost they all know me to be, and not told anyone who I was, but I couldn’t do it. All because of a promise I made to the only man I trusted for years.

“Cain, you have to promise me. It’s the only thing I want from you.” Grandad cups my face, and I look into his eyes. I have no idea what is about to happen, but for the first time since we’ve been down here, I see fear in his eyes, and I don’t know if it’s for me or himself.

His expression darkens, and I try everything to keep the worry hidden deep inside me.

Something you learn to do after you’ve been here long enough. Never show anyone your fear or weakness.

“I promise.” Those two words hold more promise than I can ever give anyone.

“If you make it out of here, you will go to your uncle. Give him a part of his brother, a part of his dad. Tell him I always thought about him, but I need to give him a part of his family back, which he lost. Promise me, Cain.”

Does he know something I don’t? Why is he making me promise him something like this? No matter all the questions I have in my head, I can never let him down. Everything I do from here on out is for him, and him alone.

“I promise.”

He smiles, hiding whatever it is eating at him at the moment. “Always have faith in yourself and the family.”

One promise and I still haven’t been able to fulfill it. Yes I came back into Uncle David’s life, but never told him about the things grandad said to me about him, and that weight is always on me. Maybe telling him what grandad said will not only make me feel better, but it might help him too.

“Out of the seven families’ computers you hacked into, only one of them has pictures of you. So far, it doesn’t look like they have anything outside of this club. It’s mostly me and you.” Lincoln hands me the file so I can see which family is now ready to start something with me. I’ve been out a few years and not once has a family started anything with me. I’ve had a few asking if their family member in the pit can leave, but nothing for me to worry about.

Opening the file for the Yang family. “Fuck,” I whisper the word.

“I thought that would be your reaction. What do you think he wants?” Lincoln asks, and I finally get up from the couch and walk over to the kitchen to turn on the lamp by the counter to get some light into the apartment.

Lincoln stands up and looks out the window and nods. “I think she’s gutted it’s me standing here and not you.” Ignoring his comment, it takes everything in my body to stop me from moving over to the window to see her once more before she goes to bed.

Yet, I know I’m going to be sitting on the couch all night watching her sleep. She’s afraid of something, so I’ll be watching over her. No one will be coming into her apartment without me seeing it.

Lincoln joins me in the kitchen area and leans on the counter as I take my tablets, because this fucking headache is getting to the point I want to rip my head off to ease the pain.

“What’s the plan?” Lincoln turns slightly to me, and right now I have no idea what the plan is.

“How far back do the images go?” I ask. I’ll look through the file myself, but not tonight, because there is already so much going on in my head.

“Two months. It seems new at the moment. if you ask me nothing to worry about until we know what he wants.” Lincoln folds his arms over his chest, leaning on the counter, waiting for me to say something.

“He wants his son, but you’re right. Let’s leave it for now and see if he makes a move, but monitor his computer.” Pushing myself off the counter, I turn to face him. “Like grandad always said, have faith.”

Faith is telling me to hold off, and that’s what I’m going to do. Play it out. If I’ve learned anything by taking over The Pit, it’s always believe you can do it, but take your time.

“You talking about your grandad? Does this mean you’re going to talk to David a little?” Lincoln has been telling me for a while now I should talk to Uncle David, maybe not all in one sitting but a little here and there.

And I have no idea why or what’s going on in my head, but grandad’s words are coming to me a lot more in the last few weeks. Maybe he knows I’ve not spoken to Uncle David and is haunting me until I do. A small smile comes to my lips, thinking about him and his crazy ass. Fuck, do I miss the man.

“Yeah, heading over now before I change my mind.” I look over at the window, stopping whatever pull that woman has over me to not walk over there.

I loved Tessa. She was all I ever wanted, but the pull towards Autumn-Rose is so strong, and I have no idea why.

“I’ll see you in the morning.” he pats my back as we both make our way to the elevator. “Cain, she’s a woman who is scared, not the woman coming for you. You’ve been watching her all night. All I’m saying is even you deserve a woman in your life.”

“And you?” I know what he’s doing, but he needs to remember since I got him out of The Pit, he does the same thing as me. Fuck someone in the club and that’s it.

“Fuck off.” He laughs, and without another word I walk to my Range Rover to go have a conversation with my uncle. One I didn’t want to have but Hayden is right. He lost everything that day too, not just me.

***

I look at my watch. It’s one in the morning. I know it’s a stupid time to be knocking on the door, but they also know it’s the only time I come over, so no one sees me. You learn how to hide and, how to move when you’re thrown into a dark room to learn to fight from a young age.

Unlocking the back door, I make my way into the house, and straight to the sitting room where I hear the TV.

“Oh, look who it is?” Mason jokes. He gets up and pulls me in for a big bear hug.

“What brings you here at this time?” Uncle David asks, and I sit next to Hayden, patting his leg.

I stay silent for a moment, not sure what to say to him, because how do you start a conversation like the one I want with him? Do I want it alone, or in front of these boys too? He was their grandad, too.

I look at Hayden, Mason and Miles. They’re glancing at me as they watch the movie on the screen. Declan is still in training. The moment I saw him grow up, I knew how I wanted him to train. He moans about it all the time, but little baby Crawford needs to grow up now.

“I made a promise, that if I ever made it out of The Pit, I’d-” The words get stuck in my throat, it’s still so hard to talk about the man who gave his life for me. “-give my uncle a part of his brother he lost. So here I am.”

Uncle David sits up a little, doing nothing to make me feel like he’s going to ask a million questions, but enough to know this is what he’s been waiting for.

Hayden pats my legs and nods to the twins, but I stop him. “He was your grandad too.” Hayden locks eyes with me, and all I can do is give him a nod. Not sure what I’ll be telling them tonight, it might only be something small, or all of it, I have no idea, but what I do know is that this is going to be hard to do.

“Uncle David, I have no idea what or how much I’ll tell you tonight, but it was a promise grandad made me repeat every single night. It might be crazy but he knows I’ve not fulfilled it, and I swear he’s going to keep nagging me until I do what he asked.” Uncle David laughs, like a full hard laugh.

“Sounds like dad.” He tells Hayden to move out the way and sits next to me. “Son, the night you knocked on my door at three in the morning, I got my brother back. I looked into your eyes and all I saw was your dad’s face.” I look out the window at the darkness, it matches my soul, when you never see any light, you slowly become a man with no soul. They know nothing about what happened in The Pit, and I never wanted to relive that fucked up shit.

If you don’t know that hell, there is no need to learn about it. But Grandad always told me to have faith in the family, as they will always be there no matter what. So this is me testing that faith

“Grandad spoke about you every single day.” I turn to Uncle David. “He said out of you and dad you were the one he could always talk to. Dad was the fire, and you were a little calmer and could see things differently. He always hoped, even after everything, that there was still calmness there.” Uncle David laughs a little to himself. “If only he knew it made you like my dad.” I tell Uncle David, because he is now the fire, the one who won’t let anything bad happen to the family again.

“Well, he doesn’t need to know that,” he jokes, but I look over at Mason and Miles. They’ve never been to The Pit like Hayden has. I think that’s more because Hayden told them what went on whenever he came to The Pit. He never went too far in. I never allowed it, but even the gates are enough to make anyone feel the horror which lingers behind the gates of hell.

“It’s hard to talk about The Pit and the fucked up shit they did to us, but you should know what happened to him and me. All I’m asking is to give me time to work out what to tell you.” I turn to Uncle David and I can see the water building in his eyes. “Tonight, all I could hear was grandad’s voice in my head. Tell your Uncle I love him and he thought about you every night. And always have faith in the family.”

Uncle David nods his head a little repeatedly. I can see it. He’s holding it back, whatever it is. Pain, anger, love, heartache, he’s holding it back.

“Every night he would tell me a story about you and dad, but I want you to know something. Hayden came to see me the other day and asked me how old I was when I first killed someone. I don’t want you to think I didn’t protect grandad I did-”

“Cain, never once have I thought that. Never.” Uncle David cuts me off, because I can see how much even thinking that has annoyed him, but again we’ve never spoken about The Pit before.

“I was ten when I killed a man. It was him or grandad. And I killed a lot more after that to keep grandad alive, but one day-” I stop and shift on the couch, then get up. Fuck, I’ve never spoken about the day grandad died, tried everything to not even think about it again. Never works because the day comes back to haunt me. Reminding me, I let him down.

“Cain, you don’t have to.” I hear my uncle’s voice behind me, and I pick up the picture of dad, grandad and uncle David together. Looking happy, smiling, nothing can touch them.

“You need to know what happened. I know you need to know, but how do I tell you grandad died-” I place my palms into my eyes to ease the shooting pain which is beating through my head right now, and I can feel the burning hitting my eyes.

I knew talking about it was going to trigger something, thinking about it does, talking about it was only going to make it so much worse.

“Cain, no one blames you for grandad, not once have we thought you made it out and he didn’t. Never.” Mason’s voice is who I hear, and I look back out the window, trying to push the pain away.

“Cain, dad knew there was only one thing he needed to do. Protect his grandson, and he did that. All I care about is I have a part of my brother. He might not have made us his family yet, but I never stopped loving you.” Uncle David stands next to me, pats my back a few times. “You have a family here. We never left you.”

“I know Uncle David, I know.”

“You don’t have to tell me anything else if you don’t want to. If you do, I’ll always be ready to listen.” He smiles and all I can do is give him a nod, because I know whenever the conversation starts, it’s going to be hard. But the man deserves to know how his dad died, and how I revenged it too.

“Hayden should be getting the tattoo soon.” Uncle David turns around to look at Hayden, and I do the same.

He’s about to kill for the first time, and when that happens, you get the family tattoo. A scorpion. You normally get them on your hand, but I got mine on my arm by the wrist, so if anyone were to see it, they would never put two and two together.

Anything to protect my family from The Pit.

“You ready?” I ask him.

“Been looking into him. Want to follow him for a few days to make sure I have his day all planned out, then done.” Hayden gives me a nod. Once he’s done this one, I know he will be ready to start getting rid of people who get away with everything.

“Going to the club for a fight tomorrow. You want to come?” Mason asks. The club is Blake, Logan and Travis business, which I have to admit it’s a good business, but I know their grandads are the ones who started it up. They’ve just done a good job not running it into the ground.

“I’ll give it a miss. I have some other things to do.” I enjoy watching Mason fight. I taught him well. Always good to watch your students, and he’s one crazy fucker too.

“The Pit?” Miles asks.

“Sort of.” They’ve never asked to go down there. It’s a place I never want anyone to go. But if they asked, I’d take them so they can see for themselves what a fucked up place it is.

“How is Declan getting on?” Uncle David asks.

When I came out of The Pit and stayed here for a while, I told him I wanted no part of the business, but I’d teach his kids what they needed to be the cleaners, the hitman he needed them to be.

Hayden can kill a man from miles away. Mason is my crazy man with a baseball bat covered in barbed wire. That was his idea when we want information. He is the one to do it. Miles can hack into any software in the world, took me a while to teach him all that, but now the fucker can do it all. Then there is Declan. I have plans for him, just need to make sure Uncle David and Aunt Jane are on board for it.

“Good, needs to stop the fucking moaning,” I joke, which makes them all laugh. “He will be good once I’m finished with him.”

“I already know the answer, but you want to stay?” Uncle David asks, and he does already know the answer as he walks to the door with me. “Cain, I know it wasn’t easy for you to come here, but please know I’m always here when you want to talk. Not just about dad, but with what happened to you too.” He has told me a few times I need to talk to someone about what happened, because the silence will one day make me go crazy as it will eat me from the inside out.

“I know. It’s not that you’re not ready to hear it. I don’t think I’m ready to live through hell again.” Walking out to my car, I take a look around to see if I can see a lash of a camera or anything, but nothing. I normally have a feeling when I’m being watched. There is something which always hits me. Plus, Uncle David has this place on lock down.

The security is probably better than the white house.

“I…There might come a day The Pit might come for me, and I don’t think the day is very far-”

“Cain Crawford, when that day happens and you tell us, the six of us will stand together and fight, just like Crawfords do.” He pulls me in for a big bear hug, god the man is strong. “Have faith.” He smiles, and I get in my car and get back to the apartment, to watch the woman sleep peacefully, because I know I won’t be.