My Brother's Best Friend

Chapter 10

Being gentle, I bring the wet cloth to Hunter's lip. He winced in pain, flinching as I applied pressure.

  "How did this even happen?" I ask. I lean against the bathroom wall as Hunter sits on the toilet and brings his fingers up to his lip.

  "Leave it alone." I smack his hand away. Aside from the busted lip he also had dry blood above his eyebrow which I had to clean up too.

  "Jax has problems with some kids from East High." He says.

"What kind of problems?" I ask.

He sighs. "He owes this guy Ricky money and he hasn't paid him. We had stopped by Jax's house first before going to Rebecca's to check on his sister. We were heading back out when we saw Ricky's friends outside waiting for us. It was five against two so it wasn't exactly fair."

"Where's Jax now?" I say, trying to avoid sounding too worried about him.

"I dropped him off at Rebecca's. She's probably flipping out right now." He chuckles. "It's good though, we'll get them back."

"You're not getting anyone back, you got your ass beat enough. Wouldn't want a part two." I joke. I lean back down and carefully start wiping the dry blood off his eyebrow. "I could talk to Alex and see if he knows Ricky."

"No, you'll just make things worse." He says.

I stay quiet for a moment, thinking of what to say. "So, why does Jax owe this Ricky kid money?"

"They had a bet."

"What kind of bet?" I push, wanting to know the full story.

"Last month we went to a car meet and Ricky was there. Jax and him made a bet on a car and Jax lost." He winces as I put rubbing alcohol on the cut he had on his eyebrow.

"Sorry," I say. "How much did they bet?"

"A thousand." He said.

I backed away from him, shocked. "Why would he bet so much when he knows he doesn't have that kind of money lying around."

He shrugs. "He thought he would win."

"Why didn't you offer him the money?" I ask. "You know dad would give you it."

"I did offer it to him, he wouldn't take it." He gets up from the toilet and takes a look in the mirror. "He'll figure something out, he always does."

"Yeah, I guess." I say, watching him leave the bathroom, thanking me on his way out.

I couldn't help but feel pity for Jax. I knew he had problems with his family, mainly financially, so I understood why he would make the bet thinking he would win. Him losing only put his family in more problems.

He only had his sister Amanda and his mom. He's had to take care of them since he was sixteen. His father left them and got remarried to some other woman and now lives with her and her daughter Chloe.

I had to do something. I couldn't just let him get hurt over some stupid bet he made. Whether he wanted my help or not he was getting it.