Chapter 4
SABLE
"Someone is fucking with us," Leif said.
Woody muttered something in response.
I barely registered their words, spoken in voices that sounded hollow, like we were inside a tunnel.
The couch dipped as one of them sat down next to me. His thigh didn't quite touch mine.
I ventured a glance over. Leif.
Woody stalked back and forth in front of my window.
Forrest had gone to work at some point. I'd barely registered that too.
"Are you all right?" Leif asked.
When my eyebrow twitched, he made a face and sat back, like I might bite his head off. "Of course you're not all right. Sorry, that was a dumbass question."
I let out a long, slow breath. "It's okay. You're trying to be nice." What would be the point of snapping at him? It wouldn't help the situation. It wouldn't help Savannah.
"I don't know what to do," I added after a few moments of frustrated thought. "Or what to think. Why would anyone take her?"
He put an arm around me and pulled me to him. "I hate to admit this, but I don't know either. The whole thing is fucked up. Why would they get us to go all the way over there, then take her?"
I had no answer. None that made sense. I had questions, plenty of those. Only one mattered right now. "Do you think she's still alive?"
"Absolutely." He didn't even hesitate. "Whoever killed that man in the stairwell, they weren't messing around. If they wanted her dead, they would have done it. People like that? They have no shits to give. Trust me, I've seen it a million times before."
"Yeah, I guess they would have." I'd cling to that. What choice did I have? I'd rather accept logical reasoning, even as confronting as her being kidnapped, than admit the possibility she was gone.
"Is this because of me?" I whispered. "Did they do this because of me?"
Woody glanced over, but looked away without saying anything.
Yeah, I already knew where he stood. If he could blame me, he would. If I was guilty, all the better.
Leif glared at him. "This is not your fault. Whatever 'this' is, it's on the person who did it." In spite of his reassuring tone, he was troubled. His cheek twitched back, lips hard together.
"What is it?" I asked.
"I don't know," he rubbed his jaw. "Someone could be trying to use you to get to us."
"Who would do that? Who knows what you…get up to?
" Why not go after them directly, instead of playing games like this?
Not, I should add quickly, that I wanted anyone to go after them.
This mindfuck though? It was doing my head in.
Which was likely the entire plan, if this was a game.
We were mice trapped in a maze, wondering if there was any cheese to find.
"That's a good question," he admitted. "Theoretically, the four of us and Harlow St. James and her boyfriends."
"Do you think they would have…" I started, wincing at the idea.
"Not for a minute," he said. "None of them would do this." He was leaving something unsaid.
"Unless?" I asked.
He sighed through his nose and reluctantly said, "Unless they thought it was funny."
I leaned back a little. "Is that likely?" If this whole thing was a prank, it was sick as fuck.
"I don't think so, but I've been wrong about people before, once or twice." Leif didn't seem happy to admit that. If course not, we all liked to be a good judge of character, didn't we?
"Who the fuck knows what they might do?" Woody stopped pacing to speak bluntly. "Believe it or not, fucked up people do fucked up things."
"I'm not seeing it." Leif chewed on his thumbnail. "They might try to prank us, but they wouldn't take Savannah." He gave Woody a 'come on bro, you don't really buy that, do you?' look.
Woody leaned the side of his head against the window. "Yeah, okay. I don't see it either. Also, if they did any of this, I'm kicking all of their asses into the year 2126."
"Get in line," I told him. I wanted to hurt whoever was messing with us. I wanted them to suffer like I was. Worse.
Would I kill them? I might. Could I? I didn't know.
"We'll find her," Leif said. "We have resources. We have people keeping their ear to the ground. She'll be fine."
"Don't make promises you can't keep," Woody warned.
"I wouldn't dare," Leif said without taking his eyes off me. "Nothing is scarier than an angry woman."
Woody snorted.
"He's never met my mother," Leif said to me. "Only a badass could raise me and my brother. Just between us, I bet Woody's mother was a badass too."
It occurred to me I didn't know anything about Woody's mother. Was she alive? Wolfgang was married twice before me. One ended in divorce. I didn't know about the other one. Honestly, I didn't ask too many questions. He wouldn't have given me the answers. Nor did I care until now.
"My mother was the best," Woody said, glancing down at the floor. "My sister too. Half-sister.”
"Was?" I asked as gently as I could.
"My sister went missing a few years ago. No one knows what happened to her. Except whoever made her go missing. My mother died without knowing what happened to her."
"I'm sorry," I said sincerely.
That was a terrible thing to happen. He'd dispute it, but he was clearly still cut up about it. Of course he was. If someone I loved went missing, and I never knew why, it would eat me alive.
What if I never knew what happened to Savannah? What if she was just…gone?
"Do you think she's…" I asked tentatively.
"Alive?" Woody asked. "Sometimes I think she is.
She might walk through the door any minute now.
She got stuck on some deserted island where the phone didn't work.
She just got rescued, and now she's home.
But then I realize how fucking stupid that sounds.
If she was alive, she would have contacted me. "
A flash of pain crossed his features before he turned away, looking out the window.
"That's so sad," I whispered.
"It explains a few things," Leif said, also keeping his voice low. "If that happened to me, I'd be a grumpy asshole too."
If Woody heard, he gave no indication. He went on looking out toward the street as rain started to splash against the window.
Without thinking, I pushed myself to my feet and made my way over to him. Placing my hands on his shoulders, I pressed my cheek against the center of his back between his shoulder blades.
"I'm sorry that happened to you."
"Don't feel sorry for me," he said gruffly.
"I wouldn't dare," I lied.
Of course I felt sorry for him, and for his mother and sister. Chances were, Wolfgang was the reason she disappeared. If he was, that was a secret he took to his grave.
For a brief moment, I almost regretted that he was dead, if only because he might have been able to give Woody some answers. Would he have, though? I had a feeling Woody had the skills to force the words out of him, if he didn't care about his son enough to volunteer the information.
"Yes, you would," Woody said. "Being nice only gets you hurt, you know."
"Maybe," I said. "But it also gets you friends. People who care about you."
"What if I don't need people caring about me?" he asked.
"I don't believe that," I said. "Everyone needs people. Friends, family. The three of you, you're like brothers to each other."
"Does that make you my sister?" His body rumbled with a bitter laugh.
"Definitely not," I said. "I used to be your stepmother, but I'm not your mother either."
He glanced at me over his shoulder. "Shame. I'm a motherfucker, after all."
I snort-laughed. "Yes you are. But you're our motherfucker."
"Is it fucked up to want to fuck your former stepmother?" he asked.
"Depends. Is it fucked up to want to fuck your former stepson?" Especially when he tried to kill me a couple of times. That put a big question mark around the whole relationship. Was this a relationship? Right now the words 'dysfunctional family' came to mind.
Lines around his eyes crinkled. "Definitely."
"We can all be fucked up together," Leif said cheerfully.
"See, you do need people," I said. "What would you be doing right now if you weren't here with us?”
"Sleeping," Woody said. "You're all bad for my routine."
"You don't have a routine," Leif told him.
"Of course I have a routine," Woody snapped. "Everyone has routines. Even people who spend all day looking at paint colors and furniture."
"Paint colors and furniture are life," Leif told him. "Who doesn't like a nice paint color? Or a comfortable couch?" He patted the one he was sitting on.
"Don't listen to him." He stood and stepped over to me. "His apartment is as nicely decorated as Forrest's is. As nice as yours will be when we get done with it." He gestured around us.
"Only because you insisted," Woody said darkly. "He practically forced me to change the place. He waited until I was at work."
"I didn't hear you complaining," Leif said.
"You didn't hear me because you weren't there. You had other people do your dirty work for you, because you knew it'd piss me off."
"I also haven't seen you take any of it out, or repaint the place," Leif pointed out.
For a moment, Woody didn't respond. When he did, he muttered, "I have better things to do."
Leif chuckled. "He secretly loves it. He doesn't want to admit it."
"Did you really do that?" I asked. "Make him redecorate?"
"Absolutely, I did," Leif was unapologetic. "You should have seen the place before that.
"Let me guess, it was as run down as his grandparents' house?" I asked. The one he burned down. The one he'd set fire to with me in it.
"That place was a dump," Woody said.
"Exactly," Leif agreed. "And now Woody lives somewhere nice, whether he deserves it or not."
"I deserve it," Woody said. "For putting up with you."
"What does Leif deserve for putting up with you?" I teased lightly.
"A fucking medal," Woody said.
"Hell yeah I do." Leif punch the air. "I'm still waiting for you to deliver on that. I'll also accept a trophy."
"You don't have enough participation trophies from when you were a kid?" Woody asked.
"I have plenty, but there's always room for more in the trophy cabinet.” Leif grinned.
I found myself smiling at them as they bantered back and forth. They really were like brothers. They argued, but they still cared about each other. Just like me and Savannah.
Despair sank back into my heart. I wanted to kick myself for leaving her alone to open the door to the roof.
She’d been worried when I headed up there alone, but I insisted I'd be okay.
Forrest wouldn't have called me if he thought there was a risk.
I trusted him. She had no choice but to let me leave.
Had she locked the door behind me? I thought back, but I couldn't remember hearing a click. No slide of the bolt or chain.
She trusted it was all right because Forrest believed it was.
And now? I was safe and she wasn't. She could be anywhere right now, and here we were, talking about trophies.
"Hey." Leif wound his arms around me and pressed his face into the side of my neck. "She'll be okay. What we all need to do right now is get some rest."
"I don't think I can sleep," I said.
"Lie down and try?" he insisted. "If Forrest gets back here this afternoon and finds out you haven't rested, he's going to tear off my balls and Woody's, and stuff them down each other's throats."
"That's exactly what he'll do," Woody said. "I don't want to suck Leif's balls." He stuck his tongue out the side of his mouth in disgust.
"Back at you, bro," Leif said cheerfully. "I don't want to suck my own, either. In the interests of us not choking on our own testicles, will you please lie down and try to get some sleep?"
"For the sake of your balls, I could try," I conceded, although he might be exaggerating a little bit.
"For the sake of my balls too?" Woody asked.
"I don't know if I'd go that far," I teased.
I flashed him a faint smile before I toed off my sneakers and headed towards my bedroom. "You should get some rest too," I said over my shoulder.
"I was planning on it." Leif was right behind me.
"Couch doesn't look comfortable," Woody said, following us into my bedroom.
Fortunately, my bed was big enough for all of us, then some. If Forrest was here, he'd also fit. Ironic since I slept in one small section right to the left, leaving the rest of the covers untouched.
This time though, I lowered myself to my knees on the edge of the bed and crawled over to plop down in the middle. Leif lay on one side and Woody on the other.
"This is cozy," Leif said, curling up with his chest to my back. One arm draped over me.
"Yeah, it is," I agreed. I nestled into him, drawing comfort from his warm, firm body.
Woody left a couple of inches between us, but I drew comfort from him as well, even when he started to snore.
"I wish I could fall asleep that fast," I whispered.
"Tell me about it," Leif agreed. He sounded sleepy already, though.
I was tired, but my mind was turning in a million circles. How could I sleep when Savannah was out there somewhere? Scared. Alone. Not knowing what might happen to her and having no idea why.
When we found who did this to her, I might be the one ripping off balls and shoving them down people's throats.