Chapter 10 #3
I still haven’t caught my breath, but I go after them and catch up just in time to see Lex fly over the coffee table and tackle Hawk to the couch.
I don’t stop to count how many people are in the family room, watching it all unfold.
Instead, I make my way through the bodies to try to help get those pictures back.
It’s not that I’m ashamed, oh no, and I doubt Lex is either, but it’s no one’s business, dammit.
“Give it back,” Lex demands, trying to wrestle the phone out of Hawk’s hand.
“Never!” Hawk cries out triumphantly
Lex sneaks a hand under Hawk and starts tickling him, I guess, because the next second an ungodly screech escapes the singer’s mouth.
“Abuse! This is family abuse, or, or, child abuse,” he keeps shouting and everyone just watches with amused smiles.
“You’re old as fuck, you little shit. Practically forty,” Lex grumbles while still trying to snatch the phone away.
Hawk goes rigid and turns to glare at Lex.
“You take that back,” he demands imperiously
“No. You really are like fifteen years older than me. I’m just speaking facts here,” Lex says, finally amused too. But he’s still battling for the phone until Vinny, on Hawk’s other side, grabs it without a problem and then . . . looks at the picture.
“Fucking finally,” he shouts, now as animated as Hawk was, and goes to show Si and Lottie.
Lex deflates on top of Hawk and groans, burying his face against his cousin’s shoulders. I’m frozen just a foot away from the couch, my lungs not working, and blood rushing fast to my face—the blush wasn’t needed apparently.
Hawk, with his patented little-shit smile still firmly in place, pats Lex’s head before turning to look at his husband. Derek’s standing with Dad on the other side of the room, looking impassively at the show.
“What the hell, Dee? You didn’t think to save me from the giant tackling me? I thought you loved me.” The whine is really undignified, but I think it’s appropriate. He should be mocked.
“I don’t know how you expect me to save you from a six-five, two-hundred-and-fifty-pound hockey player. You’re the one who pissed him off,” Derek drawls lazily.
“Besides,” Wolf adds. “You earned it. I think it was very entertaining.”
“All right, enough,” Lyla demands and snatches the phone out of Hulk’s hands, sending him a glare that makes him shrug and wince with guilt written all over him. Lex’s dad was really interested in the picture.
“I do wonder what he won,” he says, trying to divert his ex-wife’s attention.
She ignores him and walks over to hand me the phone . . . it’s still unlocked
“Eli, do what you must with this unlocked phone.” She stresses the word, then sends Hawk a telling look with her eyebrow raised.
Hawk protests immediately.
“Nononono, wait, Eli.” I spin on my heel, already bolting to take it up to my office. “Eli! You like me, don’t you?”
I know I don’t have long, so I put all my energy into taking the steps up two at a time. I can hear thundering steps behind me, but I make it with enough time to close and lock the door behind me.
There are three hard pounds against the door just a second after. I breathe out hard, and finally look at the screen.
I don’t go snooping in his chat with Derek because I don’t want to need my eyes bleached. Instead, I go right to the gold mine—his chat with Wolf.
Since the pounding on the door is only getting louder and faster, I know I don’t have much time before Hawk forces Derek to break the door down—that would be a disaster for my security system—so I hurry to connect the phone to my computer and download the whole text history between the brothers.
I thank my custom PC for being the best thing I’ve ever owned when it takes less than thirty seconds to download probably decades of texts, and now I have infinite bribing material.
I also download the two pictures he took of us—and keep them in a locked folder for reasons—before deleting them completely off his phone.
After shutting everything down, I yank the door open, and Hawk stumbles in, clearly caught off guard and with ridiculous fear written all over his face.
I hold the phone out to him and instead of snatching it back, he looks down at it warily.
“It’s not going to explode in your hand,” I tell him, and roll my eyes at him. “But if you ever piss me off, you better believe I’m gonna share some interesting screenshots.”
Just like I suspected, Derek is right behind Hawk, and he’s the one whose face loses all its color, interestingly enough. Hawk makes a sound that suggests he’s choking on air, and I give him a little reprieve.
“I have your complete chat with your brother saved on my computer. I didn’t want my young mind traumatized by whatever you two get up to.
” I wag a finger at them, then push them gently to let me pass and walk back down.
“Now, come on, I’m hungry. And remember .
. .” I pause just for dramatic effect and look back at them. “It’s in your best interest to behave.”
As I walk down, I snicker at Hawk’s words.
“I can’t believe Aunt Lyla betrayed me like that.”
“You’re gonna have to get in line now,” Derek grumbles, and I can’t help but wonder what the hell I’m going to find in that chat history.