13 Brandon
Brandon
Brandon knew Ollie was a dog walker for the wealthy, but this place is a lot richer than he imagined.
It feels like a museum, the spotless white walls, the high windows, the track lighting spotlighting various key elements of the house: a pale modernist painting, an old-looking vase, a very high-tech air fryer.
Pete is chewing on some blue toy in a dog bed big enough for a dozen more dogs on one side of the living room.
Ollie is hugging both Brandon and Ian as they stand paralyzed in the entryway.
“I’m afraid if I move, I’ll get my poor all over this place,” Ian says, voice wheezing from how tight Ollie is squeezing them.
Ollie laughs. “It’s fine, come on, come on, just leave your bags there. I want to show you something.”
“Why does he seem so happy?” Ian whispers to Brandon as they follow Ollie up the stairs.
Brandon shrugs. He doesn’t know. He barely understands how he feels right now.
He’s worried for Jon but also scared for himself and his friends, guilty over what he’s gotten them into but also eager to actually make sure they don’t abandon Jon in case he’s the love of Brandon’s life.
Every choice seems like a bad choice. Or at least a dangerous one.
And Brandon suspects they are not a group well equipped for danger.
“Look,” Ollie says, opening the door to a room with a large bed and a larger corkboard covered in Post-its, photos, and red string.
“Uh-oh,” Brandon says under his breath.
Ian snickers. “Why is Lady Bunny up there?”
“To represent Jon,” Brandon says, understanding immediately.
He walks closer to the board, studying it.
Not much yet. A timeline, from Jon checking in, to the emoji-tattoo guy in Ian’s section at brunch this morning.
Emoji tattoo—helpfully identified by a printout of the heart-eyed emoji—is linked to three of them now, at three times.
This, Brandon has to admit, isn’t bad work.
It’s just scary, seeing it all laid out like this and still having no idea what any of it means.
“I should never have hooked up with a guest,” he says, feeling tears coming on. He turns away, sniffing them back.
“Hey,” Ian says, rubbing his back. “Yes, it was stupid. So, so stupid. But no one could have seen this coming.”
The tears are streaming now. Brandon wipes his eyes with his wrist. Ollie grabs a box of tissues and hands them to him. Brandon takes one and loudly blows his nose. It’s the softest tissue he’s ever felt—better than most cloth napkins. “And I shouldn’t have taken his phone.”
“Again, I agree,” Ian says. “Completely insane stalker-level stuff that would probably get you arrested. But not”—they gesture at the corkboard—“this kind of insane. This isn’t on you.”
Brandon sniffs again and looks up at Ian.
Reliable Ian, looking unimpressed as always.
It’s reassuring. And Ollie, excited but in a way that reminds Brandon of college, of Ollie and his lists, leading the charge to get something done.
“I’m sorry,” he says to both of them. “I’m so sorry we’re all mixed up in this. ”
“Are you kidding?” Ollie says, taking Brandon’s arm and squeezing. “This is the most exciting thing to happen to us in ages.”
“Yeah, love to be worried I’m going to die. So fun,” Ian deadpans. They cross their arms. “How high are you?”
“Just a little,” Ollie says as Brandon walks toward the corkboard, staring at it. “This girl I met, Safiya, she gave me one she liked, and since I’m seeing her tomorrow, I wanted to make sure I tried it before—”
“I just want to make sure Jon is safe,” Brandon interrupts, eyes still on the terrifying corkboard. “I don’t care about all…this.” He gestures at the web of red string.
“And I just want to make sure we’re safe.” Ian crosses their arms.
“Solving the case will do both those things,” Ollie says.
Brandon looks at Ian. They stare back, silent words passing between them: Solving the case sounds like it’ll put everyone in more danger.
There’s a low chime that takes Brandon a moment to recognize as a doorbell.
“That must be Nicole!” Ollie says, heading back downstairs.
Brandon feels a wave of relief as he and Ian follow, like a slight lightness in his chest. Nicole will fix it. Nicole is a lawyer. She knows how to take care of messes like this. It’s her job.
“I have no idea what’s going on,” Nicole says as Ollie opens the door for her, her body wound tighter than it got before the LSATs, like her shoulders are trying to become earrings. She pauses, taking in the house. “Jesus, Ollie, what is this place?”
“The Strongs’ house,” Ollie says. “And Pete’s.”
“Maybe I went into the wrong line of work,” Nicole says, looking around. “Should be a house sitter.”
“Did the person at work have any information?” Brandon asks, trying to move into Nicole’s roving gaze. They need to get back on track, or they’ll spend hours on this house.
“Not yet,” Nicole says, eyes focusing back on him. “I texted her about the tattoo though, right after we got off the phone. Something memorable like that might help us figure out who he is and who he works for.”
“We don’t even know what he’s doing,” Brandon says. He wants to collapse, but he sees no chairs. There’s the entry foyer with the dog bed and stairs, a giant kitchen to the left, and wide-open darkness to the right. “Is there somewhere to sit?”
“Oh, yes, let me show you your rooms,” Ollie says, flipping a switch and lighting up the other side of the room, which is also white, with a giant fuzzy rug, and several leather seats around a glass table.
The glass in the tall windows goes from blackout to clear, letting in some light from outside, too.
Bookshelves are on one side of the room, filled with books that are all clothbound in black and white, with several glass pieces of art spread among them.
“We’re sleeping here?” Ian asks.
“Don’t be silly,” Ollie says, walking through the living room and pressing on a wall Brandon assumed was just an architectural feature.
But no, it slides away, and there’s another white room, this one with one of those wall-mounted TVs that look like framed art, a large wraparound white leather sofa, and a white marble coffee table about the size of his and Ian’s apartment.
“This sofa pulls out into a bed. So one of you can sleep here.”
Brandon wants to collapse, but the leather on the sofa looks pulled as tight as a facelift. He stares at it warily.
“And the other bedroom is the master. They told me not to use it, but we’ll just clean up before they get back.”
“When do they get back?” Nicole asks. “How long is this viable?”
“Three weeks,” Ollie says. “Two and a half now.”
“Oh great,” Ian says. “Plenty of time to get murdered. At least the bloodstains will be impossible to get out of all this white.”
Brandon laughs but feels tears coming on again.
This is all his fault. And he still doesn’t know what’s happening with Jon.
He gives in and flops onto the sofa. It holds firm for a moment, then relaxes slightly, the leather so much softer than it has any right to be.
He grabs one of the throw pillows—not white, but the palest blue—and hugs it to his chest.
“I guess that means you’re taking the master,” Ollie says to Ian.
Ian rolls their eyes. “At least I’ll die in luxury.”
Nicole’s phone beeps, and she looks at it.
“Something from the lawyer?” Brandon asks, hopeful that somehow this has all been fixed.
“Not the Mafia,” Nicole reads. She looks up at them. “So that’s something, I guess. But that reminds me, we all need to download this app to text on. Show me your phones.”
Brandon takes his phone out, and so do Ollie and Ian, and Nicole has them download a texting app.
“It’s double encrypted, and no one has access to the messages but us, so it’s a lot safer to text there.”
“And it has GIFs!” Ollie says, texting them all an image of a cartoon hippo waving and saying hello friends!
Brandon hearts it, the emoji popping up on the side.
“We should break into Jon’s phone,” Ollie says. “If we want to know who that guy is, there’ll be more clues in there.”
“How?” Nicole asks, shaking her head. “I mean, it’s not legal, so we shouldn’t, but we’ve certainly already broken enough laws.” Her head is tilted down, almost like she’s talking to herself. “So I’m not against it.” She looks back up. “You know a hacker?”
“I brought my laptop, and…I might know how to get in.” Ian won’t meet her eye. “Could take me a while though.”
“How do you know how to hack a phone?” Nicole asks, raising an eyebrow.
Ian shrugs. “Seemed like something worth knowing after…” Their eyes drift to the ground.
“Oh,” Nicole says, voice a little soft. “That’s… Obviously cheating is bad, but I feel like hacking a partner’s phone is probably—” She cuts herself off with a shake of her head. “Know what? We’re past that. It’s useful. Brandon, give them the phone so they can hack it.”
Brandon reaches into his pocket. He doesn’t want to give it up. This is his one connection to Jon now. And yes, Jon led him and all his friends into whatever they’re into now, but he was still so handsome, and sweet, and maybe Brandon’s soulmate. It really felt like they could be—
“Brandon,” Nicole repeats, hand out for the phone. He sighs and gives it to her, and she hands it to Ian. “Get to work, hacker.”
“Work.” Brandon feels the word hit him like a live wire. “I have work tonight. Do I go? Not go?”
“Go,” Nicole says confidently. “We should act normal.”
“What if the emoji-tattoo guy comes by?”
“Treat him like you would any other guest.”
“What if he asks for the phone?”
“Tell him you don’t know what he means, no phone was left behind.”
“What if he asks why I was near a shooting?”
“Tell him you have no idea what he’s talking about, and text me. If he gets violent, call the cops. If you feel afraid walking home alone, text us; someone will come get you. But the important thing is to act innocent.”