3. Brothers
THREE
CHARITY
“DANE!”
My fist beats slowly against the apartment door, the exhaustion of the last two days pouring through my voice as I call his name a third time. I should have stayed at Peaks for another drink.
Or for something else.
The door jerks open, and I nearly end up punching him in the eye with my raised fist. Dark hair drips soap and water onto bare shoulders, and he’s holding a towel around his waist with one balled fist. Dane’s mouth is set in a hard line, but the murderous look in his eyes switches quickly to one of confusion. “Charity?”
“Idiot,” I say the word like a greeting, shoving my way into his apartment. It’s small but surprisingly put together. Not only does he have furniture in the living room, but I can see a table with matching chairs on the other side of the kitchen.
It’s...nice. Since when does this little shithead have nice things?
“What the fuck are you doing here?”
“That’s a hell of a greeting for your big sister.”
“Yeah, well.” He closes the door hard enough his keys rattle on the hook above the light switch. He has a key holder? And he uses it? “I wasn’t expecting company. Clearly.”
Dane gestures to his half-showered body, and I give him an apologetic look. “Sorry.”
“Did someone die?”
“No. Why would you think that?”
“Maybe because it’s been like three years since the last time you came here, and it was only under threat of death by our mother.”
“That’s a bit dramatic.”
“Is it?” He raises dark brows at me, but I refuse to admit he’s right. “Can I at least wash the shampoo out of my hair before we get into whatever drama brought you here?”
“Who said anything about drama?” Dane gives me alook that tells me he sees right through my shit, and I wave him off, dropping onto the couch. Seriously, where did the little asshole get the money for a leather couch?
The answer becomes apparent when he stops to slide the gun I hadn’t noticed he was holding into a spot between the armrest and the end table. “You had time to grab a gun but not to put on pants?”
“I have my priorities, fuckface,” he snarks back, flipping me off before disappearing down the hall.
The shower turns on, and I slip my shoes off to curl my feet beneath my thighs. I need a nap. Maybe a few naps? A few naps, a good fuck, or a lobotomy. Anything to forget the last three days.
When I realized I had no choice but to leave New York City, I knew exactly where I was going. I left Forest Falls the day I got my acceptance letter to Paris College of Art, and I haven’t spoken of it a single time since.
Other than the time I told Stellan. We’d been dating for two years, and he insisted it was weird he didn’t know anything about my past, so I laid it all out for him. Then he ghosted me so hard I put out a missing person’s report and moved all his belongings into a storage unit in case he ever came back for them.
He didn’t, and I never told another person about Forest Falls.
“Why do you look so tired?”
“Because I am,” I crack open one eye to glare at a now dressed and drying version of my brother, though his hair is still a fucking mess. “Driving for twenty-eight hours will do that to you.”
“You drove here?” Dane’s eyebrows shoot toward his hairline, and I can see him trying to connect the dots. Eventually, he blows out a long breath, dropping over the couch arm without taking his eyes off me. Pulling his feet onto the cushion between us, he kicks my arm out of the way to wiggle his cold toes under my thigh. “What happened?”
“Nothing hap?—”
“Don’t,” he cuts me off, crossing both arms over his chest. “I know you, Cherry. Something ran you out of New York.”
My hand snaps out, slapping him on the temple. He doesn’t try to avoid the hit. I don’t know if he intentionally stayed still or if I should be concerned about his self-preservation instincts. “Don’t call me Cherry, shithead.”
“Still a freak about nicknames, then.”
“They’re stupid.”
“You’re stupid.”
“Says the mobster.”
“To the art major.”
That makes me snort against my better judgment, and Dane smiles triumphantly. I use the momentary break in his concentration to slap him again. “Fuck! That one hurt.”
“You deserve it.” He huffs dramatically at my words but doesn’t deny them. “How is the mobster-ing going, anyway? You’re being safe?”
“Yes, Mother,” he rolls his eyes dramatically, making me roll mine in return.
“Fuck off, you little shit. I just want to make sure everything is good with you.”
“Everything is good,” he admits with a shrug. “Now stop deflecting and tell me what happened.”
“You’re like a fucking dog with a bone.” Sighing, I sink further into the couch cushion as I try to put the right words together. “Eric and I broke up.”
Dane makes a face, but he smooths it over quickly. “Ah, shit. I’m sorry, sis.”
“I’m not.”
“You’re not?”
My eyes close as I try to fight the urge to cry from exhaustion, but it feels like a losing battle. I mean what I say: I’m not sorry we broke up. I’m only sorry I let him get so deeply entwined in my life before I knew his true colors. “It’s complicated.”
“Did that asshole hurt you?”
“No, he just,” I huff, rubbing a hand against my temple. “He freaked me out.”
I’ve never heard my brother sound as serious as he does when he asks, “How?”
“He started acting weird. At first, it was little things, like going through my phone while I was asleep and asking my friends to verify my time with them, but then he started following me. He tried to play it off like it was just a series of coincidences, but it was too often to be accidental. I quit answering his calls and even stopped inviting him over, but…” I take a breath, not wanting to think about the next part much less say it out loud. I go with the amended version; Dane doesn’t need to know the whole truth. “He broke into my apartment and refused to leave.”
“So, you ran.”
“I didn’t run, you ass.”
“You did. You always do. But at least this time, you ran straight into your baby brother’s arms.” Dane throws his arms wide, reaching for me with grabby hands that I have to slap away.
“No, shitstick, I ran straight to Peaks. You were an afterthought.”
Dane’s loud and bright laugh reminds me of the only other man I’ve spoken to today. “Why Peaks? You don’t even like sports.”
“I, uh,” clearing my throat, I try to shake the image of Theo leaning over me from my mind. “I needed a drink after the terrible drive.”
“What was that?”
“What?”
“You’re hiding something.”
My eyeballs couldn’t handle the level of eye roll that statement requires. “I am not.”
“You are!” Dane kicks one of the feet wedged beneath my thigh, nearly toppling me over the far side of the couch. “Who is he?”
“No one important.”
I want to take the words back the moment I’ve said them. Dane immediately sits up, a mischievous glint in his eyes. “So, it is a guy!”
“No! I just ran into someone I know—knew—a long time ago. It doesn’t matter.”
A dark smile spreads across Dane’s face, and I have to hold back an exasperated groan. “Ohmygod, you’re being so evasive right now! Do you have a crush on this mystery man?”
“You’re ruining my moment of personal growth, asshole. I finally came home! That’s a big deal.”
“Yeah, Mom is going to lose her shit, but I’m not Mom,” he waves a dismissive hand as if he’s physically swiping the conversation out of the air between us. “Tell me about the mystery guy.”
“There is no guy!”
“Oh, no. Is he ugly?” Dane sounds so sympathetic to my plight of crushing on an ugly man that I want to smother him with one of the decorative throw pillows.
“He is definitely not ugly.”
“I knew it!” His triumphant shout is accompanied by his hands shoving excitedly at my shoulder. “How hot is he? Like, wreck your life, hot? Or just come home twice a year for a fun time, hot?”
“What the hell is wrong with you?” I try to hold back the laugh bubbling up in my chest as I slap his hands away, leaning across the couch so he can’t reach me anymore. “I just spent twenty minutes telling you about how disastrous my last relationship was, and all you care about is some guy I ran into at Peaks?”
“Yes.”
“You’re an asshole.”
“If you don’t tell me, I’ll be forced to ask Theo.”
My heartbeat picks up at the name coming from my brother’s mouth. “Theo?”
“Grady, yeah. He was working at Peaks tonight. Some shit went down earlier, and he got called in to cover for Merrick. Which I only know because your baby brother got called in to cover for Theo.” He looks unusually proud of himself, but before I can come up with some half-assed congratulations, his phone lights up on the coffee table, an alarm blaring through the speakers. “And there’s my cue. I gotta get ready for work.”
“Now? It’s nighttime.” I point to the darkened patio doors as if he needed a visual reminder that the sun has gone down.
He laughs, using my head to help leverage himself off the couch. “Yeah, Theo’s on nights right now.”
“Mobsters have a night shift?”
Dane snorts, flipping me off. “Stop saying mobsters. It makes you sound so old.”
“I am old.”
“Thirty-five is not old,” he scoffs, stopping at the edge of the hallway. “Where are you staying tonight?”
“I figured I’d end up at Mom and Dad’s, eventually.”
Dane wrinkles his nose at the idea of staying with our parents and gestures toward the room at the end of the hall. “Stay here. The bed will be empty, and it isn’t safe to drive around at night.”
“It isn’t safe to drive around, yet you’re going out there towork.” I raise my brows as if to challenge him on the point, but he doesn’t take the bait.
“I’m prepared, remember?” He pulls the gun from its hiding spot on the end of the couch, waving it gently back and forth as if to emphasize his point. “Besides, I’m not alone. Mateo is head of Border Security now.”
“Our cousin, Mateo?”
“The very one.”
“That makes me feel a little better,” I begrudgingly admit. “At least he isn’t a little shithead like you.”
Dane snorts, shaking his head at me before heading to his bedroom to change. Ten minutes later, he’s stomping back through the living room, dressed head to toe in black. “Well, don’t you look like a textbook criminal?”
Dane flips me off behind his back as he grabs his wallet and keys at the kitchen counter. “Be good. Don’t leave the apartment. Lock the door behind me, and?—”
He stops mid-sentence, his eyes tracking something across the parking lot. Frowning, he moves to the sliding glass door for a better look. Whatever he sees seems to ease the tension out of his shoulders. “And help yourself to anything in the kitchen, though there isn’t much in there.”
“What did you see?” I try for casual, but can tell I’ve missed the mark based on the look Dane gives me.
“Tell me you’ll stay inside.”
“Yes, Mother.” I parrot his words from earlier back to him, matching his permanently sarcastic tone.
Dane smiles, flipping me off one more time before he steps out the front door. “Lock this.”
“Lock it yourself, asshole,” I shout after him as he pulls the door closed. I wait to hear him lock the door, but the sound doesn’t come. Sighing, I drag myself off the couch. I’m halfway across the room when headlights catch my eye through the glass doors. Turning, I see Dane’s car pull out of the parking lot, but that isn’t the only thing I see.
Well, fuck me.