Page 100 of Keep You Close

“Not everything is about you, Lea,” Fee shot back, lowering her eyes at her friend. “Savea, Katie, and Reagan are feeling a little left out, so they decided to drop by.”

Savea, or Savvy, was Kingston’s wife. Who, of course, I’d met in passing a few times. But I would be interested to know what kind of woman snagged a man like Kingston.

Katie was Rush’s woman.

And Reagan apparently had a thing for grumps because she was with Nixon.

“What about Dusty?” Autumn asked.

“Dusty?” I asked, that name not ringing a bell.

“Ryan Mallick’s wife,” Peyton explained. “It’s impossible to keep everyone straight right away. You’ll get there.”

“She said she was feeling a little anxious tonight, and just wanted to stay in. So, she will meet AJ at Sunday dinner,” Fiona said. “Now, AJ, we must know,” she said, abandoning her drinks to make her way over to me. “What weird shit does Atlas have hidden around this house?”

“Weird shit?” I repeated.

“You know boys. They keep weird shit stuffed in closets. It used to be porn, but that’s all digital now. I mean, unless he’s a paper purist. In which case, we will need to know what kind of porn mags he subscribes to. Leather stuff? Au naturale lady business?” she asked.

“Can we maybe not talk about what kind of porn my brother is into?” Scotti asked.

“I mean, porn was a long shot anyway,” Peyton agreed. “Is it superhero comics? Video games? Some old, ratty blanket from when he was a kid?”

“He… he really didn’t have anything in the house when I moved in,” I admitted. “There’s a locked room in the basement, though, that I never had access to.”

“Well, that sounds like a mission to me,” Fiona decided, jumping up. “Who has a bobby pin?”

“If anyone put the lock in, it was Kingston,” Lea reasoned. “I doubt a bobby pin would work.”

“Compressed air and a little hammer then,” Peyton said, going off in search of the items.

“Don’t worry. I’m reasonably sure the only thing in that room is all of Atlas’s gear and souvenirs from his travels,” Scotti said, moving in at my side. “And Atlas will know how the girls are when they get a bug up their ass about something. He knows you wouldn’t go breaking into his super secret storage space that he likely doesn’t really even know about, considering how little time he’s actually spent here.”

Right then, Peyton came running back with the can of air, and Fiona found a hammer, and we were all trekking down the narrow, steep basement steps in the dimly-lit basement where I had to venture to do laundry, a task that always filled me with dread and made me wish I’d never seen a horror movie before.

It was a heck of a lot less scary, though, when the space was full of carefree female voices as they charged toward the storage room, and got to work on the lock.

It really didn’t put up much of a fight, and the girls threw open the door, reached for the light string, and walked into the space.

“Well,” Fiona said. “That’s… disappointing,” she decided, looking around at the assortment of sports equipment—several snowboards, surfboards, skis—and a ton of winter coats, hats, gloves, boots.

The only other items in the room were boxes of little trinkets he’d picked up on his travels.

“I mean, the only real interests he’s ever had are sports,” Scotti reasoned. “So it makes sense.”

“I guess. Would it kill the man to have some manga porn or something I can use to tease him with, though?” Fiona asked, shaking her head as she ran her finger over a snowboard on her way back out of the room.

“You coming?” Scotti asked as I stood there for a second, looking at all the equipment that represented all of his travels. And, suddenly, a deep sort of sadness overcame me. “Hey, what’s wrong?” she asked, concern etching her pretty face.

“Look at everything he’s giving up for me,” I said.

“I don’t think that’s the right way to look at it,” Scotti said.

“What’s the right way?” I asked, my heart hurting at the idea of taking something away from him that he’d devoted his life to.

Like taking an animal out of the wild and sticking it in a cage.

“That he’s deciding to dedicate more of his life to a different kind of adventure. That’s what building a life with someone is, you know. Making a home, opening a business, getting married, having babies. Those are all adventures too.

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