Page 44 of For Fox Sake

She puts one hand on her hip. “Is this like, a date?”

If Ryan hasn’t told her, I’m not going to be the one to do so. “Why are you asking?”

Her brows lift and then she straightens, stretching her five-foot-nothing height as tall as it will go. “Ryan has been my best friend since before puberty. If you string her along or hurt her, I know twenty-five ways to kill a man and I have a four-body trunk.”

I frown. “Do you need a four-body trunk to murder just little ol’ me?”

She shoves me in the shoulder. “I mean it, Donuts.”

I lift my hands. “Listen, Bernie. I like Ryan. And Ari. I would never do anything to hurt either of them.”

Guilt pushes at me. Am I already hurting them? Or about to, once I come clean?

I’ve had dinner with her and Ari every night since the sink incident earlier this week.

Last night, I treated them both to pizza after running into them here at the hospital when they came to visit Ryan’s mom. We ate, played games, and watched more of The 10th Kingdom. We’re only a couple episodes in, and Ari is as obsessed as my sisters and I were when we were kids.

Every night, I fully intend to come clean about the real reason I’m here in Dull. Lay everything all out there. But every night I can’t. The words stick in the back of my throat. So, it’s still there, sitting between us like a giant immovable rock, growing in size, and I am the only one aware of it.

I haven’t been staying to hang out with Ryan after Ari goes to bed. It’s not just because of my avoidance to telling the truth. Ryan is clearly exhausted from running herself ragged day in and day out. It would be cruel to impose myself on the only time she has to herself to relax. I can’t kiss her again without telling her everything. And I can’t be alone around her without wanting to kiss her.

The need is a drumbeat in my veins.

I’m making excuses to avoid dealing with consequences.

Because consequences suck. But I can’t keep it a secret much longer. There will be no perfect time. Logically, I know all this, and yet when I’m hanging out with my girls it’s... that’s just it. They feel like “my girls” and I have no right to it. And as soon as I tell her the truth, it will be over.

“I’m glad you’re taking her out. She deserves a nice dinner.” Bernie’s voice snaps me back to the conversation. “It’s been a rough week. You know her mom is deteriorating pretty quickly.”

“I know.”

A nurse calls her name down the hall, and she has to run to check on a computer issue, waving at me over her shoulder as she strides away.

I blow out a breath and then open Elaine’s door.

I grab an HR form from the wall randomly, just in case someone walks in and asks questions, then I carefully open the drawer and grab the keyring.

Elaine only goes out for lunch once a week. The last time I attempted to get into the locked scanning room with all the files, I ran into Ryan. This time, I have to get it done. I may not have another week before my family descends and forces me back home. Honestly, I’m surprised someone hasn’t shown up on my doorstep already. I slip the keys in my pocket and then check my watch. I have about twenty minutes until Elaine gets back.

My hands are shaking. I barely register the ding of the elevator when I reach the bottom floor.

Glancing around, I move as fast as my shaking hands allow, sticking in one key after another until finally I reach one that works.

Eureka!

Elation bursts through me but there’s no time to celebrate.

I shut and lock the door behind me, then flick on the lights. On the table at the back of the room sit two dark computer monitors with a scanner in between them. Lining the walls to the left are beige file cabinets, each about five feet tall. I stride over, singing the alphabet song in my head as I scan the labels. There. GRE-GRO.

Sliding it open, I flip through the files until I find it.

Green, Mia

My stomach flips, heart accelerating.

Guilt whispers through my gut. I shouldn’t be doing this. But I have to do this. I might not even find anything useful, but I have to check for... something that connects Mia to Dad. Anything.

I open the file, skimming through the details, flipping through the pages. Basic biographical information. A record of the congenital heart defect, tricuspid atresia. Fontan procedure given at six to divert the flow of blood around the right ventricle. More follow-ups and hospital visits, and records transferred from Ithaca...

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