Page 7 of How I Love You

He was observant. I’d give him that. He knew we were trying to find a way to talk about this without him around, and I had to hand it to him for tossing up the perfect plan to make that happen.

Colt tilted his head. "Not a bad idea."

"Sounds good,” I said, wincing as I turned toward the door. “Though, we'll need to eat at the counter so I can stand."

An hour later, Colton and I had compared notes about what we knew so far, and Austin had played about a million bucks worth of Pacman and pinball. Thank goodness for the classic pizzeria with its old-school games.

Now, Colt and Austin were in the grassy town square, throwing a football back and forth. Colt insisted on traveling with one because he did his best thinking while tossing it around, and I watched as his former quarterback muscle memory allowed him to deliver tight spirals to my brother as naturally as breathing.

But we couldn’t all stand around and play games in the nippy fall air. I had to call the only person in the world who would be just as upset about Austin being here as I was: our mom.

"He's with me," I said, not even letting her get the full question out.

Austin had told me over pizza how he'd managed to track us down and the escape plan he'd executed that'd likely given our mom a heart attack. She'd called me several times since she'd discovered him missing, but every time I tried to call her back,she hadn't answered. The woman was forever leaving her phone in every room she went into—on silent, of course—and then couldn't find it.

I listened as she went on and on about how that boy was a hundred times worse than I was when I was his age, which was over twenty years ago at this point. Mom had been young when she'd had me with her first husband, and then when she’d had Austin, she was old enough to be called "geriatric” by her doctors. That hadn’t sat well with her, yet she acted like she was an elderly woman when it came to her ability to handle him.

"What are you gonna do?" She asked. "You can't send him back the way he came. It's bad enough he took a Greyhound across the country the first time. You can't just stick him back on one to come home."

"I would never do that," I said, pinching the bridge of my nose.

"Are you gonna stop working and drive him back, then?"

"I can't do that either."

She scoffed."Okay, so what's your plan?"

"You could fly out and get him, then fly back with him."

I knew she wouldn't, but I had to try.

"Tucker."

I sighed. "I'll just keep him with me."

"While you work a case?"

"It doesn't sound like I have an option, Mom."

She hummed, and then I could practically hear her nodding as the wheels turned in her head. I could picture her wearing a hole in the floor of the house she rarely left, biting her nails. "If you're sure you can't stop working the case, that's what'll have to happen, I guess. Will he be safe?"

I bit back a dry laugh. She didn't know I'd been shot—and I didn't plan on telling her. You'd think that would give me pauseabout whether or not my brother would be safe, but it didn't. I'd die before I let anything happen to him.

"He'll be safe," I promised.

"Okay. Well, thank you for being you, Tuck. I love you, baby."

"Love you too, Mom. We'll keep you updated, okay?"

She agreed, and then, as I tucked the phone back into my pocket, the hairs on the back of my neck stood up.

Someone was watching me.

I turned, half-expecting to come face-to-face with my shooter. Like I’d somehow know him when I saw him, or maybe he’d have the gun cocked and ready for round two.

But, no. It wasn’t my shooter. It was worse.

Dakota—walking right toward me, her smile as bright as the sun.

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