Page 11 of The Winslow Brothers

Screw this. I’m done.

I turn to leave, shoving around Flynn’s stationary body, but I pull up short when a woman steps into my path, seemingly out of nowhere.

She has bright green eyes—so powerfully colored that they shine even in the dim room—and her dark hair is pulled back under a velvet hood. She looks relatively youthful, her skin unmarred and smooth, but I can tell she’s a lot older than she looks. Somehow.I just can’t put my finger on how.

“Hello, boys,” she says softly, gesturing forward with both hands. “Remington, Flynn, Ty, and Jude. I’m sorry I’ve kept you. I’m Cleo.”

“Where did you come from?” Flynn asks, his eyebrows drawn together in a way that says he’s just as spooked as I am by her sudden appearanceanduse of our names.

“It matters not where we’ve been, my dear, but only where we are going.” My skin tingles with uncertainty at her cryptic message. I don’t like the feel of this place at all, and as my body prepares to move, her eyes jump directly to me.

“That is why you’re here, is it not? To have your fortune told?”

My shoulders settle as she pulls her lips up into an impressively curved smile. She’s teasing me, I think.

And I really don’t know if I like it.

“Where’s the crystal ball? Isn’t there always a ball?” Ty asks, bouncing from the opening to the back room forward, bumping both Flynn and me out of the way.

“Still a little worked up over almost having to find a replacement for that testicle, huh, child?”

My eyebrows draw together, and Flynn’s head whips toward me as my mind races.How the fuck does she know about that? And our names?

And then it hits me.

We were just talking outside, in front of her shop. She probably has a million fucking cameras pointed out there, with audio, and that’s how she gets her ideas for what to say to people when they come in and pay her for a load of garbage.

“How many cameras do you have outside?” I ask, my tone unmistakably accusatory.

She smiles again, skirting past me toward the back room. “However many you need to believe I have, my dear.”

I roll my eyes. Fucking hell, this woman is full of shit, and apparently, she gets some kind of sick pleasure out of toying with people.

“Do you like robbing people of their money, Cleo?” I say, unable to bite my tongue any longer.

“Don’t mind him, Cleo. He’s in areallybad mood.”

I reach out and swipe at Jude’s head, and Cleo’s voice cracks out in a whiplike reprimand.

“Children, please. I know all about Remington and his moods.” She meets my eyes, hers narrowing with some weird form of allegation. “I knowallabout them.”

“What the hell is that supposed to mean?” I question, agitated. I don’t know who the fuck this lady thinks she is with all her tricks, but she doesn’t know a goddamn thing about me.

“Remy, relax,” Jude chastises. “This is supposed to be fun.” I almost growl at his devil-may-care face, but he turns back to the crazy woman and sits down in the chair in front of her table, gesturing for her to take the seat on the other side. “You can do me first, Miss Cleo.”

“Me too!” Ty volunteers excitedly, raising his hand.

Cleo tsks, sinking into the chair and holding up a flattened vertical hand to Ty. “One at a time, love. Your turn will come.”

Jude vibrates in the seat, his eyes bouncing from me to Ty to Flynn and back to Cleo again, he’s so excited. Cleo holds out a single hand, palm up, and Jude reaches out without hesitation to lay his against hers.

She clasps her fingers around his, closing the hand sandwich with her other one over the top, her eyes shutting tightly.

Her lips move almost as though she’s talking, but no sound comes out.

I give Flynn a look out of the side of my eye, and he actually has the audacity to crack a small grin.

When Cleo opens her eyes again, her mouth is curved into an exaggerated smile that feels almost inhuman.

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