Page 23 of Grit & Glamour

Chapter Twelve

Taking a sip of my strawberry milkshake, I look across the table at Theo as he devours his food. As I watch him eat three times as much as I’d ordered, I have to wonder where he puts it all. It just seems to magically vanish after passing through his mouth.

“Are you going to eat those?” he asks, already pulling the rest of my chicken nuggets towards himself. I’d eaten half of them, but my appetite isn’t doing so great while I’m worrying about how I’m going to find my brother.

“Help yourself,” I offer, after he already has the first in his mouth. He grins. “What are we going to do now?” I ask.

“Save some of those nuggets,” Three—no—Two says as he sits down next to Theo. I feel someone sit down next to me as I stare across at two in bewilderment.

“Hey, One and Two. How’ve you been?” I greet sarcastically, sure it’s their green-eyed leader sitting beside me without the need to look.

“Enjoying a nice romantic dinner?” One questions back in a similar tone.

“It’s delicious,” I comment, before taking another sip of my milkshake. I’d been pleased and surprised that the milkshake machine was working when I wanted one for a change. I don’t come in here much, but whenever I do, the machine never works. I’d convinced Theo we should come here because this is where nobody would think to look for us. Little did he know, he was totally tricked into coming here and buying me a milkshake. Thanks to not having access to any of my money right now, I’d actually needed him to for once.

“Why did you drive off?” Two asks me, before stealing another chicken nugget. Theo bats his hand away when he immediately tries for a third, drawing the line.

“There were gunshots,” I answer. Surely that’s explanation enough?

“Yeah, what the fuck was that?” One asks Theo, his left eyebrow raised.

“A problem for another time, and not one for you,” Theo answers.

“Fair enough,” I’m surprised to hear One respond. Why does Theo get such an easier job of communicating with him than I do?

“Is my brother okay?” I demand. “Can I speak to him?”

“He’s fine, and you can see him later,” Two answers with a small smile.

“How did you find me?” I ask, curious to know how they caught up to me so fast. If I made a mistake, I need to know so that I don’t make it again when I leave with Caleb.

“Tracker in your shoe. We had to lose them first before finding you, but then it was just a simple case of following a map to you,” Two answers again, staring at me intently. I’m surprised he isn’t looking over at One constantly for approval of everything he says.

“You put a tracker in my shoe?” My eyes widen in surprise.

“Just a little one.” Two shrugs.

“I’m guessing you two haven’t been in here eating the whole time, so where have you been?” One asks. I feel heat creeping into my cheeks, and I hope to hell nobody notices.

“We stopped by one of my mother’s businesses. I wanted to check it out, see if I could find anything that would prove one of us wrong—

“—Are you fucking serious?” One cuts me off before I can continue.

“Well, yeah. We—

“—I don’t care what you thought you were doing. You could have been caught. How can you be this stupid and still be alive?” he demands, as if the possibility of someone like me making it in the world really is that baffling.

“Aw, and I thought you didn’t care,” I reply mockingly, rolling my eyes. Asshole.

“I don’t,” he answers bluntly. “But you’ve seen my face. You’ve seen the Two and Three. You getting yourself caught puts us at risk, too. I won’t allow that.”

“Is that a threat?” My fists clench underneath the table on reflex.

“It is what it is, and you won’t do it again.”

“Whatever.”

“Did you find anything?” Two asks, drawing my attention back to him.

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