Page 14 of Dark Promises

“Yeah, why not. You can’t stop him anyway.”

Before he hit the elevator, I heard Sidney tell the doorman. “Thanks a lot, Edgar. You really are doing your job whatever it is anyway. I thought they’d fired all the doormen in New York. I guess one slipped through the cracks and is here to give me hell.” Sidney was his usual insulting self. I was sure he’d save the rest for me.

We had different mothers, but the same father. And because we were his only children, we developed a loose bond. I’d see Sidney when I felt like it, and he’d see me when he needed to borrow money, or if our father had had enough of him and had thrown him out. I imagined the part about the money was true today. Our father had only died a year ago.

Before I could get my morning coffee, the doorbell rang. “Oh fuck. Couldn’t he have taken the stairs?” No one took the stairs anymore. You never knew who you’d meet, even in a building like this with men and women making seven figures a year. The people above me divorced, and they found the husband in the freezer a year later, and his wife had taken everything and showed up in Europe. I guessed it was too much being together during Covid that caused a lot of couples to go insane.

Maybe that could have happened to Cole and me. I’d never know.

I peeked through the peephole, rolled my eyes, and took a deep breath before I opened the door. “What now?” I murmured. Sidney held up two cups of expensive coffee, and I opened the door because I couldn’t resist the smell of White Chocolate Mocha. What an idiot I turned out to be, because I could be bought by a smile and a cup of six-dollar coffee. I knew that coffee would cost me thousands.

Opening the door, he staggered in. Looking at his clothes he’d been up all-night partying. “What’s up with you dude?” he said, before I jerked the coffee cup and took a sip, then I aimed my body in the direction of the kitchen. He followed me. This was going to be a fucking hard day with him around.

Chapter 9

Daniel

Sidney stood back andsaid, “Don’t I get a hug. You know I’m your only family now that Dad’s dead. Did he leave you anything like a 401 K?” Sidney strolled around looking and examining my things before sticking his hand in my empty bowl, then stood in front of the fruit bowl looking in it.

“What do you expect to find in my fruit bowl?” He reached for a banana and peeled it and took a seat across from me, but never drank his coffee. It must have been a ruse to get into my apartment, because he knew I had a weakness for a few things and they were coffee, Sam and Cole. Not in that order of course.

“Do you have toast and water to wash this banana down?”

“Sure. There’s everything you need for breakfast, but you’ll have to cook it yourself, because my cook quit—”

“And your maid I see.” He pointed to the dishes in the sink. Looking around he decided to walk to the fridge and retrieve a bottle of water. “Where’s that little terror, Sam? You finally got rid of him?” He smiled and I knew why. They had a hate relationship on both their parts. If Sidney came over Sam would steal his keys, or phone, and hide them.

“He’s having a sleep over at Ryan’s,” I added. Sidney started laughing.

“Doesn’t Ryan have cats?”

“I think so.”

“Did you warn him and his partner, because you never warned me, and my partner left me because of Sam.”

I slapped Sidney’s plate containing toast on the counter. “You know damn well Sam wasn’t the reason you and yours broke up. Everyone knows that story, and here you are trying to blame Sam.” I stared at him after drinking the coffee. “Now, tell me why you’re really here, and not to discuss Sam, or your relationship, such as it is.”

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