Page 155 of The Billion Heirs Boxed Set
I kiss the top of her head and inhale the fragrant scent of her hair. Raspberries and vanilla.
She pulls away from me slightly and sets the glass on an end table. Then she turns to me, her eyes sunken and sad.
“Miles?”
“Yes?”
“Take me to bed. Please.”
16
SADIE
Miles helps me into a stand, and for some reason, I start talking. It’s been a crazy night. From the fight to his jealousy to learning about Joey… It’s all so surreal.
I’m not alone in this though. Deep down, maybe I knew Joey was dead but couldn’t admit it. There was no news from him for so long. I never understood why we were estranged, why he wouldn’t want to talk to me, his baby sister.
But I held out hope. Maybe having him gone is better. Now I know he doesn’t hate me, isn’t avoiding me because I did something. Except…I don’t want him gone.
“My best memory of Joey is from when I was five years old. A big snowstorm came through. Nothing new around here. Once it was over, snow was piled high in huge drifts around Larson Hill. Joey and his friends were going sledding, and I wanted to go so badly. Mom said I was too young, that I wouldn’t be able to stay warm enough, but Joey took one look at me, his eyes smiling.”
I continue talking as my memory hurls backward and the scene becomes vivid in my mind. I can’t help but smile.
“I’ll take care of her, Ma. Let her go.”
My mom twists her lips. “I don’t know, Joe. She’s awfully little.”
“I know how to keep her warm.” Joey goes to the closet and pulls out my purple snowsuit and then he disappears for a moment and returns with one of my sweaters and two pairs of his socks. He pushes the sweater over my head, and I laugh when he tousles my messed-up hair.
“I need two old bread bags, Ma,” he says.
Ma brings them to him while Joey gets me into my snowsuit, slides my stocking cap onto my head and then wraps a woolen scarf around me so only my nose is sticking out. He takes one pair of socks and puts them on my hands, pulling them up over the sleeves of my snowsuit nearly to my elbows. He shoves my mittens on my hands after that. I can’t move my thumbs but I don’t care. He takes the other pair of socks, slides them onto my little feet, and then makes me step into the plastic bread bags and then into my boots.
“Look at that, Ma,” he says. “How can she not stay warm?”
Ma laughs. “All right, Joe. But you bring her back in one piece, and not frozen.”
“Will do.”
“That afternoon,” I tell Miles, “with the sun shining down on the sparkling snow, and Joey and his two friends taking turns pulling me on the sled, is still one of my best memories.”
He chuckles. “Could you even move in that getup?”
I shake my head and can’t help the small chuckle. “Not really, but I didn’t have to move. I just had to stay on the sled.”
Miles’s eyes crinkle at the corner as he gives me a smile. “That sounds great, baby. I wish I’d had a little sister to take sledding.”
I warm at the thought. Miles would have been a great big brother. Protective and bossy, but in a good way.
“Central Park was always too crowded,” he continues, “but sometimes I went upstate with my grandmother.”
“Did you?” He hasn’t mentioned anyone in his family before besides his mom. The woman who was Jonathan Bridger’s second wife.
“Yeah. Until my mom alienated her, too,” he grumbles.
Funny. When my mom and dad divorced when I was eight and Joey was eighteen, Mom got custody of me, and I hardly saw my father or brother after that. My dad stopped being my dad, and it’s been a long time since I’ve seen him. He lives outside Billings in tiny house, and last I heard he’s pretty much a drunk.
But what I went through sounds tame compared to Miles’s life. It can’t be more obvious how his father wanted nothing to do with him. Or Austin. And what of Chance? They lived together on the ranch but from what I see, Chance hates the guy just as much. Maybe more.
