Page 41 of Love Thy Brother
It hurt.
All of it.
And I couldn’t see how it would ever stop.
I dug dry clothes from my bag and threw them on, River’s phone in one hand, mine in the other. The nosy bastard in me wanted to take a peek at the notifications that had buzzed through overnight.
The rest of me was scared. Of so many things. But with Riv’s phone, mainly that he had a Tinder account that was nicer to him than I was.
Would serve you fucking right.
Okay. I was over the heckling inner monologue for one day and I hadn’t had a brew yet.
I shoved River’s phone in my pocket and tapped into mine, texting Saint.
Rubi:Heading to the garage. Can you stay on the house until he leaves?
Saint:its 4 am
Rubi:Congratulations. You can tell time.
Saint:y r u going there now?
Rubi:I’m awake.
And I wanted to scope the place out without River’s gaze crawling all over me, but I didn’t feel like explaining myself to Saint.
I sent him a kissing emoji in the hope he’d take the hint and shut the fuck up.
He did. Without kissing me back.
Rude.Still, I trusted him, and I left the flat without glancing at the terraced house River called home.
The garage was locked. No alarms or CCTV. Until yesterday, the spare keys had hung on a rusty nail in the office, but I’d swiped them around lunchtime and no one had noticed.
I used them to let myself in now, leaving the lights off until I reached the windowless office.
It was exactly as I’d left it last night. Invoices stacked. Orders filed. The tea mug on the desk.
But something felt off. A creeping sensation crawled up my spine and I felt like Diet Saint.
Someone’s been here. Not River. Axel. Bear. And definitely not me.
On the off chance, I messaged Cam.
Rubi:You still have a key to the garage?
Cam:This is Alexei. He has never had one.
Alexei’s reply meant Cam was asleep. That Alexei would wake him if I gave the cause to worry.
Fuck that.
Not yet.
I replied with a thumbs-up emoji and pocketed the phone, slipping out of the office and to the front door. River never used it, so neither had I, and I hadn’t got round to checking it yesterday.
Should’ve.
