Page 66 of Some Like It Fox

Sleep, I direct my brain. It doesn’t take much prodding. I’m halfway to dreamland when the door shoves open, hitting the wall.

“Hey.” Jake plops down on the bed, sitting exactly where Finley was minutes ago. “Can I talk to you?”

I groan. “Don’t you knock?”

“Why would I do that?”

I roll my eyes. “I don’t know, common decency?”

“Huh.” He scratches his head. “Anyway, I wanted to talk to you before I left because I did what you recommended.”

“What? You finally figured out how to peeinthe toilet instead of on every surface around it?”

“Uh, do we really want to trade barbs on bathroom habits? Don’t get me started with your hair on the shower wall. Why do you do that? Are you suffering from premature balding?” He tugs on a strand of my hair.

I swipe his hand away. “I’m trying to keep my hair from clogging the drain, you’re welcome. I just forget to throw it in the trash sometimes.”

His mouth spreads into a grimace. “It’s hard to imagine why you’re still single.”

I grab my pillow and whack him with it.

He plucks it out of my hands and tosses it across the room.

“Jake!”

“You started it.”

Ugh. Brothers.“Anyway.” I reach for the other pillow and tuck it under my head. “What did you want to tell me?”

“I hired someone to help me look for the letter writer.” His nose scrunches. “It was not as cool as I thought it would be. He wasn’t wearing a trench coat and hat with those Groucho glasses. He was some normal middle-aged dude who drove a Mazda. He’s looking into things and I just wanted to say thanks for the advice.”

“That’s great, Jake. Let me know if he finds anything.”

“I’ll keep you updated.”

I reach over to tap on his knee with a fingertip. “Are you going to tell the others?”

He shakes his head. “No. Not yet.”

“Why?”

“I don’t have any real information at this point. And,” he rubs the back of his neck, “this is likemything. It gives me something outside of this place to focus on, you know? It’s something I need to do alone. If I tell anyone other than you, everyone else will find out and Finley and Archer already act like I need a nanny.”

I chuckle. “I get it.” I have my own secret journey, after all.

But I also understand where the perhaps overzealous concern is coming from. Out of all of us, Jake was hit the hardest after Aria’s death.

They were twins. Inseparable. Even worse, he was with her when she died. I can’t even fathom what he’s gone through. He never speaks about it.

Not long after she died, our dad got sick. Jake was his main caretaker, which helped distract him, but after Dad died, Jake escaped his demons by diving into any bottle he could find. None of us, except Finley, realized how bad things had gotten until he crashed the truck over a year ago and ended up in the hospital. He’s been mostly sober since, besides a little hiccup last fall.

I wasn’t home enough to notice how bad he had gotten. I was too wrapped up in my own life, my own guilt, my own desire to escape my past.

So I understand why Finley and Archer would be worried for him. Why they might want to coddle and cosset him. And I also understand why he needs a goal, a distraction that belongs to him and no one else.

“No one has asked you about the letters since last year?”

He wrinkles his nose. “Finley did once, in passing, but she didn’t seem to care much. Our sisters are too distracted with everything else going on around here.

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