Between Hello and Goodbye(2)

Morgan nodded and wiped his nose. He was a smart kid and sweeter than me. He didn’t deserve this shit. He should’ve had a mom who packed him a lunch every day and a dad who watched his soccer games. Not an older brother trying to make up for all of it.

But life didn’t give a crap what you deserved. Sink or swim. That was it. I wasn’t big on signs or omens, but I could read the writing on the wall. The years since Dad left were a run-up to this morning. It was up to me to protect Morgan from whatever bad shit wanted to wreck him and turn my happy-go-lucky little brother into something else.

I’ll be something else. I’ll take it all to keep him safe.

I nudged his arm. “Come on.”

“What? Where?”

“We gotta get out of here before the cops find us. They’ll separate us and put us in homes.”

He looked at me with round, dark eyes. Eyes like mine, dark hair like mine, but he was slighter and skinny, whereas I was already bulking up from yard work, construction work, whatever odd job someone would give me. I was sixteen—seventeen in June—but Alice at the grocery and Phil at the hardware store both told me I could pass for twenty. Maybe older.

“They’re going to separate us?” Morgan asked, the tears coming again. “They can’t.”

“I’m not going to let that happen.”

They’ll have to kill me first.

Morgan turned back to the scene unfolding below. The firemen had arrived in a truck almost as big as our trailer. Their hoses blasted what was left of our home, while cops had Mom and Dean sitting on the curb. Neither looked panicked or even concerned that there might be two boys still inside the blackened, charred heap. Too high to care or remember we existed.

“Let’s go,” I said.

Morgan sniffled and wiped his nose. He gave the scene a final glance, then followed me as we half-walked, half-slid on our asses down the other side of The Hill. To the north, Allentown was a cluster of buildings just waking up on the spring morning, about twenty miles away.

“Too close,” I muttered, thinking quickly. We had to get out of the state if I had any chance of keeping the authorities off our backs. It was a longshot, already.

“Where are we going?” Morgan sounded small. Lost.

I put my arm around his skinny shoulders. “Home.”

“Where is that?”

“Wherever we make it. It’ll be like an adventure.”

But Morgan was too smart for that fairytale bullshit. He started to cry, and I hunched down in front of him.

“Hey. Hey, look at me.”

He raised his eyes and the fiercest love surged through me. I almost didn’t recognize it as love, it was so tangled with pain and rage at the unfairness of it all.

“I’m going to take care of you,” I vowed, infusing my entire being into those words. “I’m not going to let anything bad happen to you. You hear?”

He nodded.

“I swear it. I swear on my life, I got you. Okay?”

He threw his arms around my neck, and I hugged him tight—but only for a minute. He was going to squeeze emotions out of me that I didn’t need or want. They were only going to get in the way of what I had to do.

I had four hundred bucks and a packet of corn chips to my name, but I was going to keep my promise to my little brother. Protecting Morgan and building a life for him out of the smoldering ruins were all that mattered. Somehow, someway, I’d make sure he went to school, had a roof over his head, and that no one would take him away from me.

We turned our back on the burning trailer and walked away.





Chapter One



Seattle, Washington, present day…



A buzzing sounded from…somewhere, and I made the horrible mistake of opening my eyes. Pain lanced through my head, carried on a bolt of sunshine. My vista was a mountain range of white sheets leading to a valley of tanned skin over smooth muscle.

Jake? Jack? I couldn’t remember. Or maybe I never knew.

The buzzing came again. I shut my eyes and let the sound guide my hand. I found my phone under my pillow and peered at it with one eye.

A text from Viv, decorated with eggplant and waterspout emojis.

Well??? How was he?

My head thundered and it felt like I hadn’t drunk any water in approximately eight years.

But tequila? I’d had plenty of that.

Just the thought made my stomach roil. The manly lump beside me stirred and resettled again, turning his face toward me. Chiseled chin. Cheekbones for days. I peeked under the sheet. Impressively endowed. The guy checked all my boxes for a one-nighter. I couldn’t remember much of the actual event, but Viv didn’t need to know that.

I typed back: Epic, of course. Came four times. U?

The rolling dots of her reply appeared, but my heavy eyes happened on the time in the upper right corner of my phone. Panic ripped through me, making me gasp. Suddenly, last night came roaring back in all its drunken clarity. Vivienne had talked me into a Thursday night happy hour at Gracia. I’d sworn up and down that I wouldn’t party too hard; I had the Nestle people coming into the agency at nine a.m., and if I landed this account, my promotion to partner would be all but assured. Instead, we met two Ken dolls in three-piece suits, and the margaritas flowed like Niagara.

I don’t remember much after that.