Hawk (A Stepbrother Romance #3)(23)

My mother beamed like she actually cared. Thanksgiving dinner for us came out of cans and boxes and we had some turkey lunchmeat cut if we were lucky.

When I was fourteen, the weather was the exact opposite. Thanksgiving day was twelve degrees in the afternoon, and a massive snowstorm hit Paradise Falls that night, and ended up extending the Thanksgiving weekend for another three snow days the next week. We ate at home as usual, and the next day Hawk showed up at the apartment, bundled up in so much cold weather gear he could barely move. Mom told me I was crazy when I swathed myself in layers of sweaters and a coat and went with him.

I was still freezing the whole time. We didn't go anywhere special, just pushed through snow drifts and wandered around town for a few hours until it started getting dark and threatened to grow really cold. I still remember when were almost back to the apartment and I dumped a double handful of snow down the back of his coat and he hopped around like it was a hot coal, and ended up smashing a big blop of snow into my back. The snow clung to his hair and melted from the heat of his skin, and dripped down over his face. He shoved me down and I made a snow angel in the middle of Commerce Street, then hit him in the face with a snowball.

To this day, I don't know how he made it home without freezing to death, but the next day he was there again.

I shook myself out of it as Tom carved the turkey and laid a healthy slice on my place. After he carved up the bird, the dishes were passed around. May piled up a plate of food bigger than her own head and managed to eat it all. I swear she ate half a dozen rolls, enough mashed potatoes for two people and she practically drank the gravy.

It was good, but to me it tasted like ash, and the ginger ale like smoke.

Tom and my mother drank wine.

A lot of wine. She was giggling like an idiot by the time dinner was over, and the table was strewn with the wreckage of a hearty meal.

Tom said, "Kids, clean up," and took my mother by the arm.

She had another glass of wine on her way towards the master bedroom.

Ugh.

I sprang to my feet and started carrying dishes into the kitchen. Kids did not include Lance, apparently, who rose and headed up to his room and left me and May to do all the work. I put the leftovers in containers while May scraped the plates and serving dishes clean and filled the sink. By the time we finished, I was exhausted, my fingers were pruny, and I noticed that Tom's office door was ajar.

Inside, I caught only a glimpse of dark bookcases and a chair. I shamed myself for even looking and rushed upstairs, behind May. I had more studying to do, more to occupy my time. Snooping around would be the worst possible thing I could do.

I couldn't stop myself.

Studying was a chore. My concentration was as fragile as glass, my eyes sliding off the page every time I tried to read. I was sleepy from the big meal but I couldn't get to sleep, and ended up tossing and turning. It was well after dark when I sat up and stepped out of my room. May was across the hall in her bedroom, crashed out on her bed, sleeping it off. I had no idea where Lance was. When I crept downstairs, I expected to run into Lance and try to casually excuse my presence, or worse run into Tom, or my mother.

I was alone. I poured a glass of milk in the kitchen and decided to take it back upstairs with another piece of pie, but left the pie uncut, chugged the milk and wiped my lips on my arm, and crept over to the office, my heart in my throat. The door was still ajar. I swung it open, my whole body as tight as a spring about to snap as I expected it to make a loud eerie screeching noise and give me away, but it swung open silently, the hinges smoothly oiled. I didn't dare turn on the light.

The absurdity of it didn't hit me until later. I walked into the lion's den without a plan or even an objective. What was I expecting, that on his desk I'd find a big piece of paper reading HAWK ITINERARY and his current location?

Then it hit me like a ton of bricks. My stomach flipped and I wanted to throw up.

What if Tom… did something to Hawk?

Why was he going out in the middle of the night? Why did he give me the creeps? It was stupid to snoop, but at the time I didn't understand, truly, what I was getting myself into. I was still a stupid little girl playing detective. I walked around the guest chairs and cocktail table and to Tom's desk. His computer was locked when I jiggled the mouse and I had no clue what the password might be, so I carefully went through the papers on his desk instead. There was nothing interesting, just stuff from his company. Payroll records, financial stuff, receipts, bank statements.

One thing I came across caught my eye. A bank statement for something called "ZLBPCC LLC". Whatever that was it had a lot of money coming in, and it was all listed under cash receipts. That stuck out at me, for some reason. It was a lot of money in cash. Tens of thousands of dollars a day, almost sixty for the whole month. I tried to place it back as best I could, and frowned. That didn't make sense. I didn't know anything about big construction projects, but my gut told me they weren't paid in cash, and on some kind of odd whipped off daily installment plan.

There was something really weird going on here.

I heard a creak and my heart jumped into my throat. Pressed against the wall, I made my way towards the door, not quite sure what I'd do if it swung open and Tom stepped in. There would be no way to slip past him, there was simply no way in or out. I waited, watching the light in the hallway, my heart pounding as I anticipated seeing a shadow of the bottom of his shoes any moment, but there was nothing. I slipped around the door and darted to the bottom of the stairs without looking, and slowed myself after the first two steps, careful not to make a noise.