“Junie showed me,”he laughs.
“What?”
“Apparently someone filmed the thing outside some diner and put it on TikTok.”
I groan. “Of course they did.”
“It was pecking at a cop’s boots while the cop was trying to chase it.”
“Sounds accurate.” I sure as fuck hope it was Cheryl’s boots.
“It also followed a walking couple down the street like it was their pet.”
I swallow.Oh shit.
“Yeah,”he continues.“And one of those two on the video looks a lot like my brother.”
I groan, hating that I’m appearing somewhere on the internet. I don’t have social media and hate spotlights. “Can you tell it was me?”
“Well, I recognized your back and your wonderfully bouncy walk.”
“I don’t bounce.”
“And you kept looking at the woman next to you.”
So, I’ve been caught.
“Goodbye, Jethro.” I hang up before his loud laughter makes me deaf.
My brother is an idiot who somehow managed to raise a wonderful kid, but he might be right about this. I’ll never admit it to anyone, but I don’t know if I’ve moved on. I don’t know if I’ll ever move on. And it’s not because of the things I saw and experienced in there, but because of my secret resentment.
Toward my brother.
38
Jericho
The rooster’s back. I see the TikTok star when I walk to the window.
He’s sitting right on my porch railing in hopes of antagonizing me. One foot tucked under, chest puffed, beady eyes fixed on my front door.
“You again?” I mutter, squinting through the screen.
He cocks his head. At this point, I’m sure the cockblocker understands everything I’ve ever said. I open the door, step out onto the porch, and he crows—loud, confident, like I’m the one trespassing on his territory. Maybe technically that’s true since he was here before I moved in.
“Unbelievable.” Unbelievable that I even entertain the idea of me being an intruder, but I guess Big Love is rubbing off on me.
He hops down to the steps and starts walking toward the door. What does he want? To break in?
I take a long sip of coffee and wonder, not for the first time, if he’s been sent here for all my past sins.
My phone buzzes in my back pocket. I fish it out without looking. “Yeah?”
“Jericho?”
Nora’s voice is rushed. Worried. My spine straightens without thinking. “What happened?”
“Just this thing in the diner.”
