Page 52 of Filthy Rich Brother's Best Friends

Shit.

Wes fucking Hayes.

I blink, but he’s still there. My brain’s already flipping through disaster scenarios like flashcards. I haven’t told him we are living next door to Lola.

He looks up. And stops.

I watch all the different emotions ripple across his face. Recognition hits first, then confusion, then that slow, suspicious squint that tells me he’s not in the mood for guessing games.

“What the hell are you doing here?” he asks.

Well, I’m certainly not standing on his sister’s porch at ass-o’-clock in the morning after very muchnotleaving things clean the last time I saw her.

“I live here. Well, not here exactly. There.” I point across the lawn to Miles’s house. “Hell of a coincidence, right?”

Wes looks past me toward the porch, then at the house next door, then back to me like he’s trying to triangulate the odds of this being a coincidence.

“You didn’t mention it.”

“Didn’t come up.” That one’s not a lie. It didn’t come up because I never brought it up. And Miles never would have thought to, so I know he never said anything.

Wes exhales through his nose and pushes a hand through his hair. I watch him scan the lawn, the porch, my face. He might not be as analytical as Miles, but Wes is usually smarter than anyone in the room and twice as hard to read.

Right now? He’s not hard to read at all. The way he keeps looking between the houses says exactly what he’s thinking: I don’t believe you.

I hold his gaze and wait him out. He can fish, but I’m not biting.

It takes him a second, but he unclenches a bit. The edge doesn’t disappear, but he sets it aside. And we fall into something that passes for normal. Sort of.

“You guys settling in?”

I nod. “Yeah, the house is great. And it’s close to everything.”

“How’s Miles doing?”

“He hasn’t come up for air in four days. So I’d say he’s been pretty productive.”

He nods. “Figures. He pinged me last week about expanding the user loop.” Wes pauses. “Said you and Jude were helping map it.”

“We are. He’s already rewritten half the logic.”

Wes glances past me at the house again. “He sleeping at all?”

I shake my head. “Not unless someone shuts off the Wi-Fi and changes the password.”

He laughs once. “Have you seen Lola much since you moved in?”

“A couple times.” I shrug.

Just then the door creaks open behind me. I’m almost praying it’s Gigi, but I know it won’t be. We both turn our heads.

Lola steps outside. She freezes when she sees us.

Her eyes flick to me. Then to Wes. Then back again. And in that split second, I see it all—surprise, guilt, panic. She tries to hide it but fails.

“Hey!” Her voice is wrong. I’ve never heard her at quite that pitch before. It’s…ear-splitting.

Wes doesn’t seem to notice. He gives a lazy wave. “Morning.”