Shiloh felt a little bad, but not bad enough to back down. Keeping Mal calm until this was all over was for the best.
Mal gave a curt nod, then hooked his arm through Nico’s, dragging him towards the bedroom. “Okay, good. It’s settled. Let’s go to your room and finish watchingSpirited Away.”
Shiloh heard Nico say, “I’m supposed to have classes this afternoon.”
But the door shut before they could hear Mal’s answer.
“What the fuck was that?” Levi asked.
Shiloh sighed. “That…was Malachi.”
Shiloh scanned the streets as they walked along the sidewalk. Levi’s hand grasped his, the other holding the groceries they’d just bought from the bodega on the corner. With so much ominous stuff on the horizon, it felt like the sky should have been dark, with low hanging black clouds and the threat of storms to come.
But the sky was as blue as Shiloh had ever seen it, with fluffy white clouds dotted here and there. Everything was heightened.The buildings’ red brick seemed brighter, and the scents wafting from the pizza place hung heavier in the air, making Shiloh’s stomach growl. It seemed weird to see people out living their lives when there was a plot to kill his brother just out there in the world.
Shiloh watched the couples as they passed, kids as they played, people sitting on their stoops. Were any of them plotting nefariously? Probably. This neighborhood had a high crime rate for a reason. But most of the crimes came from necessity, not malice. People robbed, stole cars, sold drugs, sold their bodies, so they could eat, so they could feed their kids. Before Micah made enough money to move them, they’d lived in a neighborhood just like this.
“What’s wrong, Dimples?” Levi asked, yanking him from his thoughts.
Shiloh didn’t want to lie to him. But he had no idea how to explain the stupid thoughts whirling around in his head. “It’s just…weird.”
Levi frowned, tugging Shiloh into him as a kid raced by on a bicycle. “What’s weird?”
“I don’t know. All of it? How do you do this? How do you just”—he dropped his voice to a low murmur, barely heard above the bus engines, the cars, the people laughing obnoxiously in their plastic chairs outside the burger place—“plot someone’s murder, then go buy frozen pizza and ramen?”
Levi’s lips twitched in a smile, and he let go of Shiloh’s hand. His heart sank at the loss, but then Levi threw his arm around his shoulder and sighed. “Well, one: because this is my life. We do this all the time. People need help, and we help them.”
“Even the Mulvaneys?”
“Especially the Mulvaneys. You can’t be as close to them as we are without getting sucked in by their gravitational force. Knowing their secret means coming when they call.”
“So, you’re like…beholden to them or something?”
“It’s not so much that we’re beholden so much as it is that we’re…a collective.”
“Collective?”
“Yeah, we’re all out here doing the same work, they just do it with more resources and a bigger budget. They help us, we help them. Adam always jokes that mutually assured destruction is what makes this all work, but I think it’s because we all feel like one big fucked-up family.”
Shiloh nodded. “What’s two?”
Levi frowned. “Huh?”
“You said ‘one’ which implies there’s a two,” Shiloh recalled.
“Oh, right. And two: Your brother is watching us. We know that. We have to keep living our lives like nothing is wrong so he doesn’t catch on to the plan. This is normal. Grabbing groceries is normal. Walking hand in hand down the street is normal. This is what couples do. Besides,” he added with a laugh. “With four of us eating instead of two, we’re running out of food quickly.”
Shiloh noted they were almost home…hah, home. This tiny apartment felt more like home than his real home ever had. And he wasn’t even pulling his weight or helping in any way. Maybe he could clean or something. He was a terrible cook, but he could learn.
Guilt settled over him, face feverish as he rushed to say, “I can pay you back as soon as?—”
Levi’s hand cupped over Shiloh’s mouth, effectively cutting him off, before dropping a kiss on his head. “Baby, that wasn’t a complaint, just a fact. Everything’s up in the air right now. I haven’t been working at the convenience store since the robbery, Nico only picks up shifts from Jericho when he runs out of money faster than Monica’s sugar-daddies can replace it. You and Mal can’t exactly go apply for jobs at Burger King right now.But when this is all over and life is back to normal, we can sit down and make a plan.”
As soon as he dropped his hand, Shiloh said, “I don’t want you thinking I’m some burden you have to take care of.”
“Nobody thinks that. This is all just temp?—”
“Levi!”
