“I don’t know, Coby. Maybe you’re right,” she admitted while still looking ready to bolt. “But my gut is telling me that I am. I can’t explain why. I just feel it.”
“So what do you want to do because I’m with you no matter what,” I assured her. “Where you go, I go.” And then I smiled. “Ride or die, bestie.”
Hunter shakily returned my smile, but all it did was highlight the dark circles under her eyes. “Ride or die,” she whispered.
COBY
Iwoke up the next morning, cuddled with Hunter in my bed, and my first thought was how glad I was that the heat was working. She was still sleeping when I slipped out of bed to get started on breakfast.
I padded barefoot into the now spotless kitchen, only to end up staring at an empty fridge and emptier cabinets. Right…no food.
I picked up my phone to check my bank account to see if I even had enough money for groceries, but I somehow ended up staring at my phone as I went back and forth over texting Ocean to confront him about all the things Hunter told me last night. And then I remembered that I didn’t have his number, so I put my phone down and forced him out of my mind.
With any luck, I’d never see him again.
I told myself it was better this way.
Almost immediately after, I remembered my brother, and my heart twisted painfully with guilt.
I had no idea if he was alive or dead, if he was still recovering in the hospital, or if he’d been discharged. I picked up my phone again to call him. The line rang until the voicemail picked up, so I steeled my nerves and forced myself to leave a message.
“Hey, Shaun. It’s me. I just wanted you to know that I’m okay. I’m back home with Hunter, and I’m safe. And I want you to know that I don’t blame you for anything that happened. You’ve always done the best you could for me, and you’ll always be mybig brother. I’ll never forget that. Call me back, please. I love you. Okay. Bye…”
Hanging up, I took a deep breath and shook off the feeling that my brother hated me.He’ll call me back.
I went back to my room and dressed myself in layers for the short trek to the grocery store. Once I was dressed and had left the apartment, I logged into my banking app to check my balance and stopped in the middle of the sidewalk when I saw it.
Checking Balance: $3,147,613.89
Confused, I checked the history and saw that $3,147,603.66 had been deposited into my account a week ago. The specific figure scratched at my memory, so I searched until I arrived on the night Ocean took me. Every penny that Roshaun had stolen from him had been paid to me, but why?
It also meant that, up until a few days ago, I had only a little over ten dollars in my account.
The wind was blowing so hard I could barely trudge through the two blocks of snow and ice until I reached the store.
Always the one stuck doing the grocery shopping for both of us, I quickly selected all of Hunter’s and my favorite foods before checking out and leaving with my arms loaded with two paper bags. As soon as I left the store, my phone started ringing, so I shifted the bags in my arms to free it from my coat pocket. Heart galloping, I answered quickly when I saw the caller ID.
“Hello? Shaun?”
“What the fuck do you mean you’re back?”
Taken aback by his furious tone, I didn’t respond right away as I stopped walking. “I’m home. O-Ocean let me go.”
“Why the fuck would he do that, Coby? What did you do? Did you piss him off?”
“No.I didn’t do anything. He let me go. And what the hell is your problem? I thought you’d be happy to see your sister home safe and sound.”
“Of course I’m fucking not, Coby. Are you fucking stupid? If Ocean can’t get his payment from you, that means he’s coming afterme. I asked you to do one fucking thing, and you couldn’t do it.”
Um…what?
All I felt was this gaping hole at the end of my brother’s tirade that was quickly filled with everything Ocean and Hunter had tried to warn me about him. “Roshaun…”
“What?” he snapped.
“Did you give me up?”
“What?”
