“Hello,” Hollis said into the phone.
“Hollis—”
“Dude, what the hell? That was longer than that wait needed to be. What’s up, Morg?”
“I needed to get through the damn traffic.”
“Yes, traffic sounds terrible. Now, what’s up?”
I exhaled loudly and rubbed my temples with my thumb and middle finger.
“Morgan, what is going on?”
“Okay, I’m sure there’s a proper way to say this, but I’ll be damned if I can figure it out.”
“Just spit it out.”
“I bumped into our nephew this afternoon.”
“What?”
“Brandon Cooper.”
“What? How? Where?”
“Club Oxygen. This week I’m meeting with members who signed up for photo shoots, and he was my two o’clock appointment with his partner.”
“You’ve got to be shitting me.”
“Hollis—”
“Are you sure?”
“Hollis, he’s from Beverly Hills, which is where we lived, where Haley lived. He’s very early twenties, which fits. He mentioned he had modeled before and then talked about his mom being a model too. When I casually asked who his mom was, he said Haley Cooper.”
“Fuck,” Hollis swore.
“Exactly.”
“Have you told Chase?”
“No. I barely made it through the afternoon to finish with the rest of the appointments. I sent you a text the second I got in the car.”
“What does he look like?” Hollis asked.
“Honestly? He looks like Chase.”
“Damn.”
“What?”
“Nothing. I was just remembering back to that Christmas Eve all those years ago when Haley finally let Chase see the kid. Chase said Haley told him that she kept the kid because he looked like Chase.”
“This is so fucked up, Hollis.”
“I hope you’re not going to photograph him. That would be all sorts of fucked-up.”
“Hollis! I’m absolutely not photographing him. I’m going to have to talk to him, or the club owner, or his partner—”
