Ivy thrust my phone at me. “Finch said she’ll send you a text later and that your silly car still smells like horse poo.”
“Ives,” Decoy warned.
“Nah, she’s right.” I stood and picked Ivy up again, spinning her over my head. “It does smell. But that’s what you get for buying a Vauxhall Nova for two hundred quid.”
Decoy eyed me and Ivy like watching us was making him tired. “Two hundred quid? When did you buy it?”
“Eighteen years ago. I’m old, remember?”
“You don’t look it.”
“That’s because I eat my dinner every day. Come on. Let’s go inside and find something on that app on your phone.”
“Youwant to eat a dodgy takeaway?”
“Yup.”
It was the closest to a lie I’d ever tell him.
24
DECOY
Cam and Rubi FaceTimed from the road.
Rubi declared International Haircut Day and sliced six inches off his golden mane with the blunt blade of a penknife.
Cam’s hair looked... different too, and the freaky pictures kept coming. Nash. Locke. River. Even Liliana chopped her wild curls to her chin.
It was as out of the ordinary as Folk ordering Dominos, and the fact that he didn’t eat it distracted me until nine o’clock when I received a message from Alexei.
Alexei:This is unacceptable.
My imagination took me to an awful place.
Then he followed it up with a photograph of Orla taking a pair of scissors to Saint’s unruly chestnut waves and I understood. At least, I hoped I did. He played with Saint’s hair a lot.
I took the pizza boxes outside. Folk and Ivy were already upstairs, watchingFree Willyin my room. It was way past her bedtime, but I didn’t give a shit. Folk made Ivy happy, and I was here for that.
He makes you happy too.But somehow over the last few hours, I’d forgotten how that felt. Anger, man. It was a fucking disease.
I locked up and trudged upstairs.
Folk heard me coming and we swapped places so he could shower.
He emerged from the bathroom in his low-slung grey sweatpants. Even around Ivy, it was a sight that usually blew my tiny mind, but I was preoccupied with Ivy’s hair. Freshly washed, it had dried in loose spirals that weren’t a world away from Folk’s, but it was soshort, barely long enough to run my fingers through. And I still didn’t know what had happened to it. If Folk’s sister had told him, he hadn’t told me.
“Seth.” Folk leaned over the bed and put his warm hands on my shoulders. “Go wash the day away.”
“You think some hot water and Imperial Leather is going to get rid of this bullshit?”
“Don’t swear, Daddy.”
Folk grinned at Ivy. “What she said. And no, I don’t. That’s why I was gonna tell you to take a cold shower.”
He tipped me a wink and ambled around the bed. I stared at his bare torso for a long second, willing my soul to reanimate.
Then I took his advice, got up, and retreated to the bathroom.
