“No. Of course not. I wanted to ask if you were okay. You seem angry.”
“Do I?” I barked out a laugh and rested my hands on my hips. “Maybe I don’t care for being interrupted with petty questions that have no relevance to me.” Every word hurt as lie built on lie.
Bethany left me alone, her face going carefully blank. Good. Her interruption proved one thing: it wasn’t getting any easier to go through the days without Harper.
It took less than a second to come to a decision. I waited until Bethany had time to make it to her desk, then I slipped out and cut around the corner into Julian’s office. “We need to talk.” I stopped in the middle of the room. “Jesus, Julian. What the hell happened in here?”
His normally pristine office looked like a wrecking crew had been through. Every painting that used to reside on the walls lay on the floor. Half of them were shredded. The other half had broken frames and tattered edges. The couch was overturned, the cushions in a pile in the corner.
Like Dante, Julian had his own private liquor bar, and the heady scent of Scotch made the entire room smell like a high end bar.
Julian sat in the window, his hair askew and his eyes bloodshot. “Didn’t like how it looked. Decided to fuck it.” He shook his head. “I didn’t fuck the fucking furniture. I said fuck it and I trashed the place. My whole life is in shambles. Shouldn’t the outside look as wrecked as the inside.”
Fuck me. I’d known we were going down hard for Harper, but I had no idea it had been this bad for Julian.
Dante stormed in, his eyes blazing and nostrils flaring. “Good, you’re already here.” He swept the room with a look, and his body tensed. “I think we’ve given Harper enough time.”
“Thank fuck.” I grabbed Julian’s wrinkled jacket from the floor and shook it out. “Come on, man. Let’s go see her.”
“Really?” His eyes lit up like a little kid at Christmas seeing their first Christmas tree. The ache in my chest intensified. Poor drunk fool. If he was a fool, we all were.
“Yes.” Dante jingled his keys. “She hasn’t been answering our messages. It’s time to check on her. If she wants us to leave, she can tell us to our faces, but I need to know she’s okay.”
“We need to wait until later. If we all leave now, it’ll draw suspicion.” I pointed it out because neither of them seemed capable of seeing the possible repercussions. Then again… “I’m sick to fucking hell of dancing around this. I want to see Harper. I’ve been sick for days at the thought of her being in the hospital and us not knowing.”
“We’d know.” Dante spun his keys around his finger. “Lila would tell us. Or my contact at the hospital.”
“Shit, Dante. You can’t just tell someone at the hospital to call you if Harper is admitted.” I threw my hands into the air to keep from wringing his neck.
“Sure I can. He’s loyal to me. No amount of money could buy him out.” Dante’s smirk dimpled his cheeks. “Now, are we going to check on Harper or are we going to stand around like a bunch of fuck boys?”
“Let’s go.” Julian grabbed the jacket from me and flung it over his shoulder. With a grin and a wink, he rolled up his shirt sleeves. “Let’s see her say no to this.”
I resisted rolling my eyes but followed him to the private elevator and from there to Dante’s car.
We barely spoke during the drive, and a moment of hesitation pinned us all in the car when Dante pulled into the driveway.
Harper’s little blue house had a cute and artistic curb appeal. Tiny window boxes framed the front windows, and the white curtains kept any nosy neighbors from being able to see into the house.
A dog barked in the neighbor’s yard, and a couple walked down the opposite sidewalk.
Now or never. I opened the door and stepped out. Julian followed from the backseat, then blew past me to knock on the front door. The first hints of twilight brushed the roof of the house, the day finally drifting toward night.
Julian knocked again. “Open the door. Open the door. Open the door.” He muttered it under his breath and cupped his hands around his eyes to try and peer through the narrow oval window in the center of the door.
No one stirred inside.
Julian knocked a third time. “Harper, please. We need to speak with you.”
A creak of footsteps sounded, then the lock clicked and the door opened.
I sucked in a lungful of air, trying to prepare for the gutpunch of seeing Harper. Only, it wasn’t her standing in the doorway.
Lila peered out, one hand on her hip and the other on the door. “What are you doing here?”
“Looking for Harper. She hasn’t been answering her phone.” Dante stood tall and proud, but grief lined his face. “Is she here?”
Lila’s eyes went wide. “You haven’t talked to her?”
