“It’s just an old storage room. Probably packed and dusty but nothing dangerous. Come on. We gotta get outta sight.”
I stepped into his hand and went ahead and let myself marvel at how easily he lifted me up.
It was an easy enough slide through the window and a straight fall forward onto my hands until I could walk myself down onto all fours.
“All good?”
“Yeah. Dusty as hell in here,” I said, sniffling.
“Incoming,” he called just before one of my bags made it through the window.
I reached for the other two, then moved back to watch him lift himself up.
“This is a much tighter fit than it used to be,” he admitted as he shimmied this way and that to squeeze in through the narrow window.
Eventually, he made it.
Then crashed down hard, making me wince, wondering if there was someone around who might hear.
“Don’t worry. He’s passed out cold by the above-ground pool. He’s been a drunk longer than I’ve been alive. Hence why this bottle,” he said, lifting up some noxious-smelling pool cleaner, “has been here since the last time I hid out in here to avoid an ass-kicking from my old man. I doodled on it,” he added, turning the label out to show me.
He put it down, then reached to close the window.
“It’s not much, but it’s relatively cool and safe.”
“Is this the first time you’ve been back since you moved your brother out?” I asked as he moved around, methodically reorganizing things so there was room for us to sit.
Luckily, underneath all the crap, the floor was pretty damn clean.
“Yeah,” he said, coming over to lower down onto the floor beside me, both of us leaning back against the wall and exhaling hard.
“I wish I’d grabbed that coffee,” I said.
Caymen reached for his phone, shooting off a text to, I imagined, his president.
“What’d he say?” I asked when he got a text back.
“Just encouraged us to stay put as long as possible. He said he’s gonna send my brother and Coast down to scope the place out to make sure it isn’t being staked out.”
“Is Dixon going to be okay with that?”
His gaze cut to mine, and he offered me a small smile. “Yeah. He doesn’t have as many bad memories here as I do.”
“You okay?” I asked, nudging him.
“Spent a lot of time here,” he admitted. “Probably still have some cheap vodka stashed in here somewhere. And a pack of cards. Played a lot of solitaire.”
“Sorry we had to come back here.”
“Not your fault.”
“Still.”
“It’s alright. Feels a lot different now.”
“Did you ever sneak girls in here?”
“Wish I’d thought of that,” he admitted. “Would have saved me from nearly getting caught by the cops a few times.”
