He kept the story of his past fluid, maybe so nobody could pin down when he’d left home or discover where his home even was. He was younger than me by at least a year, had to have been, because any stories I heard about his past had words like junior high and P.E. class and lunchroom. Homeroom. Lunch lady pizza. Someone named Kirby Kelley, whom Star had nicknamed The Monster.
Star was smart. He was the one who always referred to the two of us as boxcar boys. And then the three of us, once we hooked up with Nimble. Which had been in Chicago, when Star had spotted someone coming across the rail yard. Head on a pivot, looking for bulls. Looking ragged, like a hobo. Looking for food. For the next train out.
Star was the one who kept Nimble and me connected, because Nimble and I didn’t get along right from the start. Nimble had broad shoulders, and you could see he was going to grow into those shoulders and become a powerful man.
He had dark hair and green eyes and always,alwaysseemed to look on the bright side, a smile on his face. In spite of his shithead dad who beat him a lot, Nimble thought life was good. We were water and oil, he and I, because I knew life sucked and it always had and always would.
But Nimble was the one I had wronged. Just like I’d wronged Mike.
All of this went through my head as I looked at Wolfe, the warmth of the cabin curling around me as he knelt at my side, his hands on my thigh. The sunshine was bright outside, the shadows dark and still inside, in contrast.
“If you want to contact the Sommervilles,” Wolfe said. “You can use my phone.”
It took me a full minute, my heart beating in my chest, to realize what he’d asked me and what it meant. “How do you know my last name?” I asked, my voice coming out icy and hard. I stood up, my hands clenched, blood pounding through the tightness. “Have you known all along?”
He didn’t deny it. He just stayed where he was, at my side, carefully still, carefully keeping his eyes on me like I had just turned into a snake that was about to bite him.
“I knew almost from the first,” he said. “You were unconscious on the couch. There was a blizzard. I got worriedsomeone might be looking for you. And I found out who. Thus endeth my research.”
This knocked the breath out of me. I sat down. I wasn’t sure I wanted to be angry. I thought I should be, but after everything he’d done for me, I didn’t have the heart. Instead, I leaned on my elbows, my face in my hands. Then I looked up, gasping, scrubbing tears from my face.
“There’s a fucking reward,” I said. I knew this because I checked from time to time to find out how much my return was valued at. “Seventy-five thousand dollars. Why didn’t you take it? Then you could buy your stupid lace cutter and you wouldn’t have to sell your snowmobile and you could afford to get a bathroom fan in instead of counting every penny.”
“It’s a hundred thousand now, that reward,” Wolfe said. He stood up and went to his side of the table, his fingers draped along the edge, like he was testing to see if it was level. He took a long sip of his tea and sighed as he put his mug down and looked straight at me. “I figured there must have been a reason for you to leave a family as rich as yours behind. Besides.” He shook his head, a grim flick of his eyes, a tightening of his jaw. “I know they left you at that shithole in Virginia and didn’t care. That’s blood money to me. Wouldn’t touch it.”
He could have everything he wanted: his fancy lace cutter, mortgage payments, enough money to hire a guy to put an exhaust fan in the bathroom, just for handing me over. But he wasn’t going to do it. My head rang as though somebody had knocked over a bell inside it. Wolfe went to the sink and handed me a kitchen towel.
“Your nose is bleeding.”
My fingers fumbled as I pressed the dishtowel to my nose, swallowing copper in the back of my throat. He was right there, standing at my side, poor as a church mouse. Not someone Iwould have associated with in my old life. Someone my parents would have disdained simply for not being rich, like they were.
Wolfe’s fingers were in my hair, pushing it back from my face. In another second, he’d let go and back off, not the kind of man who tarried where he wasn’t wanted. But I wanted him there. Lifting my hand, I placed it on his fingers and held them steady. The look on his face carved itself into my heart, the concern in his eyes, the steady way he stood there. The tenderness of his fingers in my hair.
“I have such a fucking headache,” I said, taking away the towel to look at the amount of blood on it, instead of everything else that I wanted to do or say. There was a dark red smear smaller than my palm.
“Let me get you something.”
He was gone from my side, moving around the kitchen, opening the back door to gather snow in a clean kitchen towel. When he came back, he placed the bundle of snow against the back of my neck and stood close, his fingers once again in my hair. His even breathing calmed me.
“I’ll get you some Tylenol in a minute,” he said. “Do you want me to call you Crispin or Blue?”
“Blue.” My breath was thick in my throat, and I buried my face against him, in the hollow place of his hip, tears hot on my face. “Always, Blue.”
I wasn’t Crispin anymore. That life was gone. Good riddance. Feelings of being the second son, not amounting to much, being kept close just in case. Gone. Wealthy background, no longer. Fine.
The horror of the Reserve lingered, not just because it was a hellhole, but because my family had sent me there on purpose. I dipped my chin, pressing my forehead against Wolfe’s groin, burying myself in his scent, the heat of him, the heavy muscles. Only this sensation made it worth going on.
“Do you want me to leave?” I asked, my voice trembly and low. My jaw worked. I didn’t want to hear him say no, but he didn’t have to keep me. Not any more. Not now that I knew who I was. I wasn’t his responsibility. I was nobody’s concern.
“No,” he said. Then he took a breath, hard and sharp. I winced and swallowed and waited. “I want you to stay.” He bent to kiss the top of my head, warm and soft. “I want you to stay with me. We’ll figure it all out as we go.”
I hugged him around his hips. The towel dropped to the floor, caked snow spinning across the floor. His arms went around my shoulders, and he held me there while my breath slowed. Or tried to slow.
I didn’t have to go into the world, my heart beating like a hammer against my ribs, while I counted train cars and did calculations in my head as to when the best time would be to jump.
I didn’t have to dig through trash cans, eating other people’s leftovers, or scrape bits from oil-stained pizza boxes, or half a sandwich hastily wrapped and not very well, leaving the crusts stale. Or break into empty motel rooms, where the occupants had left only seconds before, leaving a warm post-shower fug floating around the room, their sheets stained and rumpled. Taking other people’s seconds. Doing rock-paper-scissors with Nimble and Star to see who would take the first shower.
Me, I’d be warm and safe. I’d work like the devil himself to do my part, to make those lanyards and key rings so Wolfe could get his fancy lace cutter. To make it worth it to keep me because, if I looked behind me, I’d see people who, though in closer relation by blood, had never felt that way about me the way Wolfe did.
