Page 54

August frowned. “What?”

“From the map. Everything else radiated out from that point. I thought it might be where you lived, but I wasn’t sure.”

Another shrug. August was passing off bringing me here as no big deal, but the slight stiffness of his shoulders told that for the lie it was. This was why he’d been so lost in thought this morning. He’d been contemplating the best course of action. “You can trust me, you know.”

“Can I?”

I held his gaze. “Yes. Not at the start, maybe, but we’ve come a long way since then. Right?”

“We have.”

The door flying open ruined what might have been a moment of softness. A handsome man stood on the other side, his bare chest covered in sweat. He held his arms aloft, stepping forward to initiate the hug when August didn’t take him up on it. “August, you son of a bitch,” he said, squeezing him tight. “You’ve been gone too long.”

The sudden pressure in my chest was indisputably jealousy, even as I tried to convince myself that it couldn’t possibly be, that it was way too soon for such an emotion. The man’s hand rested low on August’s back, mere inches away from his arse. And no one should get to touch August’s arse except for me.

Then, he made things worse by kissing August on the cheek before letting go of him. Whatever conversation had occurred after the initial greeting—and there had been some—I’d tuned out, too lost in my head.

August glanced my way, his brow furrowing. “Relax,” he said. “Barclay’s like that with everyone.”

“It’s none of my business.” My words might have been convincing if I’d said them in a more natural way. As it was, they came out stilted, like I had a mouthful of rocks to navigate.

“Whether or not it is,” August said smoothly, “that’s the truth.”

“Your truth? Or the actual truth?” I didn’t wait for an answer as we stepped inside, more interested in what I was going to find. August propped his bike against the fence and then set off after Barclay. It looked like it had once been a junkyard, junk still lining the paths that snaked in every direction. In every area that had been cleared, there were houses, some built from the same metal sheets that made up the walls, others made from brick or wood. “How many people live here?”

I’d aimed the question at August, but it was Barclay who turned to answer, the man having stayed a few steps ahead of us. “Twenty at the last count.” He held his hand out. “I’ll introduce myself, seeing as August has no manners unless he wants something.” He glanced August’s way, not showing any surprise when all he got for his jibe was an eye roll. “Barclay.”

“Keaton,” I said, taking his hand for the briefest amount of time possible, the kiss on August’s cheek still bothering me.

When we reached a fork in the road, Barclay went one way while August angled his body the other. “Is she okay?” he called after Barclay.

Barclay answered without turning. “Yeah, of course. I would have said if she wasn’t. She’ll outlive us all. Laura’s with her today.”

“She?” I asked once August started walking.

“My grandmother.”

“You have a grandmother?”

“I told you I did.”

“Yeah, but you didn’t say she was still alive.”

August gave another shrug. “Any information I give out is on a strict need to know basis, and at the time it wasn’t something you needed to know.”

The maze of junk and houses eventually gave way to fields of crops. I let out a low whistle at the three-story house that looked out over the expanse of land. It could have fitted all the others we’d passed inside with plenty of room left over. “Let me guess,” I said, “that one’s yours?”

August flashed a smile at me. “Of course. My family founded this place. Everybody else only lives here because my grandma okayed it, and she’s picky. I guess you could say she’s the lady of the manor.”

“You have this and you leave here to con people?” It was the wrong thing to say, August’s expression immediately clouding over. “I’m just trying to understand your motivations,” I said quickly. “If I lived in a house like this, I don’t think I’d ever leave.”

We kept walking. There was no junk here. Just rows and rows of neat vegetables and crops, fruit trees, and a greenhouse. There was also a barn, which I guessed housed animals of some description. A woman was bent over hard at work in the middle of one field. When she caught sight of August, she smiled and waved. “You’ve got everything.”

“Not everything,” he said. “No one can ever have everything.”

Realizing I was in danger of coming across as a little judgy, I didn’t question him further on the rather cryptic statement. I vowed to be grateful that he was trusting me to see this, and not to let the green-eyed monster take control just because he knew other men.

The walk through the fields took a while, August exchanging a few words with Jane, the woman pulling carrots. Once we reached the house, he led me up the stone stairs, the door at the top unlocked. The house was just as impressive inside as it was out, with shiny marble floors and a spiral wooden staircase. Most impressively, it was clean, the layers of dirt that seemed to cover everything—people included—missing from this slice of heaven.