Five Brothers
: Chapter 11

I’m not upset. Days later, I’m still thinking about it, but I’m not upset. Macon hasn’t looked at me one time since, or said my name. He hasn’t smiled or given any impression that what happened relaxed him at all, in fact. You could hear him yelling at Trace this morning when I got out of my car for work, and Mariette is in a tizzy after he called about something and stressed her out more. She’s given me his meals to take every day, which I throw in the garbage that’s sitting right outside the front door of the restaurant on the deck as soon as I walk outside.

He hasn’t missed the food, because he hasn’t called to complain. I don’t know what he’s been eating.

Okay, I’m a little upset. I humiliated myself. I did it to myself because why? Because I thought I would be the one person he’d finally open up to? Because making Macon Jaeger happy would mean something. Because I’m arrogant and self-important. A rich teenage girl, thirteen years younger than him, who has no idea what real pain is. Or what struggling is.

I thought I was going to be profound or some shit to him, didn’t I?

Jesus Christ. I chew the corner of my mouth.

Or maybe he’s just a fucking asshole who paid me for my services because I’m meaningless in his life.

Twenty bucks … I rub my tired eyes—I’m sleeping worse and worse every night.

“Hey …”

Clay walks into the bar and plops down on one of the many empty stools in front of me. She’s got beach hair for some reason, which is very unlike Clay. I love it, though.

“Hit me,” she says, dropping her Prada onto the seat next to her.

I lift my eyebrows.

“Please?” She pouts. “I’ll sleep it off in Liv’s bed. I won’t drive. Promise.”

I inhale a breath and push off the back of the bar, unfolding my arms from my chest. Filling a glass with ice, I grab her favorite vodka, top it with some tonic, and squeeze in a lime. I slide the drink over the bar to my friend who’s just as underage as I am.

She moans as she lifts it to her lips, taking three swallows. “I realized today how much I love working with deceased people,” she says, setting the drink back down.

I break into a small smile. Clay works in a funeral home while she takes online classes.

“We have a makeup artist, right?” she asks, but it’s not really a question. “They do the hair, too. But oh no, the deceased woman’s daughter wants to do it herself, so I let her come in. I take her to the room, and she freaks out because her mother is naked.”

“She was naked?”

“No, she had a sheet over her, of course!” She scowls at me like she probably did with the poor bereaved. Clay doesn’t like to be told how to do anything. “But the daughter wanted her dressed, and I’m trying to explain that I can’t put on her funeral clothes until the hair and makeup are done in case she spills powder or drops the lipstick.”

It makes sense. But I guess now she’ll know to warn the next person who wants to do their own family member’s hair and makeup. See? She learned something, even though she’s not ready to admit it.

She winces. “I don’t think I have the bedside manner for this.”

“You do.” I lean my elbows down on the bar, coming in closer. “We’re just not used to serving others, Clay.”

Except when dressed in cute cocktail dresses at thousand-dollar-a-plate charity dinners. That’s how we empathize. From afar. With a checkbook.

“You know you’re choosing a weird career, right?” I tease, still unable to stomach what she has to see every day. “But there’s no one else I’d trust to take care of me if I go before you.”

“Oh God.” She drops her head back. “Please don’t say that. And please don’t specifically request me in your will, because I won’t be able to deny you your final wish, but I won’t be able to handle it, either. Thankfully, Liv said that I can let my boss tend to her body if anything happens.” She reaches over and grabs a bar menu. “Which it won’t because I’ll die.”

“You’ve talked about your deaths?”

“It comes up with what I do.” She flips the menu over, reading the other side. “Macon doesn’t even want a viewing. Straight to cremation. Sounds like him. No fanfare.”

I rise up straight. “He said that?”

“Nah, it’s in his will,” she tells me. “Liv showed me. He just had it redone this past summer, actually.”

I stand there as Clay scans the appetizers, oblivious to my shock. He just had his will redone? Why?

The loss of appetite. The fatigue. The drinking. The mood swings. Is he sick?

Or is he anticipating an early death? Lots of people would love to see him dead. People who want the land and know that while they can’t get it away from him, his five siblings won’t put up nearly as good a fight. They would never go to the lengths Macon would to keep it.

But then Clay startles me out of my thoughts. “Coconut shrimp!” she shouts, beaming. She meets my eyes, slamming the menu down on the bar. “Psh, please. Two orders.”

I sigh. “But then I have to go over to the restaurant and get it.”

“Ohhhhh, I know,” she mock whines back at me. “You chose a weird career.”

I snicker, loving how she throws my words back at me. I turn and punch in the order to the POS system. “I’m just not used to serving others.”

“That’s not what I hear.”

I jerk my eyes back over my shoulder. What did she say?

She smirks, props her knee against the bar and crosses her arms over her chest. “Iron?”

I growl under my breath. “Shit. How did you hear about that?”

“Liv.”

“Iron told her?” I blurt out.

“Trace told her.”

“Ugh.” I finish inputting her order and twist back around, feeling her smug smile on me.

“So, was it him, then?” she presses. “On the couch? It was Iron?”

I fill a glass with ice and make myself a drink. “Could’ve been. I never asked him, and it was good, but … I don’t think it was, honestly.”

A blush warms my cheeks after admitting that to her. I don’t want to feel ashamed, but Clay’s only slept with one person. I don’t know why it matters that I’ve slept with more, but it matters to some people, and that matters to me. What’s Liv thinking about all this?

“I don’t know.” I take a drink, leaning down onto the bar again. “I’m getting more confused. Maybe I’m remembering a feeling or a scent that night that wasn’t really there to begin with. Maybe I’m remembering it as more than it was.”

I was in such a hard mood that night, and maybe it felt better than it otherwise would have.

But it wasn’t just about what I was feeling. It was what he was doing.

“Whoever it was,” I tell her, lowering my voice, “it was like he was talking to me without saying anything.”

It was fucking. But he was intimate.

“Shit.” Clay breathes out.

I nod. “Yeah.”

Exactly.

“Well, then,” she says. “You have to find him.”

I smile, and she smiles back, and I make another round of drinks.

Marymount Academy dismissed at noon today, but there are students still lingering in the parking lot. A few drift through the halls. Thanksgiving is in two days, and has always been my favorite holiday, a sentiment no one around me ever shared. There’s no stress to look a certain way, like on Halloween, or pressure to shop, like on Christmas. It’s just staying at home with a houseful of people and some really good food. This year will be a shitshow with my family falling apart, but I’ll try to make sure the kids can’t tell. We’re supposed to go to my grandparents’ house, but the invitation wasn’t extended to my mother. I’m sure my father will stay away so he doesn’t have to face us.

“Krisjen, hey!” someone calls out.

I look up, spotting Cate Laurel, Emaline Truax, and Antoinette Viega, juniors last year when I was a senior. They walk toward me, down the hallway.

Cate comes in for a hug. “What’ve you been doing? We miss you.”

We never hung out.

I glance at the girls’ locker room behind them, hoping my former coach is still in there.

“Oh, just working.” I smile, thankful I put on some lipstick. My clothes look like shit, though. “Waitressing.”

Toni’s face falls. “Why?”

I chuckle to myself. “What are you all up to?” I ask instead. They’re out of uniform, with fresh makeup on. Definitely not going home.

But Cate cocks her head. “Are you still hooking up with Trace Jaeger?”

I lift my eyebrows.

“Where will they be tonight?” she pries.

I hesitate, feeling the wind blow through the corridor from the open double doors at the entrance. “At home, I guess. There’s a storm coming.”

She grins, the two others’ faces lighting up.

Oh no.

I mean, I get it. I invaded the Bay last year, too, but …

I let my eyes fall to Emaline’s exposed stomach, Cate’s short-shorts.

I know the Bay now. It’s different.

“Don’t cross the tracks,” I warn them.

“Can’t make any promises.” Cate starts to back up, the others following. “We’re bored. You understand.”

“We’ll stay away from Trace,” Emaline says. “But the rest are fair game.”

“Which one’s the single father?” Antoinette asks her friends. “I want him.”

She doesn’t even know his name.

Laughter fills the hall as they spin around and rush out the door.

Shaking my head, I walk to the locker room door and yank it open.

Let them come if they want. The guys can take care of themselves. I’m not even going over there tonight. I finished my shift.

I step inside the locker room, the smell of basketball leather permeating the air, which is still thick from the showers the students took today. There’s no one around, the rows empty except for the odd towel or shoe left lying around.

I kind of miss it here. In high school. There was no pressure to be anyone yet.

But that’s about all I miss.

I head down to the coach’s office, because even though I wasn’t a great lacrosse player, I was reliable. I showed up, gave it my all, and Reva Coomer agreed to write me a recommendation for college if I ever needed one. I emailed last week to take her up on that offer. I’m still not feeling much interest in school, but it might be my only means of escape. It can even be somewhere semi-local so I can still be close to Paisleigh and Mars.

But as I approach the coach’s office and look through the window, I see it’s empty. Turning the knob, I open the door. It’s not locked. She must still be here. I’d texted to tell her I’d pick up the letter by three.

She could’ve emailed it, but I wanted to say hi. I’d hated her lessons the least.

Crossing the office, I open the door on the opposite side, peering into the corridor that only the coaches use. Across it lie the head coaches’ offices for the boys’ sports, and their locker room beyond.

Milo sits in Coach Davenport’s office, Ana Moreno straddling his lap. She’s a junior.

I watch as they lock hands and she moves over his mouth, deep and slow. Gross.

How old is she? Sixteen? I pull out my phone and hold it up, walking to the window and zooming in like I’m filming. Which I’m not because she’s a minor.

Milo’s dumb, though.

Ana sees me and quickly hops off him, backing up with her fists balled at her side.

Milo looks back at me and says something to her, sending her out the opposite door. I try to hold back my smile as I slip my phone in my pocket.

He rounds the desk and opens the door to the corridor, and I hold my hand behind me, ready to grab the knob to Coomer’s office and bolt if I have to.

He stops, leaning into the doorframe and folding his arms over his chest. “What are you up to?”

“Why are you here?” I blurt out.

“I’ve been helping the football and basketball coaches.”

“They’re letting you around high school girls?”

He literally finished his senior year from home last spring, and while no formal charges were brought, everyone knew why.

But his smile spreads behind his closed lips. “Mmm.” He nods. “And nothing’s really changed with them, either.” He looks me up and down, because once upon a time I was that naïve, too. “Other than that, there are no Bay kids like last year,” he points out.

Liv Jaeger was the only Bay kid who ever went here.

“You know half the parents here have interests in seeing that shithole torn down,” Milo tells me. “They’re all wondering how the Jaegers are able to keep the developers off their backs.”

“Do they know?”

He grins. “They do now.”

What does that mean? I haven’t told anyone about the cameras at Fox Hill. Did they find some?

And then it hits me. Cate, Emaline, and Antoinette aren’t the only ones heading for the Bay tonight.

“It’ll be lockdown,” I remind him. “The cops will pull those little shits over even before they get across the tracks.”

The canals flood in a big storm. Curfew will be in effect.

“Those little shits,” he replies, “used to be your classmates. You think you’re a Jaeger now?”

If Macon has cameras on our turf, is it possible that Saints have cameras in the Bay? St. Carmen wants trouble there tonight. They’re coming over to cause trouble. On purpose.

“The local news should be entertaining tomorrow,” Milo says.

“Why are you warning me that there’s something going down tonight? You know I’ll tell them.”

He backs into the office. “The more the merrier.” And he shuts the door, heading into the men’s locker room.

Son of a bitch.

Whipping around, I dig out my phone, forgetting all about Coomer.

Clay picks up, but I’m already speaking before she has a chance to say hi.

“Is Liv in town?”

Clay takes a second, but then replies. “Just got in. Why?”

Fuck. I’d rather she wasn’t here for this, but it’s almost the holiday. Of course she was coming back.

“I need your help tonight,” I say. “And I need you both to trust me.”