I’d looked for more of that feeling my entire life, never thinking I would find it but searching just the same.
Life got better when I found my brothers, bringing hope that perhaps there was a place for me somewhere in this world. But it wasn’t until Ethan that I thought perhaps someone could love me the way I craved so badly to be loved.
Just thinking of him made me stagger, shoulder scraping against a rough brick wall. I blinked, finally taking in my surroundings.
The alleyway was unrecognizable, a place I hadn’t been before. I’d run and run from Ethan’s building, not even seeing the direction in which I escaped. It hadn’t mattered where I ended up as long as I got away.
Tingling cold prickled my feet, and I glanced down, seeing I wasn’t wearing any shoes. I’d rushed out with only the clothes I was wearing and nothing more. Tiny cuts probably cluttered the bottom of my feet, but they were nothing compared to the gashes in my heart.
The sob I’d been holding in finally ripped free, reverberating through the alley, echoing with loneliness I was all too familiar with.
As I sank down the wall, the rough brick scrapped through my shirt, stinging my back the way my feet already stung.
Collapsing in on myself, I wrapped my arms around my knees, giving in to the urge to cry.
“I thought you were different,” I whimpered. “Why did you make me love you if you wouldn’t love me back?”
Wiping my face with my shirt, I huffed out a breath, staring through tear-blurred eyes. “Why won’t anyone love me?” I asked no one at all. “Why am I never enough?”
Crumbling again, I sat and sobbed, stuffing my fist into my mouth to muffle the sound. When undeniable longing to be safely wrapped up in the scent of pine and for a familiar voice to whisper that I was a good boy clutched at my heart, all I could do was weep harder.
31
Ethan
* * *
Bang! Bang! Bang!
My knocking on Ivory’s door was not gentle. It was insistent and demanding.
“Sir.” The bodyguard always standing outside cautioned me.
My stare slanted to him aggressively, and his eyes widened with surprise.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
A heavy hand dropped onto my shoulder, tugging me away from the wood. “You should leave.”
I spun, knocking his hand away and shoving with all my strength. He rocked back, stumbling until he slammed into the wall.
The door swung open, Neo filling the space.
Shoving past him, I rushed into the apartment. “Fletcher!” I roared, racing into the living room. “Fletch!”
“No one invited you in,” Neo intoned, voice hard.
I swung around, ignoring his wide stance. “Where is he? Is Fletcher here?”
I yelled his name again.
Neo advanced. “You think I’d tell you where he is? After what you’ve done?”
Hope sparked inside me. “So he is here?” I shoved by, heading toward the hall to search the rooms myself.
Neo caught my shoulder, spinning me around.
“Get off!” I growled, shoving him back.
He wasn’t nearly as clumsy as the bodyguard.
“What is going on?” Ivory exclaimed, rushing into the room, her blue eyes wide and worried.
“I’m here for Fletcher.”
“Fletcher isn’t here,” Ivory told me.
“You said he was!” I yelled, jabbing a finger at Neo.
“No. I said I won’t tell you where he is.”
Surging forward, I grabbed a fistful of his shirt, rushing until both of us collided with the wall. Neo didn’t seem surprised or even afraid. He just stared with glittering black eyes.
Ivory yelled something behind us, but we paid her no mind.
“Tell me where he is.”
“I told you not to make him your dirty little secret.”
I snarled, baring my teeth. “I didn’t.”
Neo laughed in my face, making the hand in his shirt tighten.
“I swear to God.” I swore, voice menacing and low. “If you don’t stop playing games and tell me where he is—”
A new glint came into Neo’s eyes. “You haven’t seen it?”
“Seen what?” I spat.
A folded-up newspaper was inserted between our snarling faces. I blinked, focusing on the photo on the front page.
With a choked sound, I forgot all about Neo, dropping him to grab the paper, the edges wrinkling under my grip.
“What the hell is this?” I roared.
Neo jabbed the black-and-white photo with the same aggression I felt. “That? That’s you doing exactly what I told you not to do!”
I stared down at the front page of the socialite section, which featured a large photograph of me and Sienna at dinner last night.
The Upper East Side’s New Royal Couple?
The smile on her face was that of a hungry cat catching her mouse.
And me? My smile was the same one I always wore at events I never wanted to be at.
Fake.
I wadded the entire paper into a ball and threw it across the room where it hit the wall and bounced off.
The fucking press!
“What’s the matter, Ethan? Pissed off you got caught dipping your fingers in the cookie jar one too many times?”
Incensed, I grabbed Neo again, slamming him against the wall. “Did Fletcher see this?”
A hint of doubt crossed Neo’s dark stare. “Isn’t that why you’re here?” The force in my hold went slack, and Neo shoved me back, straightening off the wall. “Why are you acting like you’ve never seen that until now?” He pointed at the crumpled paper.
“Because I haven’t!”
“You haven’t looked at the paper today?” Ivory said, her voice incredulous.
“I was busy.”
Neo did not like whatever he heard in my tone and lashed out. “What the fuck did you do to him?” he roared, his fist accompanying the words with a blow to my jaw.
My head snapped back, pain exploding through the left side of my face. Straightening, I turned my head, rubbing my jaw.
“One’s all you get.” I warned him.
A light-colored aura bloomed out around his huffing frame. I really didn’t have time for a migraine right now.
But I deserved one.
I deserved all the pain the world handed me right now, and that was exactly why I hadn’t taken any medication.
“If he hasn’t seen you out two-timing him around the city, then why the fuck are you here?”
“You really don’t know where he is?”
“I thought he was with you!” Neo spat.
Worry crashed into me all over again, and I felt my heart strain under the pressure. “I have to find him.”
If he sees that photo after this morning…
“Call Earth!” I demanded. “Call him and see if he’s home.”
“He’s not.” Both of us spun around to Ivory who was holding a cell a short distance away from her ear. “Earth said he hasn’t been home since yesterday morning.”
The sound of muffled shouting through the line echoed through the room, and I rushed forward, grabbing the phone.
“It’s Ethan. Fletcher ran off this morning, and I can’t find him. He’s alone.” My voice cracked, and I sucked in a deep breath. “Please help me find him.”
“What the hell did you do?” Earth yelled, but I dropped the phone back into Ivory’s hand.
“Ethan?” she whispered, voice low and afraid.
“I’m sorry,” I whispered miserably. “I’m so sorry.”
“If this isn’t about that, then what the hell is it about?” Neo demanded.
“He hasn’t seen that.” That I know of. “But I told him about her this morning. I was in the middle of trying to explain, and he freaked out and ran off.” I pushed a hand through my hair and glanced up at the ceiling. “He’s not even wearing shoes.”
Neo advanced again. “I told you he’s not
a game. I warned you what would happen if you hurt him! How dare you play with him behind closed doors and then take your shiny beauty queen out on the town?”
“It’s not like that!” I roared, suddenly completely incensed that everyone was assuming the worst of me.
“Sure as hell looks that way to me,” Neo spat. “
His face snapped back with the rest of his body when I plowed my fist into his chin. Chest heaving, I shook my fist out while Ivory gasped, rushing between us like she was going to shield Neo.
Lip bleeding, Neo quickly moved so that she was behind him out of my reach.
I rolled my eyes. “I would never.”
“That’s what you said about Fletcher too.”
My fists balled up again.
“Please stop!” Ivory wailed, her hands curling around Neo’s shoulders from behind. “Family doesn’t fight each other like this!”
“He’s not my family!” we both snapped at once.
“Well, you are both Fletcher’s!”
That sucked the fight right out of me. I sagged, feeling utterly exhausted. “I have to go. I need to keep looking.” I started forward, but Neo grabbed me back.
“Leave him alone.”
Shaking off his hold, I crowded his face, my blue eyes boring into his black ones. “I will never stay away from him. I don’t want that… West Coast Barbie, and I never will.”
“Is that why he ran off when you told him about her?”
My teeth gnashed. “I told him she was in town, but he ran off before I could tell him that I told her I wasn’t interested.”
Neo’s eyes flickered. He swayed back just a little. But then he was crowding my face all over again, and we were squaring off. “It doesn’t matter. The damage is done.”
I shoved him back, storming out of the penthouse and past the bodyguard.
“Ethan!” Ivory yelled, rushing out into the hall after me.
I stopped and turned, not wanting to take my anger out on her. “I love him,” I told her, the sound broken and weak.
“I know,” she whispered, understanding in her caring gaze.
“Please call me if you find him,” I implored. “Please.”
He wasn’t at my place. He wasn’t here or at Earth’s.
Where are you, Fletch?
Somewhere. He was somewhere, and I would find him.
32
Fletcher
* * *
I sat in that alleyway, tucked into myself, squeezing my knees as though I could hold myself together.
How ironic I held myself together while, internally, I fell completely apart.
The cold made me numb, tears dried on my cheeks, and eventually, the sky grew dim.
I wandered through the streets until I was too weak to walk anymore, and I hailed a cab to The Rotten Apple.
Upstairs, I tried the knob, not even alert enough to be surprised when the door was unlocked. I stumbled in, Beau shooting up from wherever he was, rushing forward.
“Jesus, Fletch! We’ve been worried sick!” He produced a cell phone I didn’t even know he had and pressed it against his ear. “He’s home.”
“When did you get a phone?” I asked vaguely, dropping onto the end of the sofa.
Snort jumped up beside me, wagging his tail and whining. I patted his head, thinking of Gwennie and how I’d just walked out.
She probably thought I’d abandoned her.
Tears welled in my eyes. I thought I was done crying. I thought I’d dehydrated even my reserves. I guess when it came to Ethan, my tears were limitless.
“We all got phones when you moved out.”
I made a face. “I didn’t move out.”
“Well, you haven’t been here.”
“I’m sorry.” I wallowed. “Do you want me to leave?”
I started to stand, but Beau pushed me back down, and Snort plopped into my lap. “No! Of course not! You’re our brother. We’ve missed you.”
“You did?” I looked up, focusing on my green-eyed friend. He looked like he always did, like he lacked sunlight, beanie tugged over his hair.
“Duh.”
“Where’s Earth?” I asked, glancing around.
“Out looking for you.”
“He is? Why?”
“Because Ethan and Neo called here hours ago out of their minds because you were MIA.”
Just hearing his name made me wince in pain.
“You okay?” Beau worried, leaning down. “You look like shit.”
“Nothing new.”
He frowned. “What happened?”
“I don’t want to talk about it.”
“Was it the photo? It was the photo,” he asked and answered himself.
“Photo?” I asked. “What photo?”
Alarm spread over his face, and his throat cleared. “Uh, nothing.”
“Beau!” I snapped, my voice hoarse but still getting my irritation across. “Tell me! Stop lying.”
Sighing, he scooped up a newspaper off the coffee table. My nose wrinkled. We never read the newspaper around here. Earth said half the news was fake.
I didn’t know about that, but I didn’t like to read unless it was about Spider-Man.
We never got to watch The Amazing Spider-Man together.
The door slammed open, hitting against the wall with a loud bang. Snort jumped up with a bark, and Beau straightened.
“Where is he?” Earth bellowed.
His heavy footfalls hammered across the floor, stopping in front of me. He sighed loudly, a few expletives filling the room. “I’ve searched half this goddamn city for you! Where were you?”
“I don’t know,” I answered.
All the anger left him, and he sighed tiredly. Rubbing a palm over his face, he sat on the coffee table in front of me. “I’ll just kill him.”
“No!” I yelled, jumping up off the sofa so forcefully I winced. My legs and feet were so weary.
But my heart?
It was the weariest.
“That’s not even funny!”
“I wasn’t joking,” Earth deadpanned. “I told him not to mess with you. He didn’t listen.”
Jolting forward, I grabbed the front of Earth’s shirt, my fingers aching with the force of their clench. “If you do anything to him, I’ll leave and never come back.”
I admit it wasn’t much of a threat considering no one cared much anyway. But my brothers did, and this was all I had to threaten them with.
So sad the only thing I have is myself.
Earth sucked in a breath, dark eyes staring at me incredulously. “You protect him even after today?”
“Yes,” I said, voice fierce.
Ethan hurt me. He hurt me so intensely. But I loved him anyway.
It is my fatal flaw. Loving people who don’t love me.
“All right. I won’t touch him.”
I gave him a little shake. “Promise?”
“I promise.”
I let go, falling back onto the couch.
“So, ah…” Earth asked, “What happened?”
“I don’t want to talk about it.”
“That might fly with Beau, but it sure as hell don’t with me. We’ve been traipsing all through this city, searching for you, worried sick, and I want an explanation.”
“How’d you know he said that to me?” Beau asked.
Earth rolled his eyes.
Both their stares turned to me. I crossed my arms over my chest. It only took a minute for me to buckle under their weighted glares.
“He’s getting married.”
Beau leaned toward Earth. “I thought it was just dinner,” he whispered out of the side of his mouth.
“What?” I asked, confused.
Earth crossed his arms over his chest. “He’s getting married?”
“To some woman his father brought here from California. I’m sure she’s rich and beautiful.” Sienna. Even her name was perfect.
“And he told you this?”
I nodded, sinking a l
ittle farther into the couch. I was so tired my body quivered. I was cold and dirty, and I just wanted to sleep.
“You told us just yesterday that he liked you.” Beau scowled, folding his arms over his chest like Earth.
“Turns out I’m not very likable.”
“That’s not true!” both brothers yelled at once. Snort barked.
“What did Ethan say exactly?” Earth asked.
“It doesn’t matter!” I yelled, tired of thinking about it. Tired of feeling it. “I’m cold.”
Beau grabbed a blanket and draped it over my body.
Sighing, I slid onto my side, tucking my legs up onto the cushions.
Pounding footsteps sounded out in the hall, and I realized Earth didn’t even close the door to the apartment.
“Fletcher!” Neo yelled, rushing inside.
I raised my hand so he could see it over the back of the couch. “Here.”
Rushing around, Neo dropped onto the table right beside Earth. “Where have you been? You okay?”
Ivory crouched down beside the sofa, bringing her head level with mine. “I was so worried.”
“I didn’t hear you come in,” I told her.
“That’s because Neo sounds like a buffalo.”
I giggled.
Ivory’s eyes softened at the sound. She reached out, brushing the hair off my forehead. My throat tightened because it reminded me of when Ethan did the same. “I’m glad you’re okay,” she whispered.
“Thanks.”
“Are you hungry?” She worried. “Thirsty?”
I shook my head. All I wanted to do was sleep.
“I’m really grateful to have you all,” I said suddenly, my heart aching. “Thank you for letting me be here.”
“We’re family,” Neo declared. “We’ll always be here for you.”
“This is your home,” Earth added.
“Can I get a cat?”
“No,” Earth demanded.
“But if I can’t bring her here, Ethan might not keep her.” I worried, wringing my hands under the blanket.
Earth sighed insufferably. “Fine. But if Snort eats her, it’s not my fault.”
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