Page 19 of The Bad Brother
DR. RAGNAR GAVE ME FOUR DAYS TOget my life together. It’s Sunday and nothing about my life is even remotelytogether.
I called my mother after my shift like I promised and listened to her scold and criticize me for forty-five minutes, telling me everything I did wrong that led to my best friend stealing my fiancé.
As much as I want to blame Amy, the truth is that Amy was never my friend and she didn’tstealanything. Ethan was never mine and he was never who he pretended to be. Instead of pointing that out, I simply made the appropriate noises and sighs while my mother lectured me until she ended with,why don’t you come home and stay with your father and I while we work up a plan to get Ethan back?
First, the only plan I want towork upinvolving Ethan is one that would probably land me in prison and second, Mark,isn’t my father. He’s my stepfather, and his house is not my home. The man shipped me off to boarding school as soon as I could tie my shoes. Before that, I had a nanny. While I’m sure he’d consent to allowing me to lick my wounds in one of their meticulously decorated guest suites, I’m just as sure that having me under foot is the last thing he wants. Mark and I have always had an unspoken understanding—he’ll take care of my mother and provide for me, everything that’s expected of him financially. In return, I’ll never ask for more.
Moving to Clearwater to finish my residency and accepting my surgical position at the trauma center has pushed the boundaries of our understanding and I don’t want to push them any further.
I’m staying in a hotel close to the hospital, but if I don’t find something more permanent soon, I’ll come home.
That was two days ago and I’m getting desperate. I called Dr. Ragnar’s realtor—her name is Rita—directly after hanging up with my mother and set up a meeting at a coffee shop not far from the hospital. After two solid days of touring an endless string of condos and apartments, one thing has become obvious—I’ll be living in my car for the foreseeable future. Everything she’s shown me is either asking for a ridiculously high deposit or is entirely too far from the hospital.
“Are you sure you don’t want to look at the riverfront condo I mentioned?” Rita the Realtor asks me, her tone slightly concerned. “I know that the HOA fee is a bit high, but?—”
She’s right, the HOA fee is outrageous. I should know—the riverfront condo she wants to show me is in the samebuilding as the condo that Ethan stole from me. With my luck, we’d end up being next-door neighbors.
“I’m sure,” I say, interrupting her before she can get any further into her spiel. “I’m afraid it’s a bit out of my price range.”
As a surgeon, my salary isn’t anything to sneeze at but buying the condo Ethan stole completely wiped out my savings. As soon as I spoke with him and realized what he’d done, I called the bank, only to find that he’d drained our joint account. Rushing down there, I transferred my automatic deposit to a brand-new account, one in my name only. I have an entire week before my next paycheck is dispersed and all I have are a couple of anemic credit cards and the cash in my wallet—approximately fifteen hundred dollars. I withdrew it last week to put down a deposit on the watch I planned on buying Ethan as a wedding gift. Thankfully I hadn’t had a chance to run that particular errand because now, it’s pretty much all the money I have. Fifteen hundred dollars and a few tired credit cards isn’t going to get me anything this side of the river.
Rita reaches out to pat my hand while giving me athere, theresmile. “I’ll keep looking. If I find anything, I’ll call you right away.”
“Thank you, Rita. I appreciate it,” I tell her, pushing a smile onto my face. I’m not sure how much she knows about my situation but she’s being almost unbearably nice for someone who’s wasted two days of her life on someone who is obviously homeless and broke.
Standing up from her seat, Rita leaves me to my tepid coffee and half-eaten turkey sandwich. Contemplating whether to wrap it up and save it for later or just throwingit away, I feel a shadow fall over me. Gut clenched, I look up—sure that it’s either Ethan or Amy, here to kick me while I’m down—to find a pretty, young blonde standing at the edge of my table, wearing a pair of cut-off jeans and a summery white halter-top. As soon as I look at her, the blonde smiles. She has what looks like an iced macchiato and a paper bag with the coffee shop’s logo in her hand.
“Hi.” Tossing a quick look over her shoulder, at the door Rita just breezed through, she looks back at me. “I’m going to apologize in advance for being nosy, but… did I hear you say that you’re looking for a place to live?”
Taken aback and instantly suspicious, I don’t answer her. Like my silence is an answer all in itself, the young woman’s blue eyes go wide while she shakes her head. “Oh my god—that was totally weird, right? I’m really sorry, I was raised in captivity. Sometimes I forget how to people.”
“Captivity?” I have a feeling most conversations with this woman are hard to follow.
“Foster care.” Smiling again, she sets her coffee on my table and offers me her hand. “I’m River.”
Taking her hand because if twelve years of boarding school and finishing school taught me anything, it’sdon’t be rude, I give her a cautious smile. “Sloane.”
“Sloane,” repeating my name, the woman pulls her hand from mine and reclaims her coffee. “Mind if I sit?”
Giving her a small head shake, I watch as she slides into the seat that Rita the Realtor just vacated. As soon as she’s seated, she sighs. “I know it’s rude to eavesdrop on other people’s conversations but I did it anyway, so here we are.”
At this point, the only thing that’s keeping me in my seat is vague amusement and outright desperation. “Whyare you so interested in my living situation?” I ask her, cutting straight to the point.
River grins again. “Because I happen to have a place for rent.” When she sees the skepticism that must show plainly on my face, she blushes. “I mean… it’s notmyplace. It belongs to my boss. It’s just been sitting empty for months now and I’ve finally gotten him to agree to let me rent it out.”
“Your boss?”
“Yeah.” She nods her head while she digs around in her purse. “He owns the Barrett Mill. It’s just across the river.” Coming up with what looks like an old receipt and a pen, she starts to write something on the back of it. “I’m on my way to a meeting right now but?—”
“Meeting?” Since she hardly looks like themeetingtype, I’m instantly confused.
“Yeah—” She rolls her eyes and keeps on writing. “it’sbeen a rough couple of days so I’m heading to the rec center by the high school. They hold NA meetings there every Sunday—Jen’s orders.”
“Jen?”
“Jensen Barrett,” she says like I should recognize the name. When it becomes apparent that I don’t, she shrugs. “My boss.” Finished writing, River offers me the receipt with another one of her bright smiles. “Here’s the address. My meeting starts at two and they usually last about an hour—forty-five minutes if I skip the gross coffee and stale donuts afterward,” she says, tapping the tip of her pen against her pastry bag. “Meet me there at three o’clock? I can show you the place and you can decide if you like it.”
Driven by that ingrained need to avoid being rude at all costs, I take the offered piece of paper, even though I have every intention of throwing it in the trash as soon as she leaves. “Okay.”
