“Anything interesting?” I asked.
“Nothing you probably don’t already know,” he replied. “I’ve put in an injunction to get access to the full files and evidence from Augusta County.” He gestured at the stain. “Hard to say with all the trampling and the rain, but it seems pretty clear to me that…” He trailed off, then looked up at me, his expression saying he wasn’t sure how much I wanted to hear this.
I didn’t particularly, but it also wasn’t going to send me into a spiral or anything. “She bled out on the porch after suffering multiple slashing or stabbing wounds?”
Hart made a soft noise. “That,” he said. “Not close, I guess. You and your mom.” It was partly a question.
“I haven’t spoken to either of my parents since I was fifteen,” I replied shortly. “When they were willing to let Noah’s Arcana go untreated.”
“Fuck. Right.”
He stood, and I was a little gratified to hear his knee creak—not quite as loudly or long as mine did, but still. “I’m going to feed the goats,” I told him. “Since they’re probably starving.”
I headed down the stairs and across the gravel drive to the barn, hearing the crunch of Hart’s footsteps behind me.
I pulled open the sliding door, and we were greeted by the excited bleating of goats that hadn’t been fed for a whole day. “Sorry, guys,” I told the goats, scooping out feed from a bucket with an alpaca logo on it, clearly from the Hills’ farm, putting the pellets into the little feed trough in their stall. The goats had rushed over as soon as we walked into the barn, and they started jostling to get their faces into the food first, black and white and grey goat butts wiggling. I poured in several more scoops of food.
“What’sinthat?” Hart asked.
“Corn? Stuff? No idea,” I replied. “Alpaca food.”
“They’re goats,” he pointed out.
“They are,” I agreed. “Goats’ll eat anything, and Helen brought it up from their alpaca farm after Momma died.”
He let out a soft grunt at my explanation. “What do the chickens get?”
“Corn and wheat,” I replied.
“And they stay in here?” he asked, looking around the barn.
“The chickens are in the coop,” I replied. “They can get out into their pen whenever they want. The goats I would normallylet out to graze for a while, but it’s pouring.” I put another scoop into the trough. “Okay. Let’s go down to the Hills.’”And Elliot.
“What if the Augusta County asshat is waiting just down the road?” Hart asked.
“We’ll walk,” I replied, giving the goats one more scoop. “Through the woods. There’s a track that cuts down the mountainside and will bring us up at the edge of their property behind the barn, out of sight of the road.”
The one eyebrow rose again.
“Helen used to give us cookies,” I explained.
“You didn’t get cookies at home?”
“Cookies are sinful,” I informed him. “Gluttony. So no, we didn’t.”
“Jesus,” the elf muttered. “No offense, Mays, but your family is fucked up.”
He wasn’t wrong. “We can’t all be Harts,” I replied, trying to lighten the mood a little, although I wasn’t entirely certain I was succeeding.
“According to my mother, you can,” he retorted. “So fuck these assholes. There’s a-whole-nother family willing to adopt you so you don’t have to have any more ties to this shitshow.”
Maybe it was because I was still strung out from the shock and aftershock of thinking Elliot was—and then finding out he wasn’t. Maybe it was the aftermath of my mother’s murder or the stress of Noahstillbeing in prison… But I had surprisingly strong emotional reaction to Hart’s comment and had to blink back tears. “Okay,” I said, and turned away when my voice cracked.
I didn’t see him coming, and I flinched a little when Hart’s wiry arms wrapped around me. “Fuck, Seth,” he rasped. “Don’t you fucking start leaking on me again.”
I sniffled as I hugged him back. “Sorry.”
“We’re both fucking messes, Jesus fucking Christ.” He let go and stepped back, sniffing hard. “I think we’d better go find that stripey dick before we both totally lose our fucking shit.”
