I chuckled as I went to grab a bottle of water from my fridge. I was relaxed, loose-limbed in the way great, regular sex and interesting work tasks would make a man.
After sitting down on the couch and checking some details on the tablet, I was about to text Hawk about the cameras I thought would work best for him, when a message from Emery came in.
Mom heart attack. Taking to hospital. Update later.
I gawked at the message.Jenn?The woman who was a fucking powerhouse and seemed healthy as a horse? A heart attack?
Christ. I stood and took a few steps toward the door, then stopped. What was I going to do? Drive to a hospital? Which hospital? Why? She wasn’tmymother, even though I would’ve preferred that.
Groaning, I forced myself to calm down. I couldn’t do shit, and it wasn’t my place. I wasn’t family.
I shot a text back at Emery.
Let me know any news when you have it. Not telling Wren yet.
Not until I had something concrete. There was no need to derail his recording session that, as per this morning, was going really well.
I thought for a moment, wanting to send Emery another message. Something supportive. Something… heartfelt. But we weren’t that. Right? And what was I going to say? I had no answers, so I grabbed my tablet and my phone, then marched out, soon finding myself jogging toward the house.
Just as I got to the porch, I saw Russ’ truck park in front of the house.
Frowning, I went to see what was going on.
Before I could say anything, Isley got out and then a pretty young woman joined him.
“Ville?” Isley asked, as if I had changed as much as he had in the… probably four or five years since I’d seen him last.
“Yeah.” I gave him a strained smile and went to shake his hand.
By then, Russ had gotten out of the truck. “What’s going on?” he asked, reading my expression.
“Nobody told you?”
They all looked puzzled, then Isley pulled his phone out and frowned. “Mine’s dead.”
The girl, Jerrica, I thought, was already looking at hers. “Holy crap, we’ve got to go,” she gasped.
Russ leaned back into the truck to bring out his much older phone. He fiddled with it and then frowned, before this terrible clarity entered his gaze. “Get back in the truck, kids,” he said, then nodded toward the house and looked at me. “I’ll be back as soon as I can.”
“Yeah.”
“What’s going on?” Isley asked, then scrambled into the truck when Jerrica showed him whatever family group chat they’d been alerted on.
I walked to the porch and up the stairs. I had no idea who was there.
I could hear Payton’s voice first. “But Mimi’s gonna be okay, right?”
“Right, buddy. This is just a thing they need to do to make sure,” Mal spoke in a gentle, firm tone. I could tell how much he wanted to be right.
“Hey, Isley and Jerrica just got here, but Russ is taking them to the hospital,” I said, making a very educated guess.
Mal frowned. “They hadn’t heard before?”
“No. Isley’s phone was—out of battery, and I guess Russ didn’t notice his going off while driving or something?”
Mal noticed me correcting myself to not use the D word and despite the worry in his eyes, he looked amused for a second. “Russ has his muted while he’s driving. A friend of his got intoan accident a few years ago because he was distracted by his phone.”
“Ah, makes sense.”
