Page 20 of Burning For You

The gas light came on, reminding her she couldn’t push off that chore another day.

She pulled out, went a mile, then into the gas station and next to the pump.

After unscrewing the cap and shoving the nozzle in, she stared off into space at the road in front of her.

Cars were stopped at the light, others turning, but the sound of a motorcycle caught her attention.

She’d noticed him behind her earlier, then it seemed to turn the corner and circle back.

Probably lost or something.

But when it pulled into the gas station, not into a pump to get gas, but next to her car on the outside of it and stopped, her shoulders tensed.

Why would anyone be doing that?

It wasn’t as if they were blocking her in.

She just ignored him and continued to pump the gas.

In broad daylight she wasn’t going to stress too much about someone being a dick.

But the minute his helmet lifted, she got her answer.

“Sean?” she asked.

“I thought that was you, Skye.”

“How did you know I was here?”

“I didn’t. Not until I saw you pull out at the light by the store. Or I thought it was you.”

Her brother. Her biological brother.

He’d snuck out the night of the fire when he’d been told to stay home.

He never listened and it saved his life.

For years she tried to stay in contact with him.

Not that they were ever close, but it wasn’t like they hated each other.

They lived in constant hell together.

But he’d been eighteen when their parents died. Too old for the foster system. Too old to collect social security like she got for years also.

She’d thought for sure the Lancasters would take him in until graduation, which was only a few months before school ended, but they hadn’t and she didn’t know why.

She never asked. They must have had their reasons and she believed it had more to do with the fact that Tate was the same age as Sean, they went to school together, and didn’t get along.

Sean never got along with anyone, and his senior year he was spending more time with kids out of school.

That was where he ended up. In some house with them before he left the area.

“It’s me. How have you been?”

“Good,” he said. “Are you just visiting your new family?”

It was the way he said it. New family.