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He didn’t sound fine.
“Have you heard from Mom?” Quinn said.
“Yeah.”
That was all he said. Quinn could hear him breathing, heavy and rough on the other end of the phone.
“Where are you?” she said.
“At Kurt Culpeper’s. Mom said—she said—” His voice broke. She heard snuffling.
“Jordan,” she said. “Jordan, what happened? Where’s Mom?”
“Hold on.” His breaths were jagged now, and she heard a door close. “She said I can’t come back there.” Another shaky breath. “She said she couldn’t—she couldn’t—”
And then he was crying.
Quinn sank onto the couch, distantly aware of Tyler sitting beside her, probably close enough to hear half of what Jordan was saying.
Her younger brother barely talked to her except to ask when she’d be done with the television so he could play with his PlayStation. It was unthinkable he would be crying to her on the phone, and Quinn didn’t know how to deal with this.
And where the hell was her mother?
“Are you okay?” she said. “Jordan, are you safe where you are?”
“Yeah.” He sniffled loudly and got it together. “Kurt’s mom said I could stay through the weekend. I told her Mom and Dad were going out of town. I was going to stay at Jeremy’s, but his mom always wants to call.”
“What happened with Mom?”
“I came home for clothes and she—she—” Crying again.
ignored that and cast his senses wide.
Nothing.
He dragged James inside anyway. The kid promptly dumped a massive plastic tub of Legos in the middle of the living room floor.
Then he grinned up at Nick. “Can we build a whole city?”
So they built a whole city.
His phone buzzed around eight, just when he was telling James that yes, his mother did want him to brush his teeth. Nick slid the phone out of his pocket with his heart in his throat, hoping for a message from Adam.
He hadn’t heard from him all day.
Not Adam. Michael.
Hannah’s folks are going to come pick up James so he can sleep in his own bed.
And that was it. Typical.
Nick texted back.
How was dinner??
Terrifying.
A pause, then another message appeared.
