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"Did you like the one on Preston?" I pop a cherry tomato into my mouth.
"It was really small." Alexa shrugs her shoulders. "You don't want a roommate?"
I shake my head slightly. "I'm looking forward to living alone."
"In that case, it was the best deal and close to campus." She pushes the spoon in her hand around the rim of the bowl of soup she ordered.
"I'll send an application for that one when I get home." I smile. As much as I was dreading apartment hunting today, it's turned into a fun adventure. Watching Alexa work her magic on all the prospective male landlords we met is the distraction I was longing for. It's been four days since Hunter showed up at the bistro and I haven't heard a word since. I'm beginning to believe that his story about a sick friend is real.
"What's going on with you and Hunter?" She laughs at her own joke.
"That's a horrible nickname." I bite my lip to hold back a giggle.
"He left a few days ago because of a sick friend." I pull air quotes around 'sick friend.' "It might be a rouse because he's getting married right now."
"He's not getting married." She scoops some soup into her mouth before letting it dribble back into the bowl. "It's cold."
"He might be," I counter. "It's not as if he's good at telling the truth."
"Cory is really sick," she mumbles.
"Cory?" I wince at how close the name is to Coral. Who is Cory? Yet another of Coral's vindictive relatives?
She silently reaches for her purse that is perched on the chair between us. I watch as she scrolls quickly through it before holding it up for me to view.
It's a text message from Clive: Rain check? Cory is sick. Pray for us. xx
"Who is Cory?" I pull my eyes from the phone to her face.
She places it down carefully on the table before she looks at me. "I don't know. I thought you'd know."
"Why didn't you mention this before?"
She pushes the soup away from her. "Maybe because you freak out whenever we talk about Hunter and them."
"Do you think Cory is a man or woman?" My curiosity is peaked and if this person's illness is hitting both Hunter and Clive that hard it has to be someone incredibly important.
"It's like Jordan or Billy." She taps her finger on the table. "You just never know."
"I guess," I respond.
"I bet it's another sibling. Coral's mom does like her names that start with the letter C."
I smile at the statement. I've thought the same thing too. "I asked Hunter about her siblings. He only mentioned Christina and Clive."
"Weird." She reaches across the table to pull my half eaten salad towards her. "If you're done with this, I'm going to finish it."
I nod as my mind races around the mystery of who Cory is.
***
"What does Google say?" Alexa is thumbing through a photo album of my brother's she found in the shelf by the television.
I glance up from my laptop briefly. "Nothing about Cory Parker."
"Odd." She pulls one of the pictures from its place and tucks it into her purse.
"My mother's going to notice that's missing." I raise an eyebrow.
