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I exhaled. It was painful to see my brother like this, but I was glad to see him holding up. I texted Julia, saying that all was fine, and she was happy to hear it, but she also wanted details on Owen. I wasn’t ready for that yet.
How could I have been so careless? What if Declan had collapsed somewhere in the street without anyone to identify him and get in touch with me? I was so stupid. The important thing was that I was there with him, and that his condition was stable and treatable. For now.
Worn out by the stress and all the thoughts, I dozed off in the chair, listening to the rhythmic beeping of the monitoring equipment.
When I came to, the moon was out in the sky, casting cold light into the room. I walked over to the window, yawning, and shut the blinds. The room got very dark, so I turned on the dim lamp next to the small table by the chair. Declan was still asleep, but moving around, uncomfortable, but too tired to change his position. I took his cool hand, and he opened his eyes.
“Sorry. I woke you up,” I said.
“I barely slept. My chest hurts a little. Every breath feels like my lungs are wrapped in barbed wire.”
“That’s awful Declan.”
“The drugs help.” He smiled a little. “So, tell me about him, your prince on a white horse. He better be treating you well!”
“Do you really wanna know?” In all the years, we had barely shared any real detail about our relationships, even though we were very tight. I thought Declan might be interested because he wasn’t feeling well, so I said, “Well, he’s a nice guy… but things aren’t serious. So you don’t have to worry about anything.”
I was the one who had to worry. I broke our deal, leaving him. Now I would have another huge hospital bill to contend with.
“Hmm, not serious? And where did this guy take you, exactly? Seemed far for not serious.”
I didn’t know where to begin. “Well, out of town, to his place out of town.”
“As opposed to his place in Chicago?” he asked.
“I suppose so,” I said, silently panicking about not having any cover story. “He’s got a house, and he lives in an apartment here in Chicago.”
“Oh, big money then,” Declan said.
Like you wouldn’t believe, I thought.
“And you met him at work?”
“Oh, yeah.” I knew how that sounded. I had never been good at lying to my brother, and even when sick, he was smart enough to keep the interrogation going.
“Is there something you’re not telling me, Syd?”
He knew, of course he did. I said, “Well, look, I’m s
orry, I’m not trying to fool you.”
“Yeah? Because Julia told me you met this guy at a club. Since when are you hot on nightlife, Syd? Come on, you can tell me, I’m on my deathbed here.” He said that with such cynicism that I was ready to cry.
“Don’t you say that, Declan.”
Declan smiled. “Go on then, lay it out for me. What, does he have some weird fetish? Why don’t you want to talk to me about him?”
I guessed there was no way out of it. And to what end? My brother had every right to know what was going on.
“Promise not to get angry.”
He frowned, which was visibly hard for him. “I will try.” Pale as he was, I thought he was beginning to get red in the face already.
Taking a deep breath, I told him exactly what had gone down. How Julia tipped me off about this club, and how it turned out to be an auction for rich men, and how there was a spark between Owen and me, and how I left the club with him…
“Let me stop you right there,” he said, his voice sore. “He bought you at an auction?”
“It’s not like that!”
