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Silent eye conversation with Oliver concluded, Viggo snaps the book shut and pops up from my reading chair, tall and rangy, ball cap tugged low over his messy brown hair. “What kind of greeting is that?” he asks. “We can’t pay our little sister a simple courtesy visit?”
I glance at the clock. “At eight at night? On a Sunday? Don’t you have better things to do with the final hours of your weekend than hunker down in my poorly air-conditioned apartment at the sweltering end of August and wait around for me?”
Viggo tugs rhythmically at his shirt, which is indeed clinging to his perspiring chest, fanning himself. “No other way I’d rather spend my Sunday night. How about you, Ollie?”
“No other way,” Oliver says, peeling his string cheese. “Even if I was just about to relax with my boyfriend in his new hot tub, minding my own damn business when you corralled me—ouch!” Viggo sidles up next to Oliver with a not-so-subtle elbow to his ribs and rips half of Ollie’s string cheese away.
“Hey!” Oliver shoves him. “That’s my string cheese.”
“Technically, it’s my string cheese,” I point out.
“Too right, Zigs,” Viggo says. “And let’s be honest, Oliver, I’m doing you a favor, cutting your dairy intake in half.”
Oliver glares at Viggo. “Believe it or not, I can handle my dairy intake without you rationing me, Viggo. Besides, Gavin got me supplements that help me digest dairy better.”
“Sure they do, honey bunch.”
Oliver reaches for the string cheese again. Viggo yanks it away. And, as is typical when they don’t see eye to eye, they devolve into a scuffle that I’d probably find entertaining—my two giant brothers banging around in my tiny kitchen, fighting over half a string cheese—if I weren’t already so annoyed.
“Hey!” I holler. Abruptly, they stumble apart. “I love you both. You know I do. And I’m sure in some warped, twisted, brotherly way, you mean well. But you either need to say what you’re here for or get the heck out of my apartment. I’m tired. I’m hot. And I’m hungry. Also,” I add, “there’s a reason you don’t have keys to my place anymore. After you abused that privilege, your key access was revoked.”
“Aw, c’mon,” Oliver says. “That was a really good prank. And we owed you after the marshmallow fluff stunt you pulled on us at our birthday party.”
“Our birthday party,” Viggo reminds me, like I’m supposed to feel bad about this or something.
I sigh. “Guys, it’s not my fault you taught me basically every devious thing I know and the pupil became the master. My point stands—you forfeited your keys, and you weren’t supposed to help yourself to my space. I really don’t appreciate having my apartment broken into.”
“Coming from the woman who’s been known to do some pretty stealthy breaking and entering herself,” Viggo says, dropping the string cheese half in his mouth. Watching him, Oliver makes a strangled, infuriated noise in the back of his throat.
My cheeks are hot as I blink at Viggo. Is he spying on me? There’s no way he’s seen me get into Sebastian’s house.
He smiles smugly. “That’s a guilty look on your face, Zigs. Care to share what you’ve been up to lately?”
Now I’m making a strangled, infuriated noise, too. “Good grief, Viggo, stop being so…”
“Brilliant? Observant? Cunning?” He opens my fridge door, like he’s honestly going to help himself to something else in there. I slam it shut.
“Annoying, is what I was going for. Mind your own business.”
He moves to the snack cabinet next and beats me to it when I lunge to stop him, pilfering a chocolate chip granola bar and slipping out of reach. “We both know minding my business is not one of the many skills I’ve cultivated—”
“Well, you really should,” I snap, glancing between him and Oliver. “Also, you two have a lot of nerve forcing your way into my home, acting all chummy, when the last time we were together as a family, it was very clear you knew something I’ve been kept out of.”
“Crap,” Oliver mutters.
Viggo has the grace to look a little ashamed as he chews a massive bite of granola bar, scrubbing at the back of his neck. “Yeah,” he says around his bite. “About that…”
“We’re sorry,” Oliver adds. “Mom and Dad, they were worried it would upset you, so they asked us not to say anything, but then Dad did that thing he does every couple of years, where he actually loses his temper a little bit, and he snapped at Ren because Ren was in rare form that night, too, and pushing the topic, then the keep-it-on-the-down-low aspect was sort of shot to shit.”
“Very shot to shit,” I agree, folding my arms across my chest. “Now. How about you tell me what’s going on?”
Viggo and Oliver glance at each other, having another silent eye conversation.
“It’s money,” Oliver finally explains. “Our college loans, specifically.”
“Which Dad insists on paying,” Viggo provides. “To the detriment of his and Mom’s retirement savings—”
“So Ren asked to pay them. Well, he asked on behalf of the siblings, if each of us could.”
