Christ. I rub my face, aware of Sol behind me, aware of the silence he doesn’t deserve. “Is your car going to make it out of Cornwall?”
It’s cold in the flat. Sol tugs an old woollen jumper over his head and messes with the thermostat on the wall. “A week ago, maybe not. I fixed the crank sensor yesterday.”
“What about the tyres?”
“Mal put new ones on before he brought it home last week.”
I know that already. Mal told me to shut Sol up if he bitched about it. As if he doesn’t know Sol never complains about anything, not even a lifetime of wars on the other side of the world claiming too much of the people he cares about.
Sol juices up the heating and retreats to the kitchen. He wants me to rest, and he has good reason for it, but I can’t—not until Skylar knows why my brother left him in the night without saying goodbye. That Mal tried and tried to reach him before he had to go.
He’ll know that. He’ll see the missed calls and messages on his phone.And fuck, that means he’ll be driving home knowing something iswrong.
“Sol?”
I spin around and he’s already striding out of the kitchen, as though he heard the fault line opening under my ribs before I voiced it.Becausehe did. Because he’s tuned to me on a frequency I don’t fully understand. And maybe I’m tuned to him too.
He reaches me. “What is it?”
“Mal called Skylar. He’ll know something’s up when he gets back to his phone.”
Sol winces. “I know. But there’s nothing we can do about that.”
“We can go to the hospital and meet him there. So he doesn’t drive worried.”
“Jackie, we don’t have a car. Mal took mine.”
Fuck. My head starts to spin, even though I grip it with both hands, silently begging it to stop.
Sol pries my hands from my skull. “Oscar went to Peterborough, so his car isn’t here either. We could call Marc, though? Or Cam? Someone Skylar trusts.”
“Does he trust Cam? I can never tell.”
“He loves Cam.” Sol eases my arms down, thumbs brushing my pulse points. “There’s no hate there. Just history. Not sure he’ll appreciate a biker escort home, though.”
Sol’s right. About all of it, but I’m distracted by the arch of his neck as he glances beyond me to the horizon. The current between us thrums with the same warmth and safety it always has, but now a blood-pumping heat weaves through it and it steadies me. Wanting him feels like another way of anchoring myself to the world, and for a moment, we hold our breath together, too close, too aware before Sol exhales and brings us back to reality.
“Who do you want me to call?”
Marc. It has to be. But before I can ask Sol for his phone, headlights sweep the horizon, and Skylar’s car rolls into the yard.
He came home early.
I don’t know whether to be relieved I don’t have to spend hours turning this mess over in my head, or panicked that I’m not ready and Mal made a mistake when he asked this of me.
Skylar parks his car and exits at speed, jogging up the steps and into the Joker. The front door opens moments later and he blows into the living room.
Me and Sol, we’re so close it must be obvious we were thinking about kissing. Aboutmore. But Skylar’s in no frame of mind to give a shit.
“What happened? Where’s Mal?”
Sol and I break apart. Sol fades into the background, leaving me to face Skylar alone.
“Sit down.”
Skylar plants his feet. “No.”
I can’t make him. And I don’t want to. I take a few steps towards him and stop when I’m a few feet away. “Orion and the others…they’re missing. Mal got the call tonight and he’s gone to help find them.”