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Theo?

Hello?!

“He’s going to stress-spiral, apparently.” His brother’s agitation radiated from the phone. It made Theo want to throw it across the room and be rid of this whole mess.

Fee grabbed it before he could do anything crazy. She shook her head. “Poor Rafe. You have to answer him at least.”

“Poor Rafe,” Theo echoed under his breath as he took his phone back and typed out a message.

Nothing yet.

Rafe’s responses typically took between three to five business days to roll in. But this time, Theo’s phone buzzed in seconds.

Shouldn’t you have gotten there and back by now?!

We got a little lost.

Lost? We need to find Knox.

Theo sighed.

Why don’t you just wait there until he comes back?

Wait here? Are you fucking nuts?

He handed the phone back to Fee. “He’s being irrational. Talk some sense into him?”

Fee’s brow furrowed in concentration, her teeth nibbling her bottom lip while she typed. She looked too cute. Theo stared out the window instead of looking at her. It was a gray day, cold and damp. The diner was nearly empty, the parking lot had just a handful of cars. The whole place was kind of depressing.

Or maybe Theo was just kind of depressed.

“Here.” Phoebe thrusted the phone back in his direction.

Theo read her message out loud. “Dear Rafe, this is Phoebe. Please don’t do anything rash. We will be home soon, and we will all figure it out together. We love you.”

He scowled.

“Fee, you ended with one, two, sixteen pink hearts!”

“I wanted him to know we love and support him in his time of need.”

“It’s at least partially his fucking fault we’re all in this mess!” A few folks sitting at the counter turned in surprise at his outburst.

“Sorry,” Fee said to them. “Family issues.”

One of the men, who Theo could only assume was a long-haul trucker, turned to his buddy and took the opportunity to regale him with the latest thing his ex-wife had demanded. Something about split custody of their three pugs. Theo clearly wasn’t the only one with family issues.

His phone buzzed again.

Thanks, Fee.

And Ruby says thanks for checking the resort.

Theo’s anger leeched out of him at the thought of Ruby’s tear-stained face. He wasn’t doing this for his wildly aggravating brother. Well, at least not entirely. He was doing this for Ruby and Lena.

And if he was really being honest, he was doing it because the woman sitting across from him had asked him to. Even after all this time, he just wanted to make her happy.

He texted Rafe back.