Page 224

Whatever Riot heard in his voice worked.

They crossed the yard less than two minutes later.

Marion came through the door first. Riot followed close behind her, dressed but looking like he’d accomplished that at speed.

Marion’s gaze found me automatically. It moved over my face, my arms, the brace around my ankle.

“I’m okay,” I told her.

She gave me a look that said my opinion on the subject had been formally rejected.

Riot looked at Ben. “What’s going on?”

Nobody sat.

That was the first thing I noticed.

We had a living room full of chairs and a couch big enough for half of us, but everybody stayed standing.

Ben looked at Dad.

Then Riot.

Finally me.

“I should have told you this a long time ago,” he said.

My stomach tightened.

Dad’s expression changed by degrees. Nothing dramatic. He just became very still.

Ben noticed.

“I know,” he said quietly.

“Know what?” Sunshine asked.

Ben took a breath. Then he looked straight at me.

“Wade Mercer is my half-brother.”

Nobody moved. I wasn’t even sure anybody breathed.

Wade Mercer.

The name did something different from the other things that had been happening to me.

No static. No slipping. No world tipping sideways.

Just fear. Clean and immediate.

The monster from my childhood had a name, and Coach Ben had just put himself beside it.

I stared at him. “What?”

Ben’s face looked exhausted. “Same father. Different mothers. We didn’t grow up together. I didn’t know him until I was an adult.”

Dad’s voice went very quiet. “You never told me this.”